Stay up-to-date on the companies, people and issues that impact businesses in Syracuse, Central New York and beyond.
Comfort Windows opens new showroom in Ithaca
ITHACA — Comfort Window Co., Inc., which describes itself as the “largest home-improvement company in upstate New York,” has opened a showroom in Ithaca. The
Community Foundation of Tompkins County to formally open new headquarters on Thursday
ITHACA — The Community Foundation of Tompkins County will officially open its new headquarters in downtown Ithaca at 200 E. Buffalo St. on Thursday. The
Binghamton University Foundation names Doyle executive director
BINGHAMTON — The Binghamton University Foundation, the university’s fundraising arm, has named Sheila Doyle as its executive director. Doyle will report directly to Harvey Stenger,
Two employees acquire assets of Strategic Communications
SYRACUSE — Two employees of Strategic Communications, LLC have acquired the company’s assets as the firm’s owner begins stepping away from the business and into a consulting role. One of the employees is using his acquisition to spin off a new firm in the company’s former office in Washington, D.C. The acquisition closed on June
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SYRACUSE — Two employees of Strategic Communications, LLC have acquired the company’s assets as the firm’s owner begins stepping away from the business and into a consulting role.
One of the employees is using his acquisition to spin off a new firm in the company’s former office in Washington, D.C.
The acquisition closed on June 30, says Michael Meath, Strategic’s founder and former president.
Crystal Smith, the firm’s director of integrated media for public relations, and Frank Caliva III, the firm’s director of public affairs & strategy development in the Washington, D.C. office, acquired the majority of the assets.
None of the principals involved would provide details on terms of the deal including acquisition costs or financing.
The Business Journal News Network spoke with Meath and Smith at their Syracuse office, and Caliva joined the interview over the phone from Washington, D.C.
Smith acquired Strategic’s public relations, media monitoring, reporting, and media-response practice areas. She also bought the firm’s name, its brand, logo, and website, she says.
Smith is now president of Strategic Communication, LLC.
Smith joined Strategic Communications in 2009, and Caliva joined two years later. Meath saw both as “key” members of the organization, he says.
Meath says he told Smith and Caliva “a couple years ago” that he would be looking to “step out in a few years.”
“The three of us sat down and agreed that we would work together to see if it made sense to try to find a way to have the company continue in one way or another with them leading it,” he says.
Meath, Smith, and Caliva started discussing the firm’s future shortly after Caliva began working for the company in early 2011.
As Smith noted, the work that she handles and the duties Caliva performs involve “little overlap.”
“It made more sense … for each of the practice areas to succeed in the best way possible, for [the firm] to be two separate entities,” says Smith.
Strategic Communications will continue its operations in a 1,000-square-foot office in the General Exchange Building at 3532 James St. in Syracuse, says Smith.
Meath declined to disclose specific revenue figures for Strategic Communications, but noted the firm’s balance sheet is in “pristine” condition following 10 years of growth.
“There is no debt with the company,” says Meath.
Besides her role as president and sole owner, Smith is the firm’s lone full-time employee. Meath will serve as an independent contractor following the acquisition.
Deal advisers
In the transaction, Richard Engel, an attorney with Syracuse–based Mackenzie Hughes, LLP advised Meath; attorney Jeffrey Fetter with the Scolaro, Fetter, Grizanti, McGough & King, P.C. of Syracuse provided counsel for Smith; and Katie Centolella, an attorney with Syracuse–based Centolella Lynn D’Elia & Temes LLC advised Caliva.
In addition, the accounting firm Port & Co. CPAs of DeWitt advised Meath and Smith, while Mark Carroll, an accountant and partner in Evans and Bennett, LLP, provided accounting guidance for Caliva.
P.R. Quinlan Associates
At the same time, Caliva acquired Strategic’s public affairs, government relations, and strategic-planning practice areas.
Caliva, who works from the company’s office in Washington, D.C., is using the assets to launch his own firm, P.R. Quinlan Associates, Inc., based on the practice areas that he acquired.
P.R. Quinlan will provide government relations, policy analysis, and advocacy services for Central New York organizations seeking support in Washington, D.C. and state capitals nationwide.
