Daily Archives: September 20, 2021

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ABOUT PATTEN PROPERTIES

Patten Properties and its partners are recognized as being among the industry's foremost authorities on real estate investment and development across the nation. Our culture is founded on integrity and professionalism, which we proudly combine with a commitment to creating value and opportunity in today's exciting real estate environment.

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Patten Properties Continues to Accelerate Sales as Buyers Find their Freedom in Republic Grand Ranch - inForney.com

The step back from vaccination passports in England (Tory MPs fear return of Covid vaccine passports plan in England, 12 September) may be welcomed by those who see them as limiting our freedom or who complain that they would be discriminatory. I suggest, however, that any problem lies with how such a system is applied rather than being fundamental to passports.

If I wish to exclude from my home, say, unvaccinated people then that seems to me a legitimate exercise of my freedom. Similarly for any premises, according to the wishes of the proprietor. A nightclub owner is surely entitled to exclude the unvaccinated no less than those wearing trainers. This freedom is essential to maintaining a range of different environments.

There will be some locations where the decision on access properly lies with local government and others where this role belongs to central government. It is when the government mandates the use of passports where it is in no sense to the proprietor that we may need to look to the defence of our liberties.

I would have hoped that some of those protesting against passports would instead stand up for our freedom to discriminate.John Riseley Harrogate, North Yorkshire

Have an opinion on anything youve read in the Guardian today? Please email us your letter and it will be considered for publication.

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Freedom cuts both ways on vaccines - The Guardian

In the roadmap to freedom, I hear nothing about people like me, other than as a qualifying postscript to the Covid deaths: But they had an underlying health condition, says Racquel Sherry.

Freedom day doesnt include me.

Sherry, 49 and based in Sydney, is immunocompromised and afraid.

Millions of people who have been living for weeks under harsh lockdowns on Australias east coast are counting down the days to restrictions easing when 70% of the eligible population has been fully vaccinated and further lifting at 80%.

But Sherry is one of a number of people for whom the prospect of reopening is more nerve-racking than exhilarating, either due to underlying health conditions, age, work or living circumstances, or simply because the prospect of more Covid in the community is scary.

Sherry was diagnosed with kidney cancer at 18 months of age, leading to chemotherapy and radiation. After kidney failure at 24, she underwent dialysis and needed an urgent transplant. Then, 15 years ago, she survived cervical cancer without chemotherapy, which wouldve killed her. She was told at the time she had 12 months to live.

Referring to herself as the girl who refused to die, Sherry says: My Grandpa used to say, if you were a racehorse, I wouldnt bet on you.

Survival against the odds felt particularly poignant in a pandemic. I did not come this far to die of Covid, she says.

But today she feels less levity.

Ive lived with lifelong chronic illness. There are few times Ive felt discriminated against, but this is one. Immunosuppressed people work, contribute to society, yet the roadmap to freedom excludes us, she says.

How do you open the state when theres a whole cohort of people we dont know how to protect?

Under advice from her health specialist, Sherry will continue to isolate, especially as the city reopens.

She has had two Pfizer vaccines despite specialists saying they probably wont work well on her.

For my body to not reject a foreign organ, they gave me tablets to suppress my bodys immune response. Covid vaccines rely on your immune system, she says.

I got vaccinated anyway. Ive got someone elses kidney inside me, Im unafraid of putting things inside my body. That tiny bit of protection is better than not having it, but Im eagerly awaiting research findings on a third vaccine shot for people like me.

The risk to Sherry now comes from others leaving lockdown.

Immunocompromised people like me can be hospitalised from head colds and gastro, so when people were at supermarkets in masks and with sanitiser etcetera, I ironically felt safer than ever. Suddenly everyone was in my world, she says.

At first, with our low Covid numbers, I thought, thank God I live in Australia. When the second wave hit I got anxious, thinking, thisll blow up.

That anxiety is now intensifying as reopening inches closer.

Previously, if someone coughed on a train, Id move seats. Catching it could give me pneumonia. Now, my sickness radar no longer helps me. Vaccinated people might have Covid with mild or no symptoms I wont know whos sick and who isnt.

Sherry isnt the only one whos concerned. Even though she is doubled vaccinated, 92-year-old Val Fell from Wollongong has no intention of going out into the world any time soon.

I worry the already stretched hospital system will buckle if we open too soon, she says.

She is also worried that the slow vaccine rollout means she will inevitably come into contact with people who havent yet been immunised.

Once we reopen, Id come across a whole bunch of unvaccinated people especially younger people still waiting for their jabs who could pass on the virus, she says.

Even those in states not currently locked down are fearful.

Mo Ors* is 75 and lives on the Gold Coast with a home aged care package. She now never leaves the house, not even to shop for food.

The pandemic made me a recluse, she says.

Since the start Ive been very apprehensive about catching this bloody thing. For people like me, its a killer.

Ors lives with autoimmune problems and anxiety. Shes also acutely aware of her advancing age.

Age gives you hindsight. I now realise lifes too precious and fragile to play around with. This thing is lethal. Its serious, she says.

Although desperate to see her grandchildren again, Ors doesnt plan on leaving her house until 90% of the eligible population is vaccinated.

In addition to being worried, Im angry, she says. We were in a terrific position in Australia. Its been a complete botch up because Scott Morrisons government didnt procure enough Pfizer.

Dr Nienke Zomerdijk says immunocompromised people will need to continue staying home and minimising contact with family and friends due to the life-threatening possibility of contracting Covid.

And thats hard for them theres a concerning impact on their mental health, Zomerdijk, a psychosocial oncology researcher from the University of Melbourne, says.

Their bodies produce lower antibodies so they dont respond as well to two vaccine doses.

Zomerdijk is watching the UK closely. Cases increased there after restrictions were eased.

Theyre about to administer booster doses and will prioritise immunocompromised people. Even though theres continued uncertainty in the efficacy for these people, we should adopt that here. Its a matter of time until that new wave of concern reaches Australia.

Forty-three-year-old James Cullen, from Kallangur in Queensland, says hes extremely apprehensive about the nation reopening due to his hereditary type 2 diabetes and his living arrangement in a shared house.

My housemates are as concerned as me, but one works in a high school and theyre usually great sources of whatever cold or flu is going around. So that particular housemate has a higher chance of actually getting it, he says.

Commuting also causes him stress.

I travel by train, and while most people wear masks, theres still plenty who keep them on their chin unless they see someone of authority, he says. Idiots talking about their rights not to wear one clearly shows how much they care about people like me who are terrified of this virus and most at risk.

Zomerdijk stresses the need to raise awareness that freedom day isnt fully inclusive. Its another reason vaccination is so important: to accelerate normality resuming for everybody.

Studies the University of Melbourne conducted this year show blood cancer patients are the most at risk of Covid mortality, at 34%.

But they showed they are also most at risk of psychological damage.

The difficult question is, does the risk of getting the virus outweigh the benefits of seeing loved ones or going to work for those who cant work from home? Zomerdijk says.

Racquel Sherry is philosophical. Whilst I am frustrated, Im vicariously happy about restrictions lifting for people I know it needs to happen for: small businesses, those whose livelihoods are reliant on reopening, she says.

Im very aware of the sacrifices theyve made.

* Name changed for privacy reasons

Link:

Freedom day doesnt include me: for some, the end of lockdown will be a time of fear - The Guardian

Whats happening?

Andreas Gassen, the head of the National Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians (KBV), said Germany should take inspiration from England and lift Covid restrictions at the end of October.

The UK government removed almost all Covid-19 legal restrictions such as mandatory mask wearing in England on July 19th.

Since then, England has seen a fairly high number of infections though its gone up and down. After cases fell at the end of July, the average number of daily confirmed cases climbed again in August and early September but have started to ease off again.

