Onondaga County reports 34th COVID-19 death, possible exposure from infected Walmart employee riding Centro

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SYRACUSE, N.Y. — Onondaga County Executive Ryan McMahon on Friday announced the county’s COVID-19 death toll has risen by one to 34. He announced the

Upstate Medical University to receive 1,000 face shields from Vistaprint

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SYRACUSE — Upstate Medical University will receive a donation of 1,000 face shields from Vistaprint to help in its COVID-19 fight, the company announced. Vistaprint, known for its printed marketing materials, says it is using its current large-format printing machines — used to print banners and other materials — to develop face shields. In a

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Lockheed Martin to pay second-quarter dividend of $2.40 a share in late June

Manufacturing & Engineering, Subscriber Only

Lockheed Martin Corporation (NYSE: LMT) announced that its board of directors has authorized a second-quarter 2020 dividend of $2.40 per share. The dividend is payable on June 26, to holders of record as of the close of business on June 1. It’s the same amount that Lockheed paid in each of the last two quarters.

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Cuomo: No State Fair this year without full state reopening

Health Care, Sports, Entertainment & Tourism, Subscriber Only

SYRACUSE — New York state will have to be fully open for business if patrons want to want to walk through the gates at the New York State Fair in Geddes this August. Gov. Andrew Cuomo says the 2020 event — which is supposed to be expanded to 18 days from the usual 13 —

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SYRACUSE — New York state will have to be fully open for business if patrons want to want to walk through the gates at the New York State Fair in Geddes this August.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo says the 2020 event — which is supposed to be expanded to 18 days from the usual 13 — won’t happen unless the entire state has reopened, along with coordination with neighboring states.

“Can you open the State Fair unless the entire state is at a point where it’s open? I don’t believe so,” Gov Andrew Cuomo said during his April 28 appearance in Syracuse. Cuomo held his daily coronavirus briefing at Upstate Medical University.

As the governor answered questions from reporters, he said having the entire state open would mean having parks, beaches, and water attractions open as well.

“Breaks my heart, but [State Fair officials] can’t [open] unless it’s done statewide and unless it’s done, not just statewide, but with our neighboring states,” Cuomo explained.

Without New York and neighboring states New Jersey and Connecticut all having restarted their shuttered economies, Cuomo fears “a massive infusion of people from everywhere” coming to the State Fairgrounds in Geddes.

“You’d have the highest attendance we ever had, that I can guarantee you,” Cuomo quipped about a prospective 2020 State Fair. “But it wouldn’t be good. Everything is about reducing density.”

State Fair attendance has already been increasing rapidly in recent years after the state began to make more than $120 million in investments in its facilities and infrastructure. The Fair attracted 1.33 million people in 2019, according to the state Agriculture and Markets Department.

Onondaga County reaction

Cuomo’s logic “makes sense,” Onondaga County Executive Ryan McMahon said in answering a reporter’s question during his COVID-19 briefing later in the day on April 28 at the Oncenter.

“If New York City and Long Island, in late August, are not really open… it would be very difficult to have a [State] Fair. I understand the governor’s perspective,” said McMahon. “It’s the State Fair. It’s the governor’s campus, a state campus … Certainly, if New York City is in position where [it’s] still shut down four months from now, that will mean this virus is very prevalent in New York state still, and that the Fair would be pretty risky.”

Still, the Onondaga County Executive says he remains “hopeful” that the State Fair will be held this year.

Report: 70 percent of hotel employees laid off or furloughed amid COVID-19 crisis

Sports, Entertainment & Tourism, Subscriber Only

A new report from the American Hotel & Lodging Association (AHLA) indicates that 70 percent of hotel employees have been laid off or furloughed, as eight out of 10 hotel rooms across the U.S. remain empty during the widespread coronavirus lockdown. Due to the dramatic downturn in travel, hotels that remain open are operating with

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FuzeHub awards Utica firm $50K grant to use in N95 mask production

Regional News, Small Business, Subscriber Only, Technology

UTICA — A Utica firm that specializes in advanced textile products is using a $50,000 grant award to ramp up its N95 mask production for health-care workers. Albany–based nonprofit FuzeHub awarded the funding to Environmental Composites Inc. It was among four grants totaling $300,000 that FuzeHub presented in its COVID-19 manufacturing grant program. FuzeHub also

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UTICA — A Utica firm that specializes in advanced textile products is using a $50,000 grant award to ramp up its N95 mask production for health-care workers.

