3 to seek GOP nod for 103rd Assembly
The Poughkeepsie Journal, Thursday Jan 5, 2012
Nothing is official until Gov. Andrew Cuomo calls for a special election, but a Dutchess County legislator, a former state lawmaker and a former member of New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s staff have confirmed their candidacies for the Assembly seat vacated by County Executive Marc Molinaro.
Patrick Manning, who was ousted from his seat in the 103rd District when he lost a Republican primary election to Molinaro in September 2006, said he is seeking the Republican nomination for his old job. He is being opposed by county Legislator Michael Kelsey, R-Pleasant Valley, and Millbrook resident Richard Wager, Kelsey and Wager confirmed.
Kelsey said he had let party leaders know of his interest in early December, “and I’ve been going door to door to talk to members of the town committees.”
Continued Here... External Link to the Poughkeepsie Journal
Manning, Kelsey seeking Molinaro's Assembly Seat
The Poughkeepsie Journal, Wednesday Jan 4, 2012
Four days after former state Assemblyman Marc Molinaro officially became Dutchess County executive, a county legislator and a former state lawmaker confirmed they are running for his seat.
County Legislator Michael Kelsey, R-Pleasant Valley and Patrick Manning, an East Fishkill resident who served in the state Legislature for 12 years, are seeking the Republican nomination for the seat in a special election expected to be held in March or April.
Kelsey has been a county legislator for the past four years. Manning left office in 2006 after he lost a GOP primary election to Molinaro.
The 103rd District includes parts of Dutchess and Columbia counties, Before the special election can be held, Gov. Andrew Cuomo must call for such an election. Party chairmen in Dutchess and Columbia County would select the candidates. The winner of the special election would have to stand for election again in November.
External Link to the Poughkeepsie Journal
Legislator Kelsey works to give Dutchess County its due
The Millerton News, Thursday Apr 28, 2011
HARLEM VALLEY — The history of Dutchess County will soon be formally reorganized by the county Legislature.
Michael Kelsey is the county legislator for District 25, which includes the towns of Amenia, Washington, Stanford and Pleasant Valley, as well as the village of Millbrook. He recently introduced a resolution passed by the Legislature declaring the 10 days between Oct. 23 and Nov. 1 as Dutchess County Heritage Days and announcing the county’s intention to celebrate the 300th anniversary of the Oct. 23, 1713, decision to elect the county’s first officers.
A little history lesson: Dutchess County was formed as one of New York’s 12 original counties in 1683, but it wasn’t until 1713 that the state agreed county population had grown to the point that it was necessary to hold elections for the positions of supervisor, treasurer and a variety of assessors and collectors. However, it wasn’t until 1720, after the county was split into three wards, that the first elections were held.
The county celebrated the 300th anniversary of its designation as Dutchess County in 1983, but Kelsey said he felt the Oct. 23, 1713, date was important on its own, signifying the establishment of basic democratic principals in the county.
Continued here... External link to the Millerton News
To Africa and back:
The Millerton News, Thursday Jan 27, 2011
HARLEM VALLEY - Mount Kilimanjaro, halfway around the world in Tanzania, Africa, is the tallest freestanding mountain on the planet. At its peak, Kilimanjaro towers 19,341 feet above sea level. And just before 2011 began, Dutchess County Legislator Michael Kelsey reached its summit.
Kelsey has been an avid hiker and backpacker for years. Ten years ago he climbed his first 4,000-foot peak in the northeastern United States. There are 46 peaks categorized as the Adirondack High Peaks in New York; he had climbed all of them by 2005. Then he expanded, reaching the top of all 115 peaks above 4,000 feet in New York, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine just this past August.
"Everyone kept asking, 'What's next?'" he said. "The tallest mountain in Africa just sort of fell into my lap."
Kelsey is part of a local hiking group, the Hudson Valley Hikers, that was planning to travel to Africa this past October. But between his legislative responsibilities and teaching at Marist College in Poughkeepsie, he had to turn down the offer. But when the October trip fell through and the group decided to reschedule it around the New Year holiday, things worked in his favor, as Dutchess County had just passed its budget and Marist College was between semesters.
Kilimanjaro was a big step up for Kelsey. His past record climb was in Ecuador, South America, at a little over 11,000 feet above sea level.
"Part of the Kilimanjaro experience was a very high altitude, which was really foreign to me," Kelsey said. "Much of the experience was, really, how do you deal with deprived oxygen and altitude sickness? The body is shutting down and you only continue on through willpower. You're forcing yourself to do this."
Continued here... External link to the Millerton News
Mike Kelsey's Independence is Commendable
The Millbrook Independent, Wednesday Oct 6, 2010
To the Editor:
MIKE KELSEY'S INDEPENDENCE IS COMMENDABLE
Many years of hard work, by a handful of us, at exposure and reform of the Dutchess County Resource Recovery Agency (RRA) is coming to a head as the County Legislature prepares to consider the Agency's plan to take over all waste and recycling activities throughout the County.
For years the RRA has been a secretive and isolated group of political appointees who have run the burn plant in Poughkeepsie where about half of all Dutchess residential waste is currently burned.
In last week's Millbrook Independent Dutchess County Legislator Mike Kelsey wrote:
"Garbage taxes and flow control are not the answers. Out County solid waste plan needs to take into account the actual needs of the County and provide for efficient and cost-effective waste disposal, not make rescuing the broken and inefficient RRA its top priority. We must reject the RRA-produced Solid Waste Management Plan."
We welcome Mike Kelsey to our small but growing bipartisan band of RRA reformers fighting to defeat the RRA's radical and costly plan.
For years the RRA has operated with virtually no oversight and accountability and now manages to lose about $6 million annually through poor contracts, inefficiency and mismanagement. These losses have to be covered from Dutchess property tax revenues each year as subsidy payments from the County General Fund.
Now the RRA proposes to invest nearly $100 million of taxpayer money to expand its aging, obsolete burn plant, build new facilities throughout the County and to take control, through a proposed new County law, of all waste and recyclables in the County. To pay for the ever-increasing losses, the RRA's new 20-year plan proposes a new property tax in Dutchess County, plus Legislative Flow Control. The Flow Control is a proposed County Law that would make it illegal for citizens, Towns, Villages, and private haulers to bring trash from Dutchess County homes and businesses to any facility other that a County owned one - even if the County's operations cost 2-3 times what the private facilities charge.
All of the above has been well documented in reports by the NYS Authority Budget Office, the newly elected and independent County Comptroller Jim Coughlan, the Poughkeepsie Journal, and the Millbrook Independent.
I hope some of your readers will help our "expose and reform" efforts by letting other County Legislators and our County Executive, Bill Steinhaus know that this is NOT A PLAN WE SUPPORT!
Mr. Steinhaus could be particularly helpful since he appoints half of the members of the RRA Board of Directors, including two members, one being the RRA Chairman, who, according the New York State Authorities Budget Office, are serving illegal 3rd terms pending replacement by Mr. Steinhaus.
The public is also invited to attend and speak out at a Public Hearing to be held at the City of Poughkeepsie Common Council Chambers, City Hall (3rd Floor) 62 Civic Center Plaza, in Poughkeepsie on October 12 from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. for the purpose of accepting public comments on the RRA's plan.
You don't have to be an expert. This is really a no brainer; just read the independent articles and come speak from the heart.
R. Stephen Lynch
(Please note that while I serve as a minority member of the Board of the RRA, the comments expressed above by no means reflect the views of the whole Board and are offered, rather, as my views as a private citizen, taxpayer and professional solid waste consultant.)
Kelsey advocates mental health reform during Millbrook forum
The Millbrook Independent, Wednesday Apr 14, 2010
Discussion focuses on filling cracks in broken mental health system for youth
When her daughter Katie suffered a serious accident that plummeted her into a deep depression, alcoholism, and behavioral problems for nearly a decade, Trish Luchnick didn't know where to turn.
"To be in a state where you can't handle your own child and you feel so inadequate without knowing where to find help i s devastating," said Luchnick, who now works for Astor Services for Children and Families, a non-profit children's mental health services agency. "It's not that the services aren't there, it's just that you don't know how to get them."
Difficulty in navigating the myriad of non-profit, private, and public options in the mental health system for youth is one of the defining challenges impeding access to care, said an intimate group of professionals, parents, and youth meeting April 10. The group met at the Millbrook Farm & Home Center for County Legislator Michael Kelsey's Forum to Discuss Children and Families in the Mental Health System.
Also identified as obstacles facing the mental health system for youth was the stigma associated with mental disorder, a lack of comprehensive mental health services provided at school and a "non-existent," as one parent put it, transition from juvenile to adult care.
After things got so bad with Katie that Luchnick was forced to call the police more than once, Luchnick spent the next several years traversing the "confusing" mental health system and monitoring her daughter's progress in various psychiatric programs. One of those stints in 2006 was done at Poughkeepsie's St. Francis Hospital, where Katie occupied an adult bed for five days.
If she had knocked on their door a few years later, she may have been denied care.
In March 2009, St. Francis wheeled the last of their 13 juvenile beds out of the juvenile division, shutting down the ward entirely to meet the financial bottom line. Out of their 48 beds in the adult psychiatric ward, only six, instead of the initial proposal of 18, were also cut - perhaps in part to Kelsey's opposition in the Poughkeepsie Journal in early 2009.
Still, the loss of those 19 beds has forced many suffering from mental health issues even further from home.
"In March of this year, 69 people that live in Dutchess County were sent out of County for psychiatric care," said Steve Micchio, Executive Director for People Inc., a non-profit advocating for the rights of the mentally ill. "That's just to get us started understanding how much work our health care system needs."
Although advocating Dutchess County to have some of the best mental health services for youth in the state, including Astor's home and community based services, Luchnick admitted it's "scary" that there is no longer a place in the County where parents can take their children for inpatient services.
"Imagine you had a kid who was suffering from psychiatric issues and they told you to go all the way to Katona to get treatment," Luchnick said. "The barriers of distance, work, and accessibility make it difficult for families to stay connected to their child's treatment and recovery."
Also disconcerting are youth who don't even make it to long-term treatment, instead committing suicide along the way.
The New York Office of Mental Health reports suicide as the third leading cause of death for children between the ages of 10 and 24 and the New York Department of Mental Health released data showing that more than four from every 100,000 residents aged 15-24 committed suicides in Dutchess County in 2007. Laurie Lawrence, a Regional Parent Advisor with the New York State Office of Mental Health (OMH), who joined Kelsey at forums in Wingdale and Poughkeepsie before participating in Millbrook, cited school as a major stressor for youth suffering from learning difficulties and emotional disturbance.
"Blood samples taken from some of those youth show cortisol [commonly referred to as the 'stress hormone'] levels at extremely high amounts," Lawrence said. "These kids are experiencing stress akin to a major car accident."
One pair of parents, who brought to the forum their 21-year-old daughter Sarah, diagnosed years ago with bipolar disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and anxiety, related finding support in school for their bipolar son to watching "a child drown while the teacher is standing on shore."
A desire to fill cracks in care for youth like Sarah, Katie, and his mother, who suffers from schizophrenia, is why Kelsey said this "not very Republican" issue is his passion.
After two more forums in Red Hook April 17 and Beacon April 24, Kelsey will draw on common themes identified at his forums for a report he'll present later this year to the Dutchess Legislature on how to improve the mental health system for youth.
A big thanks from Legislature hopeful
The Poughkeepsie Journal, Wednesday Oct 14, 2009
I wish to thank Key Food, A&P and Freshtown supermarkets for donating the grocery bags my campaign distributed to houses throughout Legislative District 25 (Millbrook, Washington, Amenia, Stanford, and Pleasant Valley). I also wish to thank the many county residents who responded by filling up the grocery bags with food and toiletries to donate to the local food pantries. With your help we filled up 1,700 bags of groceries that will be used by local families struggling to make ends meet in this tough economic recession. Thank you!
My idea for a food drive was fueled because in traveling door-to-door to meet residents and ask for their vote in my race for County Legislature, I noticed a trend. A lot of people were facing tough choices in this economy - choosing between paying health-insurance premiums or the mortgage, working a second ro third job...
The food drive was also inspired by my own story. In the 1992 recession, my dad lost his job. A year later, he lost his life to the sudden onslaught of cancer. my family stayed economically afloat due to food contributions from a local food pantry. Thank you to all those who proved we can indeed make a difference.
Michael N. Kelsey
Candidate for Dutchess County Legislature, Salt Point.
Legislative Candidate Kelsey Distributes Bags from Supermarkets To Collect For Food Pantries
The Millbrook Independent, Wednesday Sept 30, 2009
Michael Kelsey, of Salt Point, the Republican / Conservative candidate for Dutchess County Legislative District 25, has issued a press release announcing he is hand-delivering grocery bags to area residents with a list of food pantries so people can deliver the bags, filled with food, to food pantries in Millbrook, Amenia, Pleasant Valley, and Stanford. He is asking residents to fill the bags with groceries and drop them off at the food banks. Grocery bags were donated for the food drive by area supermarkets including Freshtown Marketplace in Amenia, and Key Food supermarket and A&P, both in Pleasant Valley.