(article continues below)

After the experience of Britain, we should also have the courage to do what worked on the island, Gassen told the Neue Osnabrcker Zeitung at the weekend.

So whats needed now is a clear announcement from politicians: in six weeks, its Freedom Day here too! On October 30th, all restrictions will be lifted!

READ ALSO:

The Our World in Data map shows the number of Covid cases per million people in the UK compared to Germany.

Gassen said the October 30th deadline would give everyone the chance to go and get vaccinated if they havent already.

He said that in the UK the healthcare system did not collapse after Freedom Day.

Thats encouraging, especially since the German healthcare system is significantly more efficient than the British one and could treat significantly more seriously ill patients, which we hope we wont have either, the KBV boss explained.

Without the announcement of a Freedom Day, the pandemic would drag on in Germany, he said.

Whats the reaction?

Theres been a lot of pushback.

Chancellor Angela Merkels chief of staff Helge Braun said he didnt believe it was a good idea because there could be another Covid wave without adequate vaccination protection.

We should not promise to lift the restrictions until the percentage of those vaccinated has increased significantly, especially in the older age groups in other words, we achieve community immunity, Braun said.

READ ALSO:

SPD health expert Karl Lauterbach, slammed the approach, saying it was simply testing what our health care system can withstand, how many patients can also be treated.

He also said it was unrealistic to hope to motivate people to get vaccinated by announcing a Freedom Day. He suggested issuing a goal of an 85 percent vaccination rate among the adult population and announcing that substantial relaxations could come when that mark is reached.

As things stand, around 81 percent of over-16s are fully vaccinated in the UK while about 65 percent of the population is fully-jabbed.

In Germany, vaccines against Covid have been licensed for those aged 12 and above so far. This age group includes 73.9 million people. At least one vaccine dose has been given to 55.9 million people so far. Of these, 52.5 million people have already been fully vaccinated.

Around 67.2 percent of the total population has received at least one jab in Germany, and 63.1 percent are fully vaccinated.

Andrew Ullmann, of the pro-business FDP, said he thought the discussion about lifting Covid rules was the right way forward. However, he said it was too early to give a specific date. In the coming weeks, he said, Covid developments have to be closely monitored.

Lower Saxonys Health Minister Daniela Behrens (SPD) opposed the move. She said it is still too reckless.

Whats the Covid situation in Germany?

On Monday around 3,736 Covid infections were reported within the last 24 hours and 13 deaths. The 7-day incidence stood at 71 cases per 100,000 people. The incidence has remained stable and has even decreased in the last weeks. But hospital admissions have gone up.

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Should Germany have its own Covid 'Freedom Day' in six weeks? - The Local Germany

Afghan women protested outside the offices of the Taliban morality police in Kabul on Sunday after the militant group shut down the ministry of women's affairs, local news reported.

The protesters demonstrated against the closure of the women's ministry and called for their rights to employment and education.

The women held signs with messages including, "elimination of women = elimination of human beings."

On Thursday, women who worked at the women's ministry were locked out, Reuters reported.

The next day, the signage was changed to the "propagation of virtue and the prevention of vice."

Although there is little information about the new ministry, it is expected to enforce strict religious doctrines.

The chief of the morality police in Kandahar told The Observer that new rules include women only being allowed to leave home if accompanied by a male guardian, compulsory prayer, and stipulations on beard length for men.

Women in Afghanistan have been fearful of the future after the militant group took control of the country last month.

During the Taliban's previous rule in the 1990s, severe restrictions were placed on women's lives. Although the group has promised to be less severe, they have already begun limiting women's freedom.

This week the Taliban banned girls from attending secondary school. The group permitted women to attend universities as long as they wore Islamic dress and segregated classrooms by gender.

However, if girls are not permitted to attend secondary school, their ability to attend university will be meaningless.

