Groton Avenue stoplights to be turned on

Traffic lights on Groton Avenue in Cortland will be activated this week, city officials announced Tuesday at a nine-minute Common Council meeting.

Alderperson Mary Clare Pennello (D-3rd Ward) made the announcement as part of her ward report. The intersections at Graham and Homer avenues had been regulated by stop signs since last summer, when contractors were tearing up the street. 

However, the traffic lights hadn’t arrived by the time construction ended for the season in November, although the city expected them to be installed and ready by January.

The $7.6 million project between Main Street and Homer Avenue improves sanitary, storm and water systems on the street. Work, which began in 2023, will eventually stretch from Main Street to Otter Creek Place, about 2,400 feet of roadway and sidewalk.

The work will resume, probably in late April, with the top layer of asphalt, new signs, striping and crosswalks. Expect the project to be completed by the end of May.

Also at the meeting:

• Council approved, 5-0, a resolution to waive a fee and issue a special event permit to Celebration Church to host Hip Hop in the Park on Sept. 13 in Courthouse Park. Alderpersons Wayne Schutt (R-1st Ward), Seth Thompson (D-5th Ward) and Tom Michales (R-8th Ward) were absent.
• Council voted, 5-0, to name City Clerk Andy Jewett the city’s records management officer, a state requirement to oversee records management and retention. He succeeds City Registrar Carrie Lynch, who left the position on Dec. 31.
•  The city accepted two donations – $500 from the Cortland Professional Firefighters Association for the fire department’s Here Comes Santa event in December, and $1,000 from Bailey Place Insurance to help pay for a disc jockey for the city’s Midnight on Main event on Dec. 31.