The Buffalo News from Buffalo, New York • 4

County Legislature to fund UB Internet connection The County Legislature plans to appropriate $25000 for a high speed computer connec tion between a University of Buffalo oundation incubator for start up businesses UB computers and the Internet The hope is that start up com panies will create jobs for Erie County residents The incubator in Baird Research Park 1576 Sweet Home Road will make the Internet connection avail able free to 11 small technical ly focused companies and one anchor tenant The 13 year old incubator so far has hatched 45 fledgling businesses now employing 436 people with college technical backgrounds Thirty one busi nesses have moved out and all but two remain in the area Jack McGowan incubator director said the largest of the current tenants is Ony Inc the developer of Infasurf a drug to treat premature infants who have under developed lungs with 25 workers Newstead planners alter subdivision hearing rules The Newstead Planning Board has agreed to change the procedure for public hearings on minor subdivisions Code Enforcement Officer Donnal olger asked the Planning Board last month to consider allowing the Building Department to schedule the public hearing as soon as a completed application is re ceived He said he felt that would cut down on the amount of time needed to approve a request" Board members said as long as they continue to have the same avenues open to them in the decision making process they are willing to change the process On another matter officials reviewed the proposed subdivi sion request by Dale Perry Reilly told planners that the Town Board wants to hold an easement for the creek that runs along the back of the proposed lots do not wish to main tain as easement on the pond or either he said to the creek can be at tained off Hake Road The pond will have to be main tained by the owners of the four Boulevard Mall read in to boost Project Literacy Hankering for a photo op with the Poky Little Puppy and Lambchop? Then the debut of the Big Little Golden Books Read In beginning at 1 pm Saturday in the Boulevard Mall Amherst is on your page The event designed to pro mote family literacy is spon sored by the mall Project Books for Kids Drive Wegmans and The Buffalo News The read in also will fea ture music and an appearance by Rosie band lead er John McDaniel The first 5000 children will receive a free book 30 whooping cough cases detected in Chautauqua MAYVILLE A dramatic number of whooping cough cases was revealed Tuesday by the Chautauqua County Health Department Dr Robert Berke county health commissioner said 30 cases have been documented over the past six weeks among children and adults He said pertussis whooping cough's for mal name is highly contagious and is spread through direct contact with infected individuals The Buffalo NewsWednesdoy September 22 1999 Briefly Lackawanna teen spared jail for posing as officer Jeremy Otrosinka the Lack awanna teen ager charged with pretending he was a police offi cer and scaring some children on a school bus last May was spared a jail term when sen tenced this week by a Town of Evans justice He was put on probation for three years He also was or dered to get counseling if it is found necessary by the Proba tion Department and complete his high school equivalency degree Justice Anthony Barone Jr granted Otrosinka 18 of Electiic Avenue youthful of fender status on his pretrial guilty plea in a case to crimi nally impersonating a police officer The youthful offender status will spare him from having a criminal record Otrosinka was accused of claiming to be an off duty po lice officer responding to a Lake Shore School District school bus radio call of unruly passengers He then drove off with three boys turned over to him by the bus driver police said The boys 11 12 and 13 years old were released un harmed near their homes and Otrosinka was arrested by Evans town police The incident sparked con cern among Lake Shore parents and school officials Lake Shore board OKs reconfiguration plan After months of study and several public hearings the Lake Shore School District Tuesday approved a plan to re configure the elementary grades for the 2001 2001 school year On the recommendation of Superintendent Kenneth Con nolly the School Board adopted a plan creating a kindergarten through fifth grade con cept The change is a result of the recent plan to move the ninth grade to the high school and the sixth grade to the middle schooL The board considered two plans one that called for the 5 configuration another that would have created a kindergar ten through third grade elemen tary school a fourth and fifth grade intermediate school and a sixth through eighth grade middle school just eliminates one more Board President Bill Connors said seems like a sounder Connors said the reconfigur ation will take place next year if the facilities are and Elma Park ball fields seen in need of attention The condition of the soccer and baseball fields at the Elma Town Park on Creek Road dominated the latest Elma Ma nila and Wales executive board meeting Executive Board Trea surer Dennis Powers said the park created in 1969 is crowded and the diamonds nev er have a chance to recover due to the constant play over an eight month period The park attendance has ex ceeded the participation num bers used in preparing the 10 year plan for EMW Sports Inc adopted and approved by mem bers of the board of directors in 1978 Help is also needed in main tenance of the fields Powers noted that the executive board has invited the supervisors of the three towns to their No vember meeting to discuss plans for the park and develop a new long range plan Depew developer planning retirement community A Depew real estate devel oper is eyeing a 50 acre parcel on Seneca Street in the Town of Elma for a gated retirement community John Syracuse president and CEO of Oxford Knight Interna tional told the Elma Town Board meeting in work session Tuesday that the sale of the land hinges on getting part of the site next to the Aurora Ex pressway rezoned from residen tial agriculture to commercial eatured would be patio homes apartments and town houses for residents 50 and old er in addition to a retirement home and skilled nursing facili ty Syracuse said the project would be built in three phases Hamburg Middle School begins open houses Open houses at Hamburg Middle School begin today The first for the sixth grade level at 6:30 pm at the school located at 360 Division St The open house for seventh grade will be at 6:30 pm Sept 29 and at 6:30 pm Oct 6 for the eighth grade The programs begin in the auditorium Parents will have an opportunity to meet team teachers as well Suburban Adult Services receives $62500 grant Suburban Adult Services Inc which assists disabled adults and their families has received a $62500 grant from the Arrison amily Charitable oundation to expand its facili ty at 118 King St East Aurora The expansion will add 1920 feet of warehouse space and eliminate the need for storage in trailers Areas currently used for shipping and receiving will be converted into program space Rest rooms also will be expanded Suburban Adult Services founded in 1975 has nine loca tions and offers services to about 800 persons Elsewhere SOUTH EDITION Pago 5 South Suburban News I RONTIER CENTRAL Board creates 'preferred position By BARBARA O'BRIEN News Southtowns Bureau When their regular teachers there a good chance that students in the rontier Cen tral schools will know the substi tute The School Board Tuesday night created a substi position to provide daily fill ins for absent teachers are committed to them to make work available to them every Superintendent Gerald Glosc said The four substitutes will agree to work in the district eveiy day for $95 a day Two will work in' the elementary schools one in the middle school and one in the high school he said Assistant Superintendent for Personnel Paul Connelly said the building principals would rec ommend who the prefered substi tutes will be Based on the substi prior work in the district Glose said chances are the pre ferred substitutes eventually would be hired as full time teachers concern I have although I think likely is be in place and there be a place for he said But with 400 teachers in the district it's a rare day that at least four are not sick or attending a conference he said If there is no substitute teaching work available for the preferred substitutes they would be given other duties he said Trustee Marianne Tomani said she was concerned about the pro cedure that would be taken to se lect the preferred subs and that some talented substitutes would never get the chance because they had not been called by the district Also Tuesday the board re stricted parking at the Educational Center at 5120 Orchard Ave from 8 pm to 7 am unless the vehicle has a permit The board also au thorized the Hamburg Police De partment to fenforce the no park ing restrictions had people park there all night had people van dalize the Assistant Su perintendent for Business Richard A Binner said The board also: Dissolved four scholarship accounts that have pot been active or do not have enough funds to distribute They are the Ruth Pray Scholarship which was last awarded in the 1996 97 school year in the amount of $25 the Daryl Krenti Memorial Scholarship Award the famtlv had asked to be dissolved the Creedon Scholarship which last awarded a scholarship in the 1984 85 school year and the Women of the Moose Scholarship last awarded in 1991 92 The net balance from the four accounts 59120 will be distributed to the remaining 19 scholarships Binner said Approved moving voting districts from Cloverbank Elementary School to the Education al Center for the Nov 2 election The School Board meeting scheduled that night will be conducted at Big Tree Elementary ORCHARD PARK Nine new teachers drop middle school class sizes By ELMER PLOETZ News Southtowns Bureau Orchard Park Middle School Principal Joan Thomas is happy about the nine new teachers at her school this fall But now she said at Tuesday Or chard Park School Board meeting the district needs to find a better way to fit all of the teachers into the school The hirings helped drop average class sizes in the building from 28 for sixth and eight graders and 27 for seventh graders to 25 for sixth graders and 24 for seventh and eighth graders But now the students and teachers must deal with more congestion than ever in the halls Last year board said to us you do this without adding onto the facility or moving outside of your And we said we Thomas Said of the addi tions with every situation but always a cost We believe right now we have a situation we can tolerate this year but not sure we can move into 2000 2001 in the situation in at the Among the problems Thomas pointed out were: Loss of as much as 25 percent of instruc tional room to travel and set up Loss of space for activities such as parent conferences and review sessions Loss of the group meet ing for classrooms Loss of space for activities such as Odys sey of the Mind musical rehearsals extracurric ular activities and community functions Loss of work space and work time for teachers sharing rooms The number of teach ers has increased from four to 28 meaning teachers use their off time to work in what had been their own rooms Thomas offered the board a list of potential solutions ranging from the small reconfigur ing hallway traffic to as large as renting portable classrooms or dividing the school into two sessions (900 students going 8 am to 2:30 pm while 400 go from 1 7 pm) point tonight was to make sure you were aware of our situation and to make sure next year will be she said Trustee Vicki Jefferis said her facilities fea sibility committee would be handling short term as well as long term issues so it will be ad dressing the problems Donald Eppers one of the leaders of the loosely organized Parents for Kids organization that played a major role in last spring's School Board and budget elections sharply criticized the board at its Sept 14 meeting over prob lems at the middle school He left Tuesday's meeting happier very optimistic that the School Board is going to address these problems and Eppers said after 'hearing' Thomas The middle school principal will be 'facing this crowding issues without one of her lieutenants Assistant Principal Gordon Kerr Kerr was named principal Tuesday night of Or chard Eggert Elementary School ing Peter Walders Walders announced his re tirement in July Ken is starting his third year in the district following stints as band director in Cheektowa ga and Williamsville Kerr 33 is a graduate of Houghton College with a degree from the University at Buffalo and his administrative 1 degree from UB and Buffalo State I Kerr took some kidding from the board I about a his son Josh had been I promised if he got the job but said later it was really a football jersey a Green Bay Packer i with quarterback Brett name artd num ber on it looking forward to being at Eggert had a wonderful experience at the middle he said Kerr will make $75000 a year MIKE GROLUBuffalo News Commemorative stamp Dr David Hohn president and CEO of Roswell Park Cancer Institute Tuesday unveils the Prostate Can cer Awareness stamp that promotes annual checkups and tests The stamp can be purchased at a tempo rary post office in the atrium corner of Elm and Carlton streets vr uImA f'' Ax TyI' Atf j' 'J niiri MhKb Irr A ui i Hl If I I i A iK HHtgW UW liZ) 1 sfr Caff I 4 irh '7'y 'VS i 7 'tJ 1 2 Bl 1 i' 1 I fl I PA 1 I I a I A IPG" VU A 1 0 tw be bl HAMBURG Crackdown hits speeders on Route 5 By BARBARA News Southtowns Bureau Hamburg police pulled over 1 more than 30 speeding motorists along Lakeshore Road in Ham burg Tuesday in a crackdown they hope drivers will remember have a zero tolerance for I speeders on Route Capp Car men Kesner said work'oute 5 very The state Department of Trans portation has jurisdiction over the I road and the town has asked the state to reduce the speed limit and to install a three light traffic signal at Rogers Road Enforcing the speed limit is the jurisdic tion as 33 motorists found out Tuesday 'i out of desperation out here again The only control the town has is over cn if Councilwoman Kath leen Courtney Ilochul said Residents along Route '5 have 1 helped publicize the crackdown with signs in their yards feading a respect the speed limit and protect our children 40 give us a break 40 is the and lordy it the speed limit is About 60 people attended a meeting Tuesday evening in Lake 4 Shore ire Hall to push the cause for a traffic signal at Rogers Road the site of a fa tai accidents including one in July 1'1 which took the life of rontier High School student Tara Panza 3 rella is going to be a long' drawn out affair said ij resident Sue Keefe adding that seeing signs on "lawns us realize we have to keep Kesner said 41 summonses were' written during the daytime blitz 33 of those for speeding eight (mph) was the high est Kesner said 4' The crackdown occurred in the Wanakah Cloverbank area the speed limit is 40 mph Kesner said the average speed of motor ists who were stopped was about 50 mph 7 '7 I Seat belt safety checks have I been ongoing in the town since Sept 10 Kesner said The town also has borrowed a portable sign 1 that states the current speed they see it they can see how fast Kesner said A truck inspection also was conducted in Woodlawn and two trucks were taken off the road and eight summonses were handed out The crackdown will continue for several days officials said Koessler oundation donates $1 million to Canisius College By KAREN BRADY News Stajf Reporter 7 7' A $1 million gift from the Ken neth and Katherine Koessler amily oundation to Canisius capital campaign was an nounced today by College Presi dent Rev Vincent Cooke The 11th donation of $1 million or more to the campaign the Koessler gift brings the drive to $288 of its $30 mil lion goal It also continues decades of support for the Jesuit college by members of the Koessler family whose name remains synonymous with Greater Buffalo Press the printing conglomerate founded by Walter Koessler in 1926 and sold to Sullivan Graphics a decade ago commitment of the Koes sler family to Canisius College is well known and spans several gen ather Cooke said? unwavering support has al lowed us to achieve many of our objectives oyer the The new Koessler donation is the lead gift in the effort to raise $34 million by July 1 2000 to meet the stipulations of an $850000 challenge grant from the Kresge oundation The funds will go toward a $12 million renovation of Canisi Old Main classroom building that will provide the college with 50 new state of the art technology classrooms are extremely grateful to the Koessler amily oundation for this generous lead gift to help us meet the Kresge ather Cooke said The Koessler amily ounda tion was established in memory of Kenneth Koessler Sr who was chairman of the board of Greater Buffalo Press at his death in 1980 and his wife Katherine Gormley Koessler who was vice president of the foundation at her death in 1996 Koessler Sr was a 1929 gradu ate of Canisius College and a for mer chairman of its board of trust ees The Koessler Athletic Center is dedicated to the memory of Koessler Sr and his late broth er Walter Class of 1922 in honor of a $1 million gift from i Greater Buffalo Press to the col I lege in 1969 The Koessler family has endowed several scholarships at the college as well son the late John Koessler Jr Class of 1949 was also a chairman of Cani 1 hoard of trustees His broth er Paul is a board member to day So is Kenneth daughter Katherine Koessler Juhasz Her son Stephen Juhasz Jr is a 1990 MBA graduate of Canisius and serves on the board of regents SOUTH EDMON OS.