" On the news today, high amounts of lead found in turf, most schools will delay instillation until a study is done "

" agreed quiver-the police blotter is more interesting than turf! lol.
Turf is like the presidental elections more blah blah blah. "

" Karl acts like that because he thinks his verbose nature masks his true ignorance. "

" i love baseball. i love to read about baseball. i do not care about motocross or multiple back-flips. all the ranting is not going to change my opinion. i respect that karl is rabid for his own preferences and it is quite possible that he would be better served by toning it down just a little bit instead trying to be so antagonizing. "

" What I miss about the Citizen is the police Blotter. Ya know, you "ain't" no one til you land in the blotter! Kind of like being a celebrity.

Can we all stop the Turf talk? It makes for boring readings. "

" Sick of having to read about baseball, period!
This weekend, a rider just landed a double-backflip on a motorcycle--where's the story?
There are motocross races taking place every Sunday where heroic battles are fought and triumphantly won by riders who don't use steroids, don't b!tch and whine about their contracts, and don't spit at or flip off their fans. "

" What is up with the Citizen? Are the Yankees the only team that plays baseball? NO.. There are several other teams and there is one other in NY that deserves equal coverage. Everytime a Yankee stubs his toe we dont have to have it on the front page. Sick of always having to read about the Yankess. "

" ITS LIKE GRASS IS THE STUFF MAN ,TURF JUST AINT WORTH THE MONEY , "

" Within a few years the turf will be pulled out for regular grass. "

" All this turf issue is that a bunch of parents who never made it insports, are now wanttabes thur their kids and they figured that thur turf they or I mean their kids will be pro material that they never were. Put the turf in a grave, Auburn doesn't need it. The money should go towards education, graduation and college. Hopefully they graduate from college ,and come back to Auburn and help return it to what it use to be. Not what it is today. "

" Anyone see the article "Sludge Tested As Lead-Poisoning Fix?" (It's one of those appearing/disappearing AP articles).

Some govt agency tilled sludge (human sewage waste solids) into the lawns at homes of urban poor families in Baltimore to see if it might mitigate the effects of lead in their environments (areas were lots of lead paint has been used in the past).

No follow-up testing of the health of people living in those homes has been carried out as far as the article writer knew.

The scary thing about sludge is that it is only tested for 9 heavy metals before being declared "safe" when there are hundreds of known dangerous and potentially dangerous contaminants in sewage -- we've been hearing recently about the stuff in our water containing pharmaceuticals, cleaning products, diseases, carcinogens, anything and everything that gets flushed -- this is solid part of the same stuff.

Questionably high rates of several of the heavy metals for which they do test are allowed, and they don't even test any other dangerous contaminants, much less do they have any idea of the interactions of various contaminants with each other or with other things spread on farm fields or in the environment in general.

This sludge stuff ("biosolids") is getting spread not only on these lawns, but on farm fields where they grow food -- right here in the Auburn area. If I told which farm(s) I know for sure are using it, The Citizen wouldn't publish my comments, but I can say there are farm(s) within minutes of downtown Auburn where they are spreading human waste on agricultural fields.

Here's one article I found which was a bit easier to read than the more detailed info you can dig through at the Cornell Waste Management site (which I always take with a grain of salt given how prejudiced Cornell is towards corporate farming):

http://www.foodandsocietyfellows.org/library/uploadedFiles/Taking_It_Slow_on_Sludge.htm

It's in YOUR environment too, city dwellers -- in your air, water, soil and now in your food as well. "

" Badgers and wolverines are wild animals (the latter are particularly noted for their ferocity); dogs are domesticated. Huge difference.

Thanks, Angmom -- a little gleam of the positive among the grumbles! (Mea culpa as well) "

" Votr no on everything the school board brings forth until they know what no means! "

" So Jim, that means that some other guy in some other part of the state is thinking,"...geez..my tax dollars are being spent in Auburn, that sucks..." It's not like they are earmarking the money coming from Auburn for this. You can vote yes, as a lot of people will, but we really don't want the burden of the replacement of a turf field years down the road. If enough communities say not to this, maybe the state will get the message, and tell the turf salesmen to take a hike, and put that money back into where it'll do more good, for all students, and just a handful of kids. "

" I hope everyone has been enjoying the beautiful weather this weekend. "

" I'd like to clarify some things...

1. The budget you will vote on in May is the district's annual operating budget. This budget contains the funds to educate and operate the district. It is not a capital project. The turf project is not included in the May budget vote.

2. The capital project will be voted on separately - I think I read that vote will be in June. That is the vote that includes the turf.

3. The private funds being raised for the turf is intended to cover the local share of the project only. The state will still pay the bulk of the cost for the turf. My understanding is about half of the local share has been raised to date.

4. If you vote down the capital project, the state funds targeted for Auburn will be redirected to another project in New York state. So your state tax dollars can be spent here in Auburn or in some other district in the state. It's your decision.

I'll be voting yes in May and I'll vote yes in June. I'm not a big fan of turf but I can't abide my state tax dollars being spent in another community when we can keep them right here in town. Voting no simply because of turf is cutting off your nose to spite your face. "

" justaround, your missing something. If you have to vote on the Turf question in anyway then some part of it is in the budget. Like the matching State Funds. Here's the twist. If you vote yes to the budget and Turf then the "Private Funds" can dry up. Thus leaving no private funds for paying for the Turf. But, since you and the other tax payers voted yes, now they can raise your taxes and spend the money anyway. If it's privately funded it does not need a vote. If there is a vote be very careful or you may be paying for something you did not expect. "

" I'm sure there are some badgers and wolverines that are nice too, but overall I wouldn't trust one. "

" If the school budget does not include the turf cost why would you vote the budget down? From what I heard it is being funded privately and isn't going to be included in the budget. If upkeep later in years is included in the budget then you have the right to vote it down if that is how you feel. If you want to vote a budget down, vote it down for reasons within the budget, not something that isn't going to be part of the budget process. "

" There are multiuse stadiums on the Professional level which use natural grass. Grass is fine. Turf is not a neccessity, and I encourage everyone to vote down the budget until they get that fact through to their pea brains. "

" Alliance Stadium had Astro turf which had it's problems. Our discussion is the use of Field turf. Also many baseball stadiums use natural grass as baseball is not that hard on the playing as is football or soccer. "

" QT
Great post....give Buffy a hug for me!
"

" When you really think about it, who cares about the artificial turf issues? "

" If the artificial turf is so great, how come the Alliance Stadium took it out of their field and started with grass again?


Is this not a fair question? "

" I've known plenty of sweet pit bulls.
I DOES come down to the owners and the upbringing. If an owner is negligent in the dog's early life, and doesn't conscientiously train the dog to be socialized and friendly, they WILL tend toward more violence than some breeds. But that can be prevented by training.
One of the problems is that some people who should never own a dog in the FIRST place raise them as some silly and pathetic pseudo-representation of their shallow masculinity. "

" Another pit bull attacked its owner; when are people going to learn? Pit bulls belong in the same category as lions and tigers and should be kept in cages so they can't get at people.

Who is the moron that knows nothing about the APBT breed?? I had a girlfriend that bred them. She also shows them. I have shown ABPT's for 2 years. They are in the UKC registry. I own a champion pit and she has been temperment tested. The only fierce things about her are her tounge and her tail. And speaking of UKC dog shows, I have never seen any of them fight while being judged, and they are roughly 8 feet apart. The people at the shows are responsible and know how to handle their dogs. Besides the ABPT, their are other dogs being shown, such as, Jack Russel Terriers, Golden Retrievers and I knew a women the was showing Afghans. The nosiest, feistiest ones were the JRT's. I have seen them fight amongst themselves, couple times the owners had to separate them. But, if you know JRT's, they are very high strung and sometimes very aggressive.
You people that hear these "horror stories" of these "flash Eating" Pitbulls are nothing short of ignorant. I am not saying that Pit's are NOT bred for fighting. To some, there is BIG money in it. I am totally against it. But there are some breeders aka "Puppy Mills" that bred litter after litter for money and money only. Well guess who buys a lot of these dogs??? Give up?? The fighting community. Sometimes they will send a Decoy family to purchase a dog. They will act like it is going to a good home. Well, guess what, they will exchange the dog to the criminal for cash, and the dog is trained to fight. When we would have a litter, which was rare. My ex would only breed to better the breed. This includes correcting faults that would make the dog be more competitive in conformation events. So, part of her job would be researching either stud or dam through their papers. Seeing what kind of blood , number of Champions, other details. Once she found what she was looking for she would have a breeding. There would be vet checks, proof of temperment testing and her interacting with the potential stud or dam. There would be a week of conception, usually 3 "ties". She cared for the dam (if it was in our house). She is a vet tech, so she would watch the vitals and overall health of the Mom. Babies were born and she checked them at birth and everyday for the next 6 weeks. When it came time to sell them, she would interview the buyers if she didn't know them. This included a questionaire and visit to their house. She also had them sign releases that they would not be used for fighting. Once the pups were with their new owner, she would make a stop to see how things are going. There are a few breeders like that.
That's enough about my ex. God, who did post that stupid statement????
Anyways, their are other dogs that should be handled like lions and tigers. Those are the ones that are not raised in loving homes. Every breed has it's share of horror stories, but it's the Yankee Terrier that gets the bad rap. I remember when it was the German Shepherd and the Doberman Pinscher. Those dogs are very good man eaters if they are trained that way.

Once again STUPID PEOPLE are breeding. "

" Pit Bulls can be very nice dogs, however because of their breeding even a "nice" pit bull is more likely to turn violent than other breeds. "

" Seems like a lot of non-dog owners are posting. I have two adult Rottweilers who are good with children, cats and other dogs. As being a long time large dog owner, its how the dog is raised and not the breed itself. I was attacked and bittem when I was a kid by a maltreated Old English Sheepdog... "

" P.S. The nastiest dog I ever knew personally was a toy poodle -- it chewed the heck out of my little brother's leg when he was about 2 and just walking around the yard. The dog had been teased and tormented by my uncle and spoiled by my grandmother and was a filthy, stinking, nasty animal. That doesn't mean I think all toy poodles should be destroyed, even though I tend to think all that breeding to get them small makes them high-strung if not outright mean. "

" I ran into a pitbull at the vet the other day. She was the sweetest, friendliest old girl -- had been with her family her whole life (I think her owner said she was 12), always loving and affectionate, never a problem. Sure, SOME pitbulls are bred to attack, and trained to be mean on top of the breeding, but not all of them. This old girl was a sweetheart and I had no problem letting her slobber all over my hand and waggle her tail when I petted and thumped her and scratched behind her ears even though I was a stranger to her, and she gave no trouble to my elderly mini-rex rabbit (who lived through the encounter, but has since passed away at the ripe old age of 9 1/2). That dog was not bred for fighting or attacking. Period. "

" Golf clubber in Syracuse was right to protect his and his neighbors property. he is lucky the thug didn't have a gun on him.

The Civil Service Commision is doing the right thing. The City put a hiring freeze in knowing it was going to create this problem.

If a dog attacks someone, they should be shot, as should their owner.

The central tennet of the turf issue is we need to improve our EDUCATIONAL facilities, not our PLAYING fields.
"

" As for the guy in Syracuse with the golf club, keep up the good work. You'll probably get fined,put on probation and the little hoods family will sue you, maybe the guy from Boces Joe L. will take up a collection for you. "

" The civil service commission made the right choice! The young people with high school and college educations are leaving Auburn as fast as they can, why? no jobs. So they city offers tests for civil services jobs,the young spend money to submit an application for the test, and take the test and pass, and then the city says oh, lets transfer someone out side the city and give them the job,heck with keeping our young talent here. They could be like Hammon, gets trained by the city, packs up and goes some where else, then jumps over other qualified offices in the Fire Dept to be chief. Yea the young will keep leaving. "

" Hold up now.....

You're after someone with a golf club, and they run away...that gives you the express right to run after them and beat the daylights out of them when they haven't committed a crime as of yet? It doesn't matter what their intentions were, they still do not have the right to be judge and jury! Last I knew...people were innocent until proven guilty (even if they were casing for unlocked cars)! Point of fact they didn't find one, and this nitwit went out and assaulted one. He's no hero, he's someone who was slighted and took the law into his own hands and got carried away.

Personally I think pit bulls should be destroyed on site. They were bred for one purpose, and that was fighting.
"

" Pit bulls should be muzzled when in public. They are bred to attack. It has nothing to do with the owner or it's training it's about breeding. "