The group also said that women were not permitted to work alongside men, virtually prohibiting them from most workplaces.

Although the militant group has continually promised to allow women to work in accordance with sharia law, it is unclear what that will mean.

Afghan women have been leading the opposition movement against the Taliban, staging several protests in the last few weeks.

The new virtue and vice ministry is an indication of the kind of strict Islamic society the Taliban wants to shape.

Although the group includes a call to respect women in the department's guidelines, they also stipulate that women should not have contact with any men outside of immediate family and should not leave the house without a guardian or a hijab.

The Kandahar morality police chief told The Observer that Afghans would be encouraged to call in and report on their neighbors if they break the rules.

Leaders of the new department are likely aware of how it is perceived internationally, The Observer said. When they handed out an English language list of new cabinet appointments earlier this month, the vice and virtue ministry was the only one not translated.

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Afghan women protest their freedom outside virtue and vice ministry - Business Insider

To the police called tothe reported home invasion in Lancaster, a few things felt off from the start.

One of the officers who responded that winter day in 2000 noted in a report "the lack of fresh footprints in the snow,"odd for a violent crime that reportedly involved more than one suspect.

Inside the house, that officer's questions continued. Some rare comic books and $10,000 had been reported taken from a safe, along with some select pieces of jewelry.

"The house was gone through far too selectively for my taste," the officer wrote.

A detective who interviewed the two adult victims reported that one "seemed to be relaying a story rather than recalling from memory."

And the neighbors, well, none of them recalled seeing anything unusual when the crime was to have occurred.

Some of these details might havehelped Ralph Blaine Smith at trial, if heand his attorneys had known about them.

But the evidence was never provided by the Fairfield County prosecutor at the time, Gregg Marx. And Smith, basedon the identification of the adult victims who said both their assailants were masked but that the mask of one kept falling down, was sent to prison for 67 years.

Now he is free, after a 21-year slog marked by failed appeals, legal dead-ends and dogged determination.

The Smith case exhibits how easily our criminal justice system, which we like to believe rests immoveable upon a strongfoundation, can be tipped on its side by the actions of just one of its key players.

So compromised, it is a monster to get right-side-up again.

Smith, 46, shared his story throughout this summer with Dispatch court reporter John Futty. Last week, Smith received the news he'd been hoping for, that current Fairfield County Prosecutor Kyle Witt had decided to dismiss all charges against him rather than pursue another trial.

Smith maintained from the start that he was innocent, but it took years to shake loose the information that ultimately set him free.

Early on, his maternal grandmother provided the moneyto push his legal fight, but she died in 2006. He researched the law and filedmotions himself. A cousin lent a hand. Eventually, attorney Joe Landusky joined his quest. Martin Yant, a Columbus private investigator with a long track record of ferreting out compromised criminal cases, dug up much of the evidence that cast doubt on whether the home invasion had occurred at all.

It was evidence that Marx had known about at the time of trial, but decided not to turn over to the defense.

Under law, prosecutors have to turn over exculpatory evidence, which is any information that could create reasonable doubt about a defendant's guilt.

Marx testified at a hearing before Fairfield County Common Pleas Court Judge Richard E. Berens nearly a year ago that he did not provide the evidence to the defense because hedid not view it as "exculpatory."

I covered police and crime for yearsand have spent a good amount of time in court. I know what I think, butI did not go to law school.

Berens did, though, and here's his take on Marx's decision to sit on the information, particularly that one officer's supplemental report:

"Given what little was presented at trial, Smith could have used these suppressed materials to put on a much stronger defense by cultivating an entirely new angle of doubt: that perhaps no crime occurred at all," Berens wrote. "Suggestions that a crime did not actually occur would fit most definitions of 'exculpatory,' in this court's view."

Berens ruled on June 9 that Smith deserved a new trial, saying the withheld evidence "undermined confidence in the verdict...and violated Smith's right to due process."

Upon dismissing all charges, Witt noted that he was not declaring Smith innocent. Because Smith had already served 21 years, the prosecutor simply said he had decided to forego another trial.

He also did not want to label those long-ago decisions by Marxprosecutorial misconduct.

He did say, "I think I would have provided information that this office didn't provide 20 years ago."

Maybe Marx made an honest judgment call. But given Smith's conviction, and his 21-year struggle to undo it, one is left to wonder what other judgment calls Witt's predecessormadeduring his 34 years with the Fairfield County prosecutor's office.

tdecker@dispatch.com

@Theodore_Decker

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Theodore Decker: Man released after 21 years in prison looks back on slog toward freedom - The Columbus Dispatch

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The 2020 census captured a Texas that does not exist in its halls of power: a diverse state that is growing almost exclusively because of people of color and where the Hispanic and white populations are nearly equal in size.

But when the Texas Legislature convenes Monday to do the work of incorporating a decades worth of population growth into new political maps, the Republicans in charge nearly all of whom are white will have a freer hand to cement their power and try to shield themselves from the change that growth represents.

The 2021 redistricting cycle will mark the first time in nearly half a century that a Legislature with a lengthy record of discriminating against voters of color will be able to redraw political districts without federal oversight designed to keep harmful maps from immediately going into effect.

And now, once those maps are enacted, the voters of color and civil rights groups that for decades have fought discrimination in the courts may face a federal judiciary less willing to doubt lawmakers partisan motivations even if they come at the expense of Hispanic and Black Texans.

I hate to be an alarmist. I want to look for the silver lining, but I dont see one, said Jose Garza, a veteran civil rights attorney who has represented the Texas Houses Mexican American Legislative Caucus for a decade. I think that this is a time of great opportunity for the Republicans.

The Legislatures work during this months special legislative session will include the complex and contentious process of redrawing maps for Congress, the Texas House, the Texas Senate and the State Board of Education to evenly distribute the states fast-growing population. On the congressional front, lawmakers must also reconfigure the map to incorporate the two additional districts the state earned because of its growth.

Like most other states, Texas leaves this task to the same lawmakers whose individual electoral survival and collective political dominance depend on how district boundaries are set up.

Former President Donald Trump claimed 52% of the vote in last years election, but Republicans hold 64% of the states seats in Congress, 58% of seats in the Texas Senate and 55% of seats in the Texas House. The GOP, however, is facing demographic changes that fundamentally work against the partys efforts to maintain or even bolster its majorities in the statehouse and in the states congressional delegation.

Republicans disproportionately rely on white voters to elect them, but people of color were behind 95% of the states population growth since 2010. Hispanic Texans alone were responsible for half of that increase. And the 2020 census found that the Hispanic population 39.3% of the total population was nearly equal in size to the non-Hispanic white population, which makes up 39.8%.

Whats more, population growth over the last decade was largely concentrated in areas where Republicans are faltering. The states suburbs, many of which have turned blue in recent years or are trending in that direction, grew the fastest. Meanwhile, the states five most populous counties Harris, Dallas, Bexar, Travis and Tarrant became home to roughly 44% of the states 4 million new residents. Harris, Dallas, Bexar and Travis are decisively blue counties. Tarrant, which is historically red but voted Democratic at the top of the ticket in 2018 and 2020, actually saw its white population decrease by more than 30,000 in the last decade.

Despite the challenging demographic landscape, the U.S. Supreme Court paved an easier road to Republican dominance with two highly consequential rulings in the last decade.

In 2013, the high court scrapped the federal Voting Rights Acts long-standing safeguard, known as preclearance, that prevented states with discriminatory track records like Texas from enacting new voting rules or maps without first getting federal approval to ensure that they didnt pull back on the voting rights of people of color. Years later, the court also ruled that federal judges cannot limit partisan gerrymandering, giving lawmakers even more freedom to justify extreme revisions to their maps by citing political motives.