He wants the new firm to serve as “a resource and an advocate for the small and medium-sized businesses out there who really just don’t have the time or resources to dedicate to monitoring what’s happening in Washington and the state capitals.”
Caliva is the sole owner, president, and one of the new firm’s three employees, he says.
Besides a customer list, furniture, fixtures, and equipment, Caliva also acquired a tool that Strategic Communications had developed.
“One of the biggest assets is a tool we developed over the past couple years called the Strategic Update, which is bi-weekly policy monitoring tool that’s customized for individual clients and provides them with very readable summation of legislation and regulation that impacts their industry,” says Caliva.
Caliva named the firm after his great great grandfather, Patrick Ryan Quinlan, who emigrated from Ireland to the U.S. in the 1840s. He was a greenhouse owner, operated a floral boutique, served on Syracuse Common Council and as a city treasurer, Caliva says.
Fallingbrook Associates, LLC
Though moving away from day-to-day operations, Meath will remain involved in both firms as they continue their transition. He has also formed a new entity,
Fallingbrook Associates, LLC, to continue work with clients nationwide during crises or other sensitive matters that pose potential threats to their reputation.
“It’s a meager attempt at retirement,” Meath quips.
Meath describes his firm as one that will serve as “of counsel,” but not in a legal sense. He wants to create a network of “senior level, old guys” who’ve served as lawyers, financial advisors, human resource professionals, or in operations to provide assistance in situations ranging from corporate turnarounds to a “true crisis.”
Meath, who will be Fallingbrook’s lone employee, will operate the LLC from his home in Fayetteville, he says.
He’ll also continue teaching courses at Syracuse University in the S. I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, and the Martin J. Whitman School of Management.
Smith is a 2002 graduate of Christian Brothers Academy in DeWitt. She later earned a dual bachelor’s degree in business administration with concentrations in marketing and finance from the University at Albany in 2006.
She worked as a coordinator at Media Marketing in Albany in 2006 and later worked in the public-relations department at Latorra, Paul & McCann Advertising in Syracuse before joining Strategic Communications in 2009.
Smith earned her certification as an accredited public relations professional in 2012, she says.
Caliva is a 2000 graduate of Christian Brothers Academy and later earned a bachelor’s degree in political science from Providence College in 2004. Caliva went on to earn a master’s degree in German and European Studies from Georgetown University in 2006.
Before joining Strategic Communications in 2011, Caliva worked for the U.S. Department of Commerce.
Contact Reinhardt at ereinhardt@cnybj.com
Scotsman Media Group leader discusses closure, job losses
SYRACUSE — The Scotsman Press, Inc., which does business as Scotsman Media Group, closed its printing operations in Syracuse and Chenango Bridge on July 3, ending about 60 years of operation in Central New York. The shutdown means the layoff of about 90 employees, the firm said in a statement released June 27. “They’ve just
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SYRACUSE — The Scotsman Press, Inc., which does business as Scotsman Media Group, closed its printing operations in Syracuse and Chenango Bridge on July 3, ending about 60 years of operation in Central New York.
The shutdown means the layoff of about 90 employees, the firm said in a statement released June 27.
“They’ve just done a phenomenal job for the Central New York community and it is terribly unfortunate that this has to go this way,” William Veit, president of the Scotsman Media Group, says in an interview.
Veit is among the affected employees but will remain with the firm through mid-August to oversee the liquidation of assets, he says.
“I will be exiting the business,” Veit says, noting that the company will provide all 90 employees a severance package.
The Business Journal News Network interviewed Veit on June 30.
The decision will not affect The Valley News, which the company publishes in Fulton. It currently employs six people, according to Veit.
Badoud Enterprises, Inc., the Virginia–based owner of the Scotsman Press, will continue as owner of The Valley News, Veit added.
Shuttering Scotsman’s printing operations is “not a reflection of the ability or skills of the company’s leadership or employees,” Veit said in the Scotsman news release. “The result is due to unforeseen business circumstances beyond the company’s control.”
Acquisition falls through on financing issues
Veit’s attempt to acquire the business or obtain additional financing was “ultimately unsuccessful,” according to the Scotsman release.
“Back in January … I had the terms and term sheet and everything we needed from the bank and they changed their mind, they changed direction,” Veit says in the interview.
The Business Journal News Network had earlier interviewed Veit on Jan. 20 when the firm first announced he had plans to acquire the Scotsman Media Group.
Badoud Enterprises, Inc. on Dec. 17 signed an agreement to sell the company’s assets to Veit.
The owner, John Badoud, Jr., who has owned the Scotsman Press since 1989, wanted to retire, Veit added in that same interview.
Neither side disclosed financial details of the transaction, which was expected to close on March 31, Veit said during the January interview.
Veit was hoping to finance the acquisition through Des Moines, Iowa–based Principal Financial Group. Principal operates a local office at 200 Salina Meadows Parkway in Salina.
“The third party on the mortgage was … Principal Real Estate Investors and they were serving Union Fidelity Insurance and they changed their mind. They just changed the terms on me to the point that I didn’t have enough time to react,” Veit says now.
When asked why the lender changed the terms at that point, Veit would only say, “I can’t comment on that.”
When the financing issue became known, Veit worked to find another location for the Scotsman’s operations, but he ran “out of time,” he says.
When asked if the building housing Scotsman’s Syracuse headquarters had any environmental problems that may have been a factor in the lender’s denial of financing, Veit again would only say, “I can’t comment on that.”
The Syracuse headquarters of the Scotsman Press operates in a 65,000-square-foot space at 750 W. Genesee St. in a building that Badoud Enterprises owns.
The firm’s operation in Chenango Bridge, which is called Our Press, operates in a 10,000-square-foot office at 41 Kattelville Road.
Incorporated in 1954, Scotsman most recently served hundreds of publishers by providing commercial-printing services throughout Central New York.
The customers include the Business Journal News Network. The Scotsman Press prints The Central New York Business Journal, The Mohawk Valley Business Journal, and The Greater Binghamton Business Journal.
As a publisher, Scotsman produced Today’s CNY Woman, Finger Lakes Vacationer, and the $ In Your Pocket coupon book, and built its business around its former Pennysaver products.
In 2013, Scotsman closed the Pennysaver business, cutting about 60 jobs. The Pennysavers included 16 different publications that covered communities stretching from Fulton to Cortland and Geneva to Fayetteville and Manlius. The papers reached 210,000 homes.
Contact Reinhardt at ereinhardt@cnybj.com
New York keeps No. 2 spot in maple-syrup production
New York retained its position as the second biggest producer of maple syrup in the U.S. in 2014, behind Vermont, according to figures from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). New York maple producers generated 546,000 gallons of maple syrup with 2.2 million taps, according to the USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service. The Empire State
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New York retained its position as the second biggest producer of maple syrup in the U.S. in 2014, behind Vermont, according to figures from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA).
New York maple producers generated 546,000 gallons of maple syrup with 2.2 million taps, according to the USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service. The Empire State edged out No. 3 maple-syrup producer, Maine, by just 1,000 gallons.
The figures represent the third best year for maple production in New York in the past 20 years, Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s office said in a news release.
The state’s maple-syrup industry had many challenges this year after the “long, cold” months of February and March, which produced several periods with no production, the release stated.
The lack of production was a “concern” for producers who use older technology, such as buckets and gravity tubing. As sap production “ceased” during the winter months, tap holes closed and sap stopped running.
Producers using newer vacuum tubing were able to keep the tap holes healthy and functioning, enabling maple-syrup production over the entire season.
Mother Nature reminds New York maple producers annually that she is in charge and that environmental factors “largely” determine the percentages of maple-syrup colors produced, Dwayne Hill, president of the New York State Maple Producers Association, said in the news release.
“This year, there was a low percentage of light amber syrup, with most of the crop comprising medium and dark colors. This is a good thing for consumers as the most popular flavors of maple are medium and dark amber,” said Hill.
New York maple products, including syrups and creams, are available at Taste NY stores on the New York State.
They are also featured at Taste NY events throughout the state, providing exposure and increased sales for the state’s maple producers.
Many maple producers carry the Pride of NY label on their products, which are available at various grocery stores and farmers’ markets, according to the governor’s office.
