Facing Out: The Week’s Most Interesting News

September 30, 2023

It’s the time of year when cool, clear mornings give rise to passing fog on the still waters of the Northeast, in this case at Whiteface Landing on Lake Placid. Nancie Battaglia

Good morning, Colleagues and Friends:

We were just about to embrace our old friend Fall when she yanked the ripcord and drenched New York City, the Hudson Valley, and Long Island with more than a month’s worth of rain. Basement apartments were inundated. The subways shut down. Kids scrambled to the upper floors of school buildings. Up to eight inches were predicted. Public officials said lives were in danger.

EAGLES EYED: Wildlife watchers and experts have thrilled to a sight that was unseen in New York City for more than a century — bald eagles. The New York Post reports there are at least four adult bald eagles — two nesting pairs — and that they have hatched up to a dozen eaglets. Bald eagle populations have made a remarkable recovery throughout the U.S. in the past half-century, after the banning of a toxic pesticide and in the wake of several protective state and federal laws. “Ten years ago, I think people would be shocked to hear there were bald eagles nesting in New York City — it sounds like the most unlikely place in the world,” Richard Veit, a CUNY biology professor and director at NYC Audubon, told the Post. “Bald eagles are generally regarded as these wild creatures that are only in wilderness areas, and to have them here is a real eye-opener … It’s a dramatic event.”

FAREWELL, TITO: Terry Francona, the manager when the Boston Red Sox reversed The Curse in 2004 and then won another World Series three years later, is managing his final games this weekend after 11 seasons leading the Cleveland Guardians. It’s widely expected that Francona, who is 64 and dealing with a variety of health issues, will retire from the game. ESPN senior writer Tim Kurkjian, who has been around major league clubhouses for more than four decades, wrote that Francona’s warmth, humanity, sense of humor and ability to connect with others “makes him the funniest, most generous, most grounded, most beloved person that I've ever met in baseball. And it is sad for the game, and bad for the game, that this is expected to be Francona's last week as a major league manager.”

WHAT A WASTE: The Wall Street Journal gets right to the point: “Some numbers are bad because they mislead. Expiration dates on our food are worse: They’re downright destructive.” Many consumers interpret “Best by” labels on food packaging to mean “Throw away after,” leading to staggering amounts of food waste that in most cases is unnecessary. A study several years ago found that more than half of people thought eating food past a sell-by date was unsafe, when in fact nearly all processed foods remain safe, if not quite as tasty, long after the “best by” date. The U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates that the equivalent of 1,249 calories per American, per day is thrown out.

LOOK ELSEWHERE: The late, great Yogi Berra was once asked about a popular restaurant, leading to one of many Yogi-isms: “Nobody goes there anymore. It's too crowded.” It seems local officials in Vermont are taking that to heart, announcing that a dirt road that had become popular with leaf-peepers would be closed to all but local traffic through mid-October, when the fall colors will have come and gone, and that trespassers would be prosecuted. The narrow road, between Pomfret and Woodstock, had become clogged in recent years with social media users and photographers looking for the perfect snapshot or selfie, often near the scenic — and private — Sleepy Hollow Farm. “Poorly behaved tourists have damaged roads, had accidents, required towing out of ditches, trampled gardens, defecated on private property, parked in fields and driveways, and verbally assaulted residents,” said the organizers of a GoFundMe site called Save Cloudland Road, as reported by The Associated Press. “It’s just a shame,” one local resident told the AP. “It spoils it for a lot of people.”

STILL GOING: Years after beating brain cancer and seven months after announcing he was stopping medical intervention and entering hospice care, former President Jimmy Carter is still defying the odds. Already America’s oldest living former president, Carter turns 99 on Sunday, passing his days in the company of his wife, Rosalynn, eating peanut butter ice cream and watching his favorite baseball team, the Atlanta Braves, make a push for another World Series. “We thought at the beginning of this process that it was going to be in five or so days,” Jason Carter, his grandson, told The New York Times.

CRISIS AVERTED: Another purported scandal, thankfully, is behind us. A week after Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer relaxed the dress code in the Senate chamber, provoking simultaneous backlash and indifference from both sides of the political aisle, the Senate overruled him, passing a formal dress code that includes a coat, tie and slacks for men. The extreme level of attention given to the dress code kerfuffle was utilized by some in the chamber to rally their colleagues to action on weightier matters, while veteran observers of Washington chided that the problem with the Senate is not how it looks, but what it does. May we judge them not by the clothes they wear but by the content of their character.

A warm welcome to autumn in Petersburgh, N.Y., on the Rensselaer Plateau. John Bulmer

JUDICIAL TEMPERMENT: In 2015 or so, a year into his tenure as a town judge in Whitehall, N.Y., Justice Robert Putorti allegedly brandished a gun at a defendant, a man he repeatedly referred to as “a large Black man.” Years later, the state Commission on Judicial Conduct learned about the incident and investigated, recommending just last year that Putorti should be removed. Purtorti said the defendant lunged at the bench and the judge flashed his loaded gun out of fear for his life – but his story has changed over time. The defendant said he was handcuffed to a bench. He acknowledged he was being unruly but had no way of charging at anyone when Purtorti walked by and flashed his gun. The judge challenged the Commission’s recommendation before the Court of Appeals, New York’s top court. While his case is under consideration, he has been suspended from the bench, with pay. 

LABOR PAINS: If you think the current labor market is challenging, with shortages magnified by the exodus of baby boomers whose sheer numbers dwarf those of successor generations, get used to it. The youngest of the boomers will reach the average retirement age of 64 in 2028, with a shrunken pool of workers forecast to constrain economic growth as a result. Add to that the stress facing many working parents, who are finding child care options harder to access and more expensive than ever now that $24 billion in congressional stimulus money is no longer subsidizing providers. “It isn’t just individual children or parents that will be impacted, it’s the economy as a whole,” Julie Kashen, a senior fellow at the Century Foundation, told The Washington Post. “When more than 3 million children lose care, that means all of those parents are going to have to figure out something else or reduce their work hours or leave their jobs altogether.” New York State is worried it could lose a third of its providers.

A HOME IN THE WOODS: For the first time, the U.S. Forest Service will build homes on Forest Service property to house their own employees. Like other employers, the Forest Service is having trouble recruiting new employees in expensive Colorado. With Congressional authorization, they are solving the problem through a collaboration with a local government and local developer who will build, on land specifically set aside for such development, 200 affordable homes. They’ll be configured in multistory buildings mixed in with some green space and a community center and public transit.

NORTHERN EXPOSURE: Our friends in Canada find themselves in the media glare lately. First, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said his country had “credible reasons” to believe agents working for India were behind the 2020 murder of a Sikh separatist on Canadian soil, accusations India strongly denied and that resulted in the mutual expulsion of diplomats, severely testing the bond between traditional allies. In the midst of all that, the speaker of the country’s House of Commons, Anthony Rota, resigned after inviting the chamber to recognize the World War II heroics of a Ukrainian soldier who, as it turned out, was in a unit that fought for the Nazis. It came immediately after an address to the Parliament by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. “No one in this House is above any of us. Therefore I must step down as your speaker,” Rota said in Parliament. “I reiterate my profound regret for my error in recognizing an individual in the House during the joint address to Parliament of President Zelenskyy. That public recognition has caused pain to individuals and communities, including to the Jewish community in Canada and around the world in addition to Nazi survivors in Poland among other nations. I accept full responsibility for my actions.”

A GRIM MILESTONE was reached last weekend with the deaths of New York Fire Department EMT Hilda Vannata and retired firefighter Robert Fulco from illnesses related to their service at Ground Zero. The number of FDNY personnel who have died from World Trade Center-related illnesses reached 343 — the same number as died in the collapse of the towers.

A MOTHER IN MEXICO calmly and quietly comforted her 15-year-old son, who has Down syndrome, covering his eyes so he wouldn’t react as a bear inches from their faces devoured the lunch she had set out for his birthday celebration. “Santiago is very afraid of animals, a cat or a dog, any animal scares him a lot,” Silvia Macías told The Associated Press, which published remarkable video of the incident. “That’s why I covered his eyes, because I didn’t want him to see it and scream or run. I was afraid that if he got scared or screamed or scared the bear, that the bear would react.”

SOUL FIRE FARM in rural Petersburgh, N.Y., is the recipient of a $250,000 cash gift from the Heinz Family Foundation, in recognition of founder Leah Penniman’s work to change the future of agriculture and call out inequities in our food systems. Soul Fire Farm describes itself as “an Afro-Indigenous centered community farm committed to uprooting racism and seeding sovereignty in the food system,” and highlights its efforts to bring diverse communities together, train the next generation of activist-farmers and strengthen food sovereignty and community self-determination.

UPS AND DOWNS: Charlie Woods, 14-year-old son of Tiger, shot 66 with his dad as his caddie to win his age group in a regional qualifier for the junior golf national championships. He’ll compete for the championship in November in Louisiana. … Haley Van Voorhis, a junior at Shenandoah University in Winchester, Va., made history last weekend as the first woman who was not a kicker or punter to play in a NCAA college football game. … And in knucklehead news, a high school football coach in Ohio resigned three days after his players repeatedly used the word “Nazi” to call out plays against a rival from a city where nearly 90 percent of residents are Jewish. His lawyer now wants him to get his job back, arguing, in essence, everybody does it.

BROOKS ROBINSON was quite possibly the greatest fielder who ever lived, his bronze statue outside Camden Yards in Baltimore adorned, appropriately, with a gold glove. Known as the “Human Vacuum Cleaner,” Robinson won 16 consecutive Gold Gloves as third baseman of the Baltimore Orioles, and his unforgettable defensive performance in the 1970 World Series lives on in jaw-dropping highlight reels. A two-time World Series champion, Robinson was the 1964 American League Most Valuable Player, an 18-time All-Star and a beloved figure in Baltimore, where he was part of the Orioles TV booth for decades after his retirement. “Great player, great guy on the field, great guy off,” fellow Orioles Hall of Famer Jim Palmer told ESPN. “Respectful, kind. And you don't meet too many guys like that.” Robinson was 86.

DIANNE FEINSTEIN’s break in politics arrived tragically and unexpectedly on Nov. 27, 1978, when gunshots rang out at San Francisco City Hall and Mayor George Moscone and another local official were assassinated. She was president of the San Francisco City Council and working in the building at the time. She rushed to the dying mayor’s side. To her fell the job of comforting a horrified city. She was chosen to succeed Moscone as mayor, then elected in 1992 to the U.S. Senate. California’s first female Senator became the longest-serving woman in Senate history. Dianne Goldman was born into affluence and educated at Stanford but endured a childhood of abuse by an alcoholic mother, a painful divorce that left her a young single parent, and the deaths of her father and her second husband after struggles with cancer. She faced threats to her life — a bomb was once planted at her home and the windows of her vacation house were shot out — but persevered as a Democrat who often embraced conservative views. “Dianne is almost unsuited to politics,” her friend Willie Brown once said. “She’s too candid, too direct, too incapable of game playing.” She was 90.

“I would say that Travis Kelce has had a lot of big catches in his career. This would be the biggest.”
— New England Patriots coach Bill Belichick, on the buzz surrounding Kelce, the Kansas City Chiefs’ tight end, and pop star Taylor Swift. (Kelce’s brother, Eagles center Jason Kelce, responded, “That was a great line by Bill.”)

MYTH BUSTING: If you’ve ever chewed gum in your life, chances are pretty good that you’ve been warned not to swallow it because it’s going to sit in your gut for seven years. It’s not. “It’s an old wives’ tale,” Simon Travis, professor of clinical gastroenterology at the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom, told CNN. “I’ve no idea where the myth came from — I can only imagine that it was suggested because someone wanted to stop their children from chewing gum.” An Indiana University professor who has written several book debunking myths about the body added that, while swallowing the occasional piece of gum is harmless, “Gum base is a mixture of elastomers, resins, fats, emulsifiers and waxes. So I wouldn’t say it’s healthy.”​​​​​​​

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Principal Author: Bill Callen.

Sincere thanks to our contributors: Ryan Moore, John Brodt, Leigh Hornbeck, Troy Burns, Tina Suhocki, Kristy Miller, Nancie Battaglia, and John Bulmer.

FACING OUT is what we do. We help companies, organizations and individuals work effectively with their most important external audiences – their customers, their shareholders, their communities, the government and the news media.  www.behancommunications.com

Facing Out features news and other nuggets that caught our eye, and that we thought might be of value to you, our friends and business associates. Some items are good news about our clients and friends, others are stories that we hope will leave you a bit more informed or entertained than you were five minutes ago. As always, we welcome your ideas and feedback. 

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