Theyve got a shield that they can discriminate against [people of color] and say its all about partisanship and theres not going to be any review from Washington, D.C., on what they do, Garza said. They have this great strength because they control all the seats of power and dont have [preclearance], but they also have this sense of desperation because so many of their districts are severely underpopulated. I think thats a formula for disaster for the minority community and for Democrats.

During the last redistricting cycle, Republicans defended their maps by arguing that they were drawn based on partisan advantage, rather than race. But federal judges eventually ruled that lawmakers intentionally discriminated against Hispanic and Black voters by giving them less say in choosing who represents them in the Texas House and in Congress. In districts where lawmakers supposedly used race in the name of complying with the Voting Rights Act, which is allowed, the judges found they instead turned the VRA on its head by unnecessarily crowding Hispanic voters into certain districts.

For decades and in that round of mapmaking, preclearance which was granted by the U.S. Department of Justice or a Washington federal court served as a critical safeguard to political redistricting in a state with a tradition of suppressing Hispanic and Black voters by blocking the Legislatures initial maps from being used.

Under that regime, the Department of Justice lodged objections to Texas maps at least eight times in less than three decades. In total, the department objected to 207 voting changes made in Texas in that time period more than in any other state subject to preclearance.

The last time a Washington federal court refused to clear the Legislatures maps in 2012, it noted the case against the state included more evidence of discriminatory intent than we have space, or need, to address here.

Republicans in charge of the process in the House and Senate, whose offices did not respond to interview requests for this article, have so far said they are taking a transparent and cordial approach to whats often a contentious process.

As you know, the legal issues around redistricting are complex and continually evolving, state Sen. Joan Huffman recently told other senators on the chambers redistricting committee, which she chairs. Please know that I continue to be committed to a fair, transparent and legal process, and I encourage participation and input from each of you as we work together toward this goal.

When he was appointed to chair the Houses committee, state Rep. Todd Hunter acknowledged in a statement that redistricting is never easy but promised he was fully committed to a fair process.

But since the enactment of the Voting Rights Act in 1965, Texas has not made it through a single decade without a federal court ruling that it violated that federal law or the U.S. Constitution and ordering it to correct its legal mistakes.

Certainly is it the case that the Legislature has demonstrated it has zero institutional memory when it comes to redistricting and that could be a willful ignorance on its part, said Nina Perales, the vice president of litigation at the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, who has challenged the states maps in the last two redistricting cycles. If the past can tell us anything about the future, it would be that Texas turns a blind eye to the court rulings of the past that found discrimination.

Though lawmakers this year will be deciphering how the future of representation and political control will shape up, the echoes of legislative work from a decade ago are ringing loudly. Ten years ago, Republicans also controlled the entire process, had a roster of nearly all white lawmakers and were confronting census numbers that showed people of color had accounted for nearly all of the states population gains.

At a committee hearing in 2011, a lawmaker asked Perales what lawmakers should keep in mind in that years redistricting effort given the states previous missteps. The lesson, she told them at the time, is that we should not repeat past mistakes.

Those dynamics are reverberating so profoundly that Perales unintentionally quoted herself in imploring todays lawmakers to not extend the states long-running practice of violating the voting rights of people of color in redistricting.

Redistricting plans should avoid the mistakes of the past, Perales told the Texas Senates committee on redistricting in a public hearing last week.

As in 2011, this years deliberations will be backdropped by months of debates over whether the Legislature is sufficiently acknowledging the different lived realities of Texans based on their race.

A decade ago, lawmakers were fighting over Republican legislation to allow law enforcement to ask about the immigration status of people they detained, as well as a new stringent voter ID law that was later found to have discriminated against Hispanic and Black voters. Democrats repeatedly warned those proposals would disproportionately burden people of color; Republicans dismissed those concerns.

