All Over Albany

High winds and rain cause flooding and power outages, McