This is the Delaware County Newscast with some of the latest news from around the county. I'm Andrew Cantor. Well, this story's it's a bit infuriating. Sometime on Memorial Day, thieves stole three name plates from the donor wall at the Sydney Veterans Memorial Park. These plates, they're worth basically nothing to the thieves, but there's real sentimental value to the veterans and the Veterans Association. Now, the police are offering a $1,000 reward for anyone who can, you know, help arrest these thieves, and a local memorial business is making new plaques, but it's kind of not the point. What is wrong with people? Some farmers in Delaware and Sullivan counties are gonna be getting a bit of a windfall from the State Department of Environmental Conservation. It's like this Friesland Campina Ingredients, which is just outside Delhi, has agreed to pay a $2.9 million fine for releasing pollution into the air and water around Delhi, doing it repeatedly, in fact. Half of the settlement is going to 25 farms in Delaware and Sullivan counties, and they'll be trying out some uh, quote, innovative farming technologies and practices, unquote, and that's to help reduce pollution. They'll be getting up to 75 grand each to do that. In case you haven't heard about this one already, we're gonna file it under stupid is as stupid does. And yeah, it's not Delaware County, but it's it's close enough. A lieutenant from the Otsego County Sheriff's Office was arrested for having 10 grams of cocaine on him. He was on duty, uh, he was in Herkimer County though, in an unmarked police vehicle, and I love this, he got pulled over for a traffic stop. Whoopsie! So now Thomas Felrath of Hartwick is looking at two felonies plus a misdemeanor for official misconduct, and yes, he was fired immediately, which, considering the prison time he's looking at, is probably the least of his worries. If a river runs through your property during a flood, you are in a floodway. And if you were hoping to get funding from the Catskill Watershed Corporation to protect your property from flooding, think again. The CWC is proposing a new rule. If your property is in a floodway, the CWC will help pay for you to move, but it won't give you anything to help you stay. And it makes sense, you know, why spend public funds to protect buildings that are going to be standing in basically a river? We've got a couple of shout-outs for you. First, Dollar General, its Literacy Foundation. And yes, apparently Dollar General has a literacy foundation. It just gave a $10,000 grant to literacy volunteers of Otsego and Delaware counties, and that's to help adults improve their reading skills. Then there's UHS Delaware Valley Hospital, which was just recognized by the federal government for being amongst the cleanest hospitals in the country. Just try not to think about the ones that didn't score so well. Did you know that Delaware County has one of the lowest bed taxes in the state? That's what people staying in short-term rentals like motels and Airbnbs pay. Well, now county officials are thinking that maybe we should raise that tax from 2% to something like 3 or 4%, because that could bring in something like half a million bucks to the county, and then the county could, in theory, share that money with towns and villages. The downside is once that money got divvied up, it wouldn't be a huge amount for each individual town and village. On the other hand, it could be used to pay for services that could be shared countywide, like code enforcement officers or grant writers. Village trustees in Sydney are fed up with abandoned and neglected properties, and now they're looking for ways to pressure absentee landlords to keep up those properties. Or, well, they don't know what the or would be, just that having these unsafe buildings and uncut lawns all over the village, that's a no-go. They can't just foreclose and demolish the properties, as tempting as that might be, because that would cost a lot of money that the village doesn't have. Still, the the trustees agreed that things cannot stand the way they are. So for starters, Mayor Ray Baker is going to ask the county for help, because the problem is certainly not limited to Sydney. And finally, speaking of Sydney, although it's still not getting an Aldi, Amphenall is apparently exploring the idea of a new 30,000 or 40,000 square foot office building in the village. Right now it's in the uh, we'll call it the chin scratching phase. Nothing's actually planned, but the company is apparently talking with the county zoning folks, so we'll see what happens next. And that's your quick look at some of what's been happening around Delaware County. You can hear us here, you can hear us weekends on WDLA at 92.1 FM, or catch us anytime at Delconewscast.com. Until next week, I'm Andrew Cantor. Thanks for being here.