This spring, the regular legislative session was dominated by clashes over legislation to restrict how the legacy of racism can be taught in Texas schools, plus sweeping legislation to create new restrictions on voting that Democrats said would raise new barriers for marginalized voters, especially voters of color.

Debates on the former featured tense exchanges between Democrats of color and white Republicans who appeared to reject the idea that some of the countrys founding principles, including the three-fifths clause of the U.S. Constitution, were racist, instead describing slavery as a deviation from those principles.

At one point, House Speaker Dade Phelan asked lawmakers to avoid even using the word racism during a floor debate on the voting bill.

The level of anti-minority legislation that came out of this session of the Legislature, in my mind, far exceeds anything weve seen in recent memory, said Gary Bledsoe, the longtime president of the Texas chapter of the NAACP, which has previously challenged the states redistricting work. This session is a throwback. It seems like the idea of turning back the hands of time to go back to another era seems to be motivating individuals.

With redistricting up next on the docket, Bledsoe said he anticipated for the states new maps to be built on the suppressed votes he believes will result from the states new voting restrictions.

All of this works together, Bledsoe said. All that fits hand in hand so when you come out with marginal seats or seats that may be more at risk because youre trying to take too many seats, that gives you your chance.

Join us Sept. 20-25 at the 2021 Texas Tribune Festival. Tickets are on sale now for this multi-day celebration of big, bold ideas about politics, public policy and the days news, curated by The Texas Tribunes award-winning journalists. Learn more.

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In a changing Texas, Republicans will begin redistricting with more freedom to draw their maps - The Texas Tribune

The Underground Railroad was more than a route to freedom; it was a movement that transcended the lines of race and gender not just nationally, but here in Oneida County. The countys efforts along the freedom trail highlighted the cooperation of free and enslaved groups black, white, men, women who pushed New York State and the nation one step closer to universal freedom.

Colgate University Intern Ashley Tourtelot developed the newest exhibition at the History Center which focuses on the Underground Railroad in Oneida County. Social, political, and economic factors made the route to freedom possible.

On Saturday, Sept. 25, at 1 p.m. Ashley will discuss how abolitionist sentiments emerged and grew in central New York while also spotlighting a few of Uticas own developments in the freedom struggle, including the Utica Riot, Utica Rescue, and Post Avenue settlements.

Tourtelot grew up in Rome. After graduating from Rome Free Academy in 2018, she attended Colgate University where she is a member of the 2022 graduating class. She is majoring in history with a minor in writing and rhetoric. Ashley is a member of the History Club, Pre-Law Society, and a videographer for Colgates football team

The event is free and will take place in the OCHC gallery. In accordance with local, federal, & CDC guidelines, masks are required for all visitors regardless of vaccination status during public events and programs. This program will be recorded and available on the OCHC Youtube channel.

The Oneida County History Center is a private 501(c) (3) not-for-profit educational institution dedicated to preserving the history, heritage, and culture of the Greater Mohawk Valley for present and future generations. Admission to this program is free for the general public; donations are encouraged. Contact the History Center at 315-735-3642 or visit the OCHC website (www.oneidacountyhistory.org) for more information.

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CNY and the birth of the Oneida County Freedom Trail talk Sept. 25 - Rome Sentinel

Ed Berthiaume| For The Post-Crescent

APPLETON - Molly Preston calls it a love letter to Wisconsin.

The New Jersey native fell hard for Appleton, the Fox Citiesand Wisconsin when she arrived as a first-year student at Lawrence University 15 years ago. She loved the picturesque landscape and the small-city vibe that blended active arts advocacy with Midwest niceties.

Now, the aspiring filmmaker has brought her Portland, Oregon-based film crew to the Fox Cities to film scenes forFreedom, WI, a coming-of-age comedy that she has written and is directing.

Wisconsin will always be that place that feels like going back home, Preston said.

The film crew, 15 to 20 strong on any given day, has been shooting scenes in and near downtown Appleton as well as nearby locations in Kaukauna, Menasha, Greenvilleand, yes, Freedom, since the middle of August.

Preston is hopeful the movie its centered on a young woman living in small-town Wisconsin who has her routine disrupted when she strikes up a friendship with a writer from Chicago will be ready for the film festival circuit next summer.

MORE:32 movies with Wisconsin ties in 2020, from 'Like a Boss' to 'Wonder Woman 1984'

MORE:How Lawrence's Laurie Carter went from first-gen student to university president

It was while a student at Lawrence that Preston first began entertaining the idea of a career in film. It was before Lawrences Film Studies program launched, but the history major found herself drawn to a number of history classes that focused on film.

I took every single film-related class that I possibly could, she said, pointing to insights from history professors Peter Blitstein and Paul Cohen as being particularly helpful in allowing her to connect her love of history with her passion for film.

She learned to look at films through the lens of history.

You are not only analyzing the film for what the filmmaker did the cinematography, the acting you are also analyzing a moment in time, Preston said. What the historical context is when the film was written and when it was shot gender norms of the time and the political climate. Its just really interesting to think about history through watching a movie and figuring out how the world was in that moment and how that might have influenced the filmmakers to make the movie in that particular way.

Those are analytical skills, she said, that come into play now as she finds herself writing and directing her own stories.

I found that while I dont technically work in the field of history, learning how to analyze text and figure out the narrative based on facts you read from different sources has made me a better filmmaker, a better writer, she said. Its definitely benefited my work in film.

Preston moved to Portland eight years ago to try to make headway in the film industry. She started as a production assistant, then moved into editing and producing before jumping into her own project withFreedom, WI, a story she began writing while living in Appleton shortly after graduating from Lawrence.

The storyline is dark but comedic, she said, focused on a young woman in the tiny Town of Freedom who enters adulthood grappling with grief. A relationship with a struggling writer from Chicago sets her on an unexpected journey of self-discovery.

Her film career is still a work in progress, but Preston is hopeful this film will be a stepping stone to more opportunities.

In the meantime, shespent nearly a month in Appleton and the Fox Cities, working alongside her husband, who serves as director of photography, and a film crew that has grown tight.

Its a fun time with friends, old friends and new friends, Preston said of being back in Appleton. We work such long hours, but we have our fun while were working.

Ed Berthiaume is director of public information at Lawrence University. He can be reached ated.c.berthiaume@lawrence.edu

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Lawrence University alum back in Fox Cities shooting a movie, 'Freedom, WI' - Post-Crescent

In the final weeks of an 11-month Nottingham Forest tenure that ended last week, Chris Hughton would frequently talk about his desire to change formation; to try something different.

It was not just something discussed in the media Hughton had the same conversations with his coaching staff as they searched for a way to break their malaise.

But, to the end, he remained convinced he did not have the personnel to switch from his preferred 4-2-3-1. He never did. If he was monitoring events at Huddersfield Town on Saturday in Forests first game without him, Hughton might have felt a pang of regret.

In contrast, if Steve Cooper the man who is set to replace him in the dugout, with confirmation of the former Swansea City managers appointment expected imminently was doing the same, he will surely have been given some positive food for thought.

Because there was a new formation, a new approach and a new outcome as interim manager Steven Reid changed to a 3-4-3 system and immediately breathed fresh life into the team. It inspired a performance that secured a deserved first Championship win of the season at the eighth attempt and, more than that, suggested Cooper will be armed with the flexibility to play more than one way when he begins work.

Cooper also often favoured the 4-2-3-1 formation for much of the past two seasons at Swansea, but did also have lengthy spells when he switched to a 3-4-1-2 set-up. Tactically, the Welshman is somebody who is happy to mix things up.

He was not understood to have been among the crowd at the John Smiths Stadium as the final negotiations were completed over his appointment.

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'Freedom' and new formation show Forest have options in the team, with Cooper confirmation expected soon - The Athletic