Upstate, Fort Drum train for medical-transport situations
SYRACUSE — Upstate University Hospital and the U.S. Army’s Fort Drum near Watertown on June 26 conducted a medical-transport training exercise on the roof of the Syracuse medical facility. The event included a Black Hawk helicopter from Fort Drum landing on the structure’s helipad. The exercise sought to ensure that both Upstate and Fort Drum
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SYRACUSE — Upstate University Hospital and the U.S. Army’s Fort Drum near Watertown on June 26 conducted a medical-transport training exercise on the roof of the Syracuse medical facility.
The event included a Black Hawk helicopter from Fort Drum landing on the structure’s helipad.
The exercise sought to ensure that both Upstate and Fort Drum are “familiar and very comfortable working together” in the event they have to save someone’s life, Captain William Keller, executive officer for the medevac unit at Fort Drum, said while speaking with reporters on Upstate’s helipad.
“Fort Drum is beginning a range medevac mission in that we’re going to be covering soldiers out on the range that are out doing training. We do train very hard and it’s vital that the medevac that is responsible for evacuating our soldiers is not only prepared to pick them up, but [also] to come here to Upstate as well and drop them off,” Keller said.
The training involved getting the pilot familiarized with flying from the range environment at Fort Drum to Upstate and then moving the patient from the helicopter and the facility’s roof into the hands of the medical professionals at Upstate, Keller said.
Besides Upstate, Fort Drum is also beginning similar relationships with Samaritan Medical Center in Watertown and a medical facility serving Burlington, Vt., he added.
It’s part of an ongoing collaborative effort with Fort Drum to do outreach, training and education with them for the combat personnel there, Steve Adkisson, Upstate University Hospital’s pediatric and adult trauma program manager, said in his remarks to reporters on the helipad.
“The training … is just how to safely approach the helicopter when it’s running and when it’s moving, so when someone comes in, no matter what their injuries are, how to get them off the helicopter safely as possible and as quickly as possible, while maintaining safety for both the crew and the patient,” said Adkisson.
Upstate University Hospital has been working with Fort Drum in a training and outreach capacity for almost six years now, he adds, not only with the helicopters, but also with advanced trauma life-support training for combat medics and combat physicians.
The training exercise “streamlines” the actual process when the helicopter lands and turns over a patient, Kristen Halsey, staff sergeant at Fort Drum, said while speaking to reporters.
Halsey serves as a flight medic on the helicopter.
“We practice with them, then when we do land and they come up to the helicopter, they do it in a safe manner and they’re able to have a good handoff with the patient,” said Halsey.
Contact Reinhardt at ereinhardt@cnybj.com
Syracuse Crunch think big with Frozen Dome Classic
SYRACUSE — The Syracuse Crunch is hoping to make a big splash with their planned “Frozen Dome Classic,” the first professional hockey game held in the Carrier Dome, when it takes the ice with the Utica Comets on Nov. 22. “I really believe that Syracuse is … a big-event market,” Howard Dolgon, owner of the
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SYRACUSE — The Syracuse Crunch is hoping to make a big splash with their planned “Frozen Dome Classic,” the first professional hockey game held in the Carrier Dome, when it takes the ice with the Utica Comets on Nov. 22.
“I really believe that Syracuse is … a big-event market,” Howard Dolgon, owner of the Syracuse Crunch, said in his remarks during a June 11 news conference in the Carrier Dome to announce the November contest.
The team on June 25 announced that Toyota will serve as the title sponsor for the Frozen Dome Classic. The same company also served in the same role for the Crunch’s Mirabito Outdoor Classic on Feb. 20, 2010.
Tickets for this November’s Carrier Dome game went on sale to the general public on June 24 and range in price from $20 to $50, the Crunch said.
“We’re going to be using the same configuration as the basketball [court],” James (Jim) Sarosy, COO of the Syracuse Crunch, said in answering a question from the assembled media.
Capacity for the Frozen Dome Classic will in the mid-30,000s, he added.
Besides the matchup between the Crunch and Comets, which both play in the American Hockey League, the daylong hockey showcase will also feature an NCAA Division III matchup between the Utica College Pioneers and the Oswego State Lakers.
The event will also include a law-enforcement charity game involving the Syracuse and Utica police departments prior the Crunch-Comets game.
Conroe, Texas–based Ice Rink Events, which assisted in the production of the outdoor game at the State Fairgrounds, will provide assistance and the rink for the Frozen Dome Classic as well, Sarosy said.
