Cortlandville Town Supervisor Greg Leach Joins X101 for Interview

John Eves: [00:00:00] And hi again, everybody. It’s John Eves back in the studio as we continue our local election coverage right here on X 1 0 1. Joining us in the studio today is Cortlandville Town supervisor Greg Leach. And, Greg, thank you for stopping by this morning. You, as I do my math have been town supervisor, about 15 months after, Tom Williams left, a lot going on.

In, Cortlandville, what are some of the biggest issues to you and what are your, what do you feel you’ve been able to accomplish in those, in that short time period?

Greg Leach: Well, we’ve, and thank you by the way for having me here, inviting me here. Some of the issues that we’ve dealt with, obvious one, it would be sales tax, the county, adjusting the sales tax distribution rate.

We’ve had to accommodate that. We’ve also had to enact a solar moratorium. When I say we had to, we’ve decided to do that, to allow us more time to properly manage it, the [00:01:00] growth of that. And then I guess right behind that would be, growth of, burned dairy and the expansion out there. That’s huge, by the way.

Not to mention, just their growth, but a hundred jobs, more jobs that they’re bringing. And every job has housing, requirements and food and, and, and, and so on. I think they bring a lot to the, community.

John Eves: You hit on two huge issues I wanna, follow up on with you. We’re speaking with Greg Leach, the, town supervisor in Cortlandville.

Obviously, the Burn dairy project is huge. When I look at Cortlandville, I personally look at it as the, as the business driver in Cortland County. It really, the expansion, you look at everything out there. Even recreational Guches Lumber Park, that’s where our focus is to, increase businesses.

Cortlandville what are some of the, what’s some of the stuff you guys are working on?

Greg Leach: Well, you mentioned guts, lumber, sports complex that has been in the news. We are making a lot of significant changes [00:02:00] out there, and you’ll see it. Coming around from the standpoint of public interest, from my perspective, I will comment that we had the old timers band there.

Mm-hmm. For a summer concert well attended. We’d like to do that more often, get people out there. We have, the, the bald diamonds, if you’re not aware, are about equivalent to a triple A ball field anywhere, and the economic benefits of the tournaments that come in are huge. I’ve seen the numbers. And, and although you can’t say, how does that affect Cortland?

Well, indirectly it does because there’s lodging and, and they all haves to eat s Yeah. And go to, to, to the stores.

John Eves: Along that lines, I mean, do they have any expansion plans? I mean, I’m a pickleball player. A lot of stuff going on, that’s kind of my own personal question to you.

Greg Leach: Understood. There are plans.

When I took the position, there was plans to expand possibly [00:03:00] eight, rectangle type fields for multipurpose Wow. Soccer, lacrosse, or soccer. Okay. We do have, in the back of my mind, I believe I’ve heard that, we wanted to have, a venue for. Female sports Uhhuh we’ve already made and adopted it for youth.

We have movable mounds, pitching mounds. So, to accommodate them, we have a bocce ball out there. Mm-hmm. And any of those ideas, John, are well worth bringing to the board and say, could you think. We have 75 acres still out there. Wow.

John Eves: That’s, that’s a lot. And it’s prime location. It is, yeah. Greg, we’re speaking with Greg Leach, the, town supervisor, Cortland, Greg, you had mentioned too, and of course this is a national regional state.

Sales tax and taxes in general.

Greg Leach: Yeah. We have had, three of our legislators for Cortlandville actively working on our behalf to mitigate the loss for Cortlandville. We’re doing better now than [00:04:00] it first came out that we would, how much we would have to give up. And I’ll echo what you said earlier, John. To be blunt, Cortland is the economic engine of the county.

And I stated in I think, another, interview somewhere that if Cortland does well, the county does well. Given fact. So that’s my goal is to make sure we’re doing everything we’re supposed to be doing so that everyone benefits this sales tax thing. We’re gonna lick this too. It’s just a challenge that we didn’t anticipate amongst everything else that’s coming our way.

John Eves: You get thrown a lot at you in government right now, Greg. We’re getting a little short on time. Obviously one of the huge, issues is always water. I know, the aquifer, you also, got permission to build a, a municipal, well, talk about the water issue.

Greg Leach: It, it’s my understanding that it’s been discussed for almost a decade.

Wow. We should have had a, a well in that vicinity. Going forward, we are very [00:05:00] close to taking possession of, of, of a, some, land out there on a burn hollow drive area and building a municipal well. And to that, degree, we have also obtained a $500,000 infrastructure grant with the help of Cortland County to help with the build of this.

Now, what that will do will give us, and it’s proven, we need one more source of water, a good source of water, and it’ll help mitigate the. Pressure issue out on that end of town and, and, it’s my hope that we get this infrastructure squared away. Maybe we could focus on, this is my opinion on building and developing that corridor out.

Route 13 to attract more businesses.

John Eves: Wow. Very interesting. And Greg, we are just about out of time. This is a pretty, you know, we don’t have like the national, all the polls all the time. Your opponent is Doug Whithey Democrat. Obviously if you’re listening to the radio or anything, you can see it’s a very active campaign.

If I asked you, put you on the [00:06:00] spot, what differential. Differentiates you from him. Why should people vote for Greg Leach?

Greg Leach: I bring to the town the same ethos that I do with my business or our second business that my wife and I own. Treat people the way we want to be treated and, and, and give it the best you’ve got.

And I’ll tell my children, do the best you can with what you’ve got. That’s all you can do. That’s what I bring to Cortlandville.

John Eves: Alright, Greg Leach, we wanna thank you very much. Wanna remind everybody? Hey, early voting starts October 25th, and election day is Tuesday, November 4th. We’ll have complete coverage for you right here on X 1 0 1.

Greg, I wanna thank you very much for stopping by this morning. Thank you,

Greg Leach: John.

John Eves: And that’s gonna do it for another edition of our local election coverage right here on X 1 0 1.