Albany–based nonprofit FuzeHub awarded the funding to Environmental Composites Inc.

It was among four grants totaling $300,000 that FuzeHub presented in its COVID-19 manufacturing grant program.

FuzeHub also awarded grants to businesses in Cohoes in Albany County, Willsboro in Essex County, and one in Brooklyn.

FuzeHub also announced that the Cornell Center for Materials Research (CCMR) will supplement its COVID-19 manufacturing grants with an additional $10,000 — $2,500 per project — to provide the winning manufacturers with more resources to “select, acquire and modify” materials and equipment necessary for their projects.

CCMR is a Cornell University research center dedicated to the development of advanced materials.

FuzeHub launched its COVID-19 manufacturing grants program to help New York–based, small-to medium-sized manufacturing companies “quickly accelerate” production of personal protective equipment (PPE) and respiratory-care equipment.

The program focused on two tracks. The first, “prevent the spread,” awarded $50,000 grants to increase manufacturing capacity of N95 masks, and the second track, “save lives,” provided $100,000 grants to increase the state’s manufacturing capacity of ventilators.

“When New York State called for help, our manufacturing industry answered. Local manufacturers have been innovative, resourceful and courageous in addressing critical needs to combat the coronavirus,” Elena Garuc, executive director of FuzeHub, said in a statement. “The winners of FuzeHub’s COVID-19 manufacturing grants pivoted quickly and focused intensely on trying to solve some of the biggest problems our world has ever faced. Despite the magnitude of the challenge, these New York manufacturers stood tall and found a way to produce essential supplies that will help stop the spread of the virus and save lives.”

About Environmental Composites’ work

One of the “most critical” supply chain issues related to the N95 mask shortage is access to meltblown fabric, FuzeHub says.

Meltblown nonwovens are currently used to achieve the sub-micron particle filtration efficiency requirements. However, other textile-manufacturing methods can incorporate similar design principles, including electrostatic charge.

Environmental Composites’ design will use a needle punch nonwoven with a “tuned” electrostatic charge. Its operation boasts a capacity of 12 million masks per month and can produce a “complete mask,” per FuzeHub.

Broome County hotel occupancy rate falls 39 percent in March

Regional News, Sports, Entertainment & Tourism, Subscriber Only

BINGHAMTON — As the coronavirus pandemic erupted here and elsewhere, hotels in Broome County saw a steep drop in guests in March, according to a new report. The hotel occupancy rate (rooms sold as a percentage of rooms available) in the county plummeted 39.1 percent to 34.2 percent in March, according to STR, a Tennessee–based

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New York milk production rises 2 percent in March

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New York dairy farms produced nearly 1.32 billion pounds of milk in March, up 2.1 percent from almost 1.29 billion pounds in the year-prior month, the USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) recently reported. Production per cow in the state averaged 2,100 pounds in March, up 2.2 percent from 2,055 pounds a year ago. The

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Cayuga Medical Center to resume elective surgeries

Health Care, Subscriber Only

ITHACA — Cayuga Health says it will again start performing outpatient elective surgeries the week of May 4 at its Cayuga Medical Center and will bring back some of the 200 employees who recently took voluntary furloughs. Cayuga Health’s Schuyler Hospital in Montour Falls will resume elective procedures on May 12. Elective outpatient procedures are

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Cayuga Health’s Schuyler Hospital in Montour Falls will resume elective procedures on May 12.

Elective outpatient procedures are an important part of Cayuga Health’s business and service to patients. Cayuga Medical Center performed 6,942 such procedures in 2019 while Schuyler Hospital conducted 391, John W. Turner, VP at Cayuga Medical Center, tells CNYBJ.

Cayuga Health says the resumption of elective surgeries is possible because it meets Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s requirements. New York State requires fewer than 10 new hospitalizations of coronavirus patients in a county over the past 10 days in order for the elective procedures to resume in that county. Patients also must test negative for COVID-19 before undergoing a surgical procedure.

“For the past seven weeks, COVID-19 has impacted our operation throughout the Cayuga Health system. Per the governor’s announcement last week, our team is preparing, and getting ready. Safety is our first priority on meeting the needs of our elective surgery patients,” Dr. Martin Stallone, president and CEO of Cayuga Health, said in a statement. “We are ready and able to resume elective surgery with an adequate supply of PPE, all infection control measures will be followed, and safety monitoring is already in place to make sure our patients are safe. Our team in surgical services has been working hard over the past several weeks to prepare for the reopening of outpatient elective surgeries and we are ready to resume.”

Cuomo on April 21 announced that hospitals would be able to again start performing elective outpatient procedures on April 28 in counties that meet the guidelines for new COVID-19 hospitalizations and bed capacity.

The governor in March ordered hospitals across the state to cancel elective surgeries to make room for a flood of COVID-19 patients, which largely has not materialized in the Southern Tier, Central New York, and other parts of Upstate.

Elective surgeries that are scheduled in advance — such as hip and knee replacements, tonsillectomies, and hernia repairs — are generally hospitals’ biggest generators of revenue. Losing that revenue source, along with reduced patient visits to their doctors, has led to a spate of health systems across Central New York and Upstate implementing furloughs, pay cuts and freezes, and other belt-tightening measures.

Cayuga Medical Center recently said the COVID-19 crisis reduced its hospital volume by 50 percent. The hospital adopted a series of measures to address the shortfall, including reassigning employees to its COVID-19 testing site in Lansing and sending staff to help at New York City hospitals, according to Stallone. The organization’s senior leaders also took salary cuts. Finally, Cayuga Health instituted a temporary, voluntary furlough of employees and 200 full-time workers signed up for it. The health system plans to return all its employees to work after its patient volumes and revenue return to normal levels.

New York home sales slide in March on COVID-19 impact

Construction, Design & Real Estate, Subscriber Only

ALBANY — New York state realtors sold 7,408 previously owned homes in March, down 14.8 percent from the 8,695 homes that were sold in the year-ago period. For the full first quarter, existing homes sales were down less than 1 percent from the comparable period in 2019, indicating that the COVID-19 shutdown in March slowed

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ALBANY — New York state realtors sold 7,408 previously owned homes in March, down 14.8 percent from the 8,695 homes that were sold in the year-ago period.

For the full first quarter, existing homes sales were down less than 1 percent from the comparable period in 2019, indicating that the COVID-19 shutdown in March slowed a previously strong housing market.

That’s according to the New York State Association of Realtors (NYSAR)’s March housing-market report issued April 21.

Sales data

The March 2020 statewide median sales price was $281,000, up about 4 percent from the March 2019 median of $269,900, according to the NYSAR data.

Pending sales totaled 9,036 homes in March, a decline of 21.1 percent from 11,448 homes in the same month in 2019.

The months’ supply of homes for sale at the end of March was 5.1 months, down about 12 percent from 5.8 months at the conclusion of March 2019.

A 6-month to 6.5-month supply is considered to be a balanced market, NYSAR says.

The number of homes for sale totaled 57,884 this March, down more than 10 percent from 64,583 in the prior-year period.

New listings also fell 25.4 percent to 14,005 homes — from 18,778 units a year earlier.

The residential real-estate industry ground to a halt in the state in the latter part of March with the New York State on PAUSE shutdown of non-essential businesses. Real-estate agents, home inspectors, and appraisers were initially deemed non-essential so in-person home showings, inspections, and appraisals stopped. Empire State Development Corp., however, reversed that decision on April 1 and declared the real-estate industry an essential business that can operate during the state’s business shutdown. Open houses are still banned.

Central New York data

Realtors in Onondaga County sold 249 existing homes in March, down more than 21 percent from the 316 homes sold in the same month in 2019. The median sales price rose about 11 percent to $155,000 from nearly $140,000 a year ago, according to the NYSAR report.

NYSAR also says that realtors sold 102 homes in Oneida County in March, down more than 6 percent from the 109 sold during March 2019. The median sales price increased 5 percent to nearly $130,000 from more than $123,000 a year earlier.

Realtors in Broome County sold 90 existing homes in March, down more than 27 percent from 124 a year ago, according to the NYSAR report. The median sales price increased about 18 percent to $115,000 from nearly $97,000 a year prior.

Bucking the down trend in home sales was Jefferson County, where realtors closed on 80 homes in March, up over 31 percent from 61 a year ago. But the median sales price of $115,000 was down about 6 percent from $122,000 a year earlier, according to the NYSAR data.

All home-sales data is compiled from multiple-listing services in New York state and it includes townhomes and condominiums, in addition to existing single-family homes, according to NYSAR.

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