“We’re going to be given access [to the Dome] on a Monday morning as early as possible and hope to have ice Thursday night, so it’ll be a quick, quick turnaround,” he added.
Bringing ice and generators inside the facility, transitioning in “very short order” during football-to-basketball season, and an ice-hockey game is a “tremendous undertaking” for [Carrier Dome Managing Director] Pete [Sala] and his staff, Joe Giansante, executive senior associate athletics director and chief communications officer and external affairs, said during his remarks at the press conference.
“It’ll be one of those things that we’ll always remember about being here in the Dome,” Giansante said.
As Crunch officials fielded questions from the media, the Business Journal News Network asked Dolgon about the cost to stage the Frozen Dome Classic.
“A lot,” Dolgon said in response. “A lot with a few zeros after that.”
“Times 10 a lot,” Sarosy added.
But Dolgon also believes he has a “very fair deal” with Syracuse University for the event.
“We know that the university puts on first-class events. So we’re going into this knowing what the risk is and what the reward could be,” he added.
In his remarks, J. Ryan McMahon II, chairman of the Onondaga County Legislature, discussed the county’s role.
“We run many of things that people enjoy in our community and our downtown in our arts and cultural [activities] on room-occupancy tax, so it’s a great opportunity, it’s a great investment,” said McMahon.
And Saturday won’t be the only day with activities surrounding this event, Dolgon said.
“We plan on [that] Friday to have a celebration of hockey in New York state … to have as many youth hockey players participate and enjoy the comforts of the Carrier Dome and ice hockey in the Dome,” said Dolgon.
The Crunch is also planning a fan festival in the part of the Dome that’s not used for the game.
“That will develop as we come up with more ideas,” Dolgon said.
It’s not the first time the Crunch has hosted a hockey matchup outside the Onondaga County War Memorial, its regular home venue.
The Crunch in 2010 played the Binghamton Senators in the Mirabito Outdoor Classic at the New York State Fairgrounds.
And even though he’s now on the management side of the sport, one of the Comets’ top officials played in a special-event matchup in even colder conditions.
Robert Esche, current general manager of the Utica Comets and a former National Hockey League goaltender, recalled playing in the 2009 Kontinental Hockey League (KHL) All-Star Game outdoors in Moscow’s Red Square
The temperature was 17-below zero and he’ll “never forget it,” Esche said in his comments at the news conference.
“Being able to play inside and setting a record … is something from a historic level for both franchises for Utica and Syracuse,” he says.
Contact Reinhardt at ereinhardt@cnybj.com
Syracuse Manufacturers Mobilize for Victory in World War II: the Story of Onondaga Pottery
Before the outbreak of World War II, factories located in Syracuse and Onondaga County, N.Y., made shoes, typewriters, air conditioners, washing machines, and many other civilian products. Military preparedness was low on the nation’s list. However, shortly after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on Dec. 7, 1941, and the U.S. declared war on Japan
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Before the outbreak of World War II, factories located in Syracuse and Onondaga County, N.Y., made shoes, typewriters, air conditioners, washing machines, and many other civilian products. Military preparedness was low on the nation’s list. However, shortly after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on Dec. 7, 1941, and the U.S. declared war on Japan and Germany a few days later, President Franklin Roosevelt set very challenging goals for many American manufacturers, including producing 125,000 airplanes, 120,000 tanks, and 55,000 anti-aircraft guns by 1943. Several local manufacturers answered the president’s call for making war material between 1941 and 1945.
On July 28, 1944, the “War Workers Cavalcade” paraded along Salina Street in downtown Syracuse. Comprised of many local businesses that had shifted from manufacturing civilian products to war material, the cavalcade displayed these companies’ patriotism via elaborate floats in a procession that took 2 ½ hours to pass 70,000 spectators.
This article is the second in a series (the first one appeared in the March 14 issue of The Business Journal) that will focus on six local manufacturers that participated in the War Workers Cavalcade 70 years ago, and which played vital roles in supplying the Allied military forces with much-needed war items during World War II.
The Art of Ceramic Destruction: Onondaga Pottery goes to war
Prior to World War II, Onondaga Pottery Company (O.P. Co.) had been manufacturing a variety of ceramic products at its Fayette Street and Court Street plants in Syracuse. The company was world-renowned for its fine residential china and commercial hotel and restaurant ware. In 1893, Onondaga Pottery Company won the High Award Medal for its ornate vitreous china known as Imperial Geddo at the Columbian Exposition in Chicago, and in 1904, the company won the Grand Prize of Clays and Table Ware at the Louisiana Purchase Exposition in St. Louis. In 1896, the company installed the ceramic industry’s first in-house lithographic shop for printing decals that decorated the ware. In 1921, the company opened the Court Street plant to make its hotel ware, the first linear, one-story plant in the American china industry. By the late 1930s, O.P.Co. was decorating its ware with Shadowtone, an airbrush design that sprayed colors onto the ware through stencils. Although still in the midst of the Great Depression, the 1930s proved to be one of O.P. Co.’s most successful decades for design, reputation, and even sales.
By the fall of 1939, a new world conflict had begun in Europe, and two years later, the U.S. joined its allies in Europe and the Pacific to fight the Axis powers. At the time, O.P. Co. employed 1,150 people. Once the U.S. declared war on Germany and Japan, local men, and some women, joined the armed forces, and O.P. Co.’s workforce became predominantly women. Wartime production dramatically increased as these women assisted with filling large military orders for bowls, mugs, and plates for the Army Quartermaster and Medical Corps, Navy bases, and the Marine Corps. O.P. Co. also supplied large quantities of ware to the burgeoning wartime government agencies and bureaus, as well as the cafeterias at aeronautical factories and munitions plants throughout the U.S. During the four war years, the women employees contributed to making almost 60 million pieces of china for these military and civilian entities.
However, conceivably the most significant and secretive wartime operation at Onondaga Pottery Company was the development and production of the M-5 anti-tank landmine and the M-7 pocket mine. Working in conjunction with the Army’s ordnance department, Richard Pass, company president, selected specialists from O.P. Co. and Pass & Seymour to develop a non-metallic landmine that the enemy could not detect with electronic mine sweepers. Army specifications stated that the landmine had to work in any type of soil, as well as under water, and it had to remain intact under the feet of infantry soldiers but explode under the slightest weight of moving vehicles. It also had to be effective between 40 and 170 degrees Fahrenheit. The landmine required a specially designed chemical fuse. After seven months of research, the O.P. Co. and Pass & Seymour design team created a non-metallic landmine that would detonate in any weather conditions. Tests were conducted inside Highland Forest Park, south of Syracuse. Electrical workers at Pass & Seymour made the fuses and O.P. Co. employees made and assembled the landmines. The company also produced the M-7 pocket mine, an explosive device carried by soldiers in their pockets and used for demolition purposes, as a booby trap, and as a hand grenade.
Production began in July 1943 and lasted 15 months until Oct. 1, 1944 when the military met its quotas for landmines and fuses. The project was kept secret until the Rochester Ordnance District released information to the public on July 28, 1944. A special section had been carved out of the Court Street plant and converted to landmine production. Several female employees were re-allocated to the Court Street ordnance division, where they often worked seven days a week and produced 1.3 million landmines. On Sept. 30, 1944 about 90 former ordnance employees attended a banquet in their honor at the Eastwood Sports Center.
The Army Ordnance Department recognized Onondaga Pottery Company as being a pioneer in the field of non-metallic ammunition and was commended by military officials for their work. On Oct. 18, 1944, Court Street employees were presented with the Army-Navy “E” Award for excellence in production of war equipment. The company also had the honor of flying the Army-Navy “E” Award pennant outside the Court Street plant. It was quite a tribute; only about 3 percent of all American production firms were qualified to receive the “E” award. President Pass, in his congratulatory speech to the employees stated, “The successful production of the mines here has been made possible only by the faithful, loyal work and support of every member of the Pottery organization. This support has accomplished more in aid of our country’s war effort than you may know.” The non-metallic landmines produced by Onondaga Pottery Company became known as the “Syracuse Secret Weapon of World War II.”
Onondaga Pottery Company had “turned a source of beauty into a force of destruction. One of the finer products, so much a part of the American Way of Life, became a force in the defense and preservation of that American Way.”
Once landmine and fuse production ceased, company officials turned the production space back to making civilian ceramic items. Many of the women who made the landmines and fuses decided to stay on at O.P. Co. From that point in time, more than half of the employee work force consisted of women. After World War II ended in 1945, returning male veterans joined these women in producing some of the finest American china the world has ever known. Later employees followed their parents and grandparents to work at Onondaga Pottery Company, even after the company officially changed its name to Syracuse China Corporation in 1966. Syracuse China continued to produce wares until it closed in 2009. At Syracuse China’s closing, the Onondaga Historical Association (OHA) acquired the remnants of the 138-year-old establishment — business records and documents, decals and other designs, tools, and tens of thousands of pieces of ware. Although the company has closed and Syracuse China is no longer made in Syracuse, its legacy continues at OHA. Visitors may still see 138 years of company history and revel in the fact that Syracuse was once home to a company that made the world’s best china, as well as one of World War II’s “secret weapons.”
Thomas Hunter is the curator of museum collections at the Onondaga Historical Association (OHA) (www.cnyhistory.org), located at 321 Montgomery St. in Syracuse.
A Change in Leadership at the Chenango Arts Council
NORWICH — The Chenango Arts Council has new leadership. On June 30, Victoria Calvert Kappel, executive director, stepped down from her position after 15 years to explore new opportunities. The Chenango Arts Council (CAC) has been a community anchor for participation, education, and quality of life in Chenango County for the last four decades, Kappel said
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NORWICH — The Chenango Arts Council has new leadership.
On June 30, Victoria Calvert Kappel, executive director, stepped down from her position after 15 years to explore new opportunities.
The Chenango Arts Council (CAC) has been a community anchor for participation, education, and quality of life in Chenango County for the last four decades, Kappel said in an interview with The Business Journal News Network before her departure..
Kappel attributes a lot of the success and stability of the organization to the long-term leadership it has had. For 34 of its 40 years, CAC has had only two executive directors, Kappel and Lucy Funke, who served for 19 years prior to Kappel. In addition to the steady management, Kappel also praises the work of a consistent, strong board of directors who “get the organization and have no hidden agendas.”
Prior to moving to Norwich from Chicago in 1999, Kappel was already familiar with upstate New York from visiting her sister who lives in Greig in Lewis County. In fact, Kappel liked the area so much that she and her husband were married in Constableville, also in Lewis County. Then, when she was ready for a change from Chicago, upstate New York was on her list of places to peruse for a new career.
As much as the position was the right fit for her 15 years ago, Kappel knows that stepping down at this time is also the right move. Wanting the board to have enough time to find her replacement, at the January board meeting, Kappel announced her decision to leave at the end of the fiscal year, June 30. Before the end of January, the selection committee had already met to put in motion the executive search.
Though she is not retiring or planning on leaving the region right away, Kappel says she’s looking forward to the next thing, though she’s not quite sure what that is yet. “All things are possible,” she says.
Kappel recalls her time at CAC fondly, saying “It was a good fit, a happy fit.”
As for the board’s new executive director selection, Kappel says, “I heartily agree with their choice.”
The new leader
On July 1, Diane Batson-Smith joined CAC as the new executive director. She fills the third full-time staff position alongside program director Michelle Connelly and operations manager Joyce Zummo.
Most recently coming from the Martina Arroyo Foundation in New York City as its executive director, Batson-Smith’s background also includes producing movies in Hollywood, managing the Clarksville Arts and Heritage Council in Clarksville, Tenn., and acting as the designated agent for the Tennessee Arts Commission to grant funds throughout Tennessee.
Batson-Smith looks forward to working and living in Norwich, and says she plans on finding a place to live that’s within walking distance to the office.
“People here are seeped into what the arts can do for the community,” Batson-Smith says. “There’s a lot of potential here.”
She hopes to use her background to expand the program repertoire that CAC can offer, potentially including a film series, a theater program for new plays, and more outreach to the schools and communities the council serves. “Of course, one does not do this work alone, so the board would have to agree and the staff as well, as it does often create more work,” says Batson-Smith.
Her career expertise in the arts goes beyond theater, film, and education outreach; she also designs hand-sewn heritage wool quilts. In 2013, Batson-Smith formed a small textile business, NY Textile Company, with her son, which will now be located in Chenango County. The fabric for her quilts is made by Thistle Hill Weavers, a small custom-weaving mill in Cherry Valley, in Otsego County.
Council operations
A focus on earned income will be a big priority for the CAC board moving forward, with facility rentals and online tickets sales as two opportunities Kappel sees for growth in this area. The council’s theater, gallery, conference room, and studio classroom are all available for the public to rent. CAC organizational members can use the William J. Hall Conference Room once a month for meeting purposes at no charge.
Located at 27 West Main St. in downtown Norwich, in a building that used to house Norwich High School, CAC occupies 10,601 square feet on the first floor of what is now called the Norwich Center Office Plaza. The structure is managed by the Chenango Housing Improvement Program. The other half of the former school is occupied by Norwich Senior Housing.
The Chenango Arts Council’s main office used to be the high school principal’s office, the gallery was once the cafeteria, and the former school auditorium is now the 514-seat Martin W. Kappel Theater, named for Kappel’s late husband.
Martin Kappel worked as the technical director for CAC. After he passed away, the board voted to name the theater in his honor.
Expanding the staff is also a goal for the CAC, though Kappel says when it will happen depends on state funding, which the nonprofit will not know about until December. The next hire for the council will concentrate on facility rentals and earned income opportunities.
Kappel says she has also done everything she can operations-wise to make sure that Batson-Smith’s transition is as smooth as possible, including already having the budget and season set for the next fiscal year. “She’s not going to have to play catch-up,” says Kappel.
CAC’s annual budget ranges from $350,000 to $375,000. The budget doesn’t vary much from year to year, says Kappel. Almost $100,000 of the budget represents pass-through funds for the decentralization grants distributed each year.
A program of the New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA), decentralization grants support local decision-making in public-arts funding for arts and cultural organization across every county in the state. CAC operates as the decentralization site for Chenango, Broome, and Otsego counties, and has $99,400 allocated for a three-year cycle.
In April, CAC distributed this year’s funds to 54 nonprofit organizations and artists in the three counties. This year, the Stewart W. and Willma C. Hoyt Foundation in Binghamton provided an additional $10,000 for funding in Broome County.
Contact Collins at ncollins@cnybj.com
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Chenango Arts Council
27 West Main St.
Norwich, NY 13815
(607) 336-2787
Chenangoarts.org
Founded: 1975
Employees: 3 full time
Volunteers: 35
Service Area: Chenango, Broome, and Otsego counties
Mission: The Chenango Arts Council says it supports life-enriching art throughout the greater Chenango region.
Programs and Services: Performance series, gallery series, decentralization funding for Chenango, Broome, and Otsego counties, classes and workshops for all ages, special events.
Recent Organizational Highlights: Long-time executive director, Victoria Calvert Kappel, is leaving the council after 15 years service. She will be replaced by Diane Batson-Smith, an arts administrator with career highlights spanning several cultural sectors.
Planning/Fundraising Outlook for 2014: Semi-annual benefit, “Parked Under the Stars,” planned for November 2014, annual 5K Allegro Run for the Arts takes place each May, additional fundraisers and grant-seeking efforts are ongoing.
Key Staff:
Executive Director:
Victoria Calvert Kappel (until 6/30/14)
Diane Batson-Smith (starting 7/1/14)
Executive-director’s compensation from 2013 IRS 990: $55,835
Program Director: Michelle Connelly
Operations Manager: Joyce Zummo
Board of Trustees (Officers)
President: Lisa Natoli, Natoli & Natoli Law
Vice President: Van Mason, retired educator
Treasurer: Joseph Skundrich, NBT Bank
Secretary: Jeff Genung, Chobani, Inc.
Board Members
Sheila Briglin, community volunteer
Donald Brown, II, Chobani
Ann Coe, Norwich Business Improvement District
Stephanie Coggins, community volunteer
Henry Drexler, artist
Mary El Emerson, community volunteer
Alexandra Erath, Voss Group
Emma Golden, Golden Foundation
Geoff Magnani, retired educator
Michael McCormack, Norwich/Sidney Pennysaver
F. Sheldon Prentice, NBT Bank
Edith Revoir, Area Agency on Aging
Dominic Shea, Wells Fargo Advisors
Grayson Stevens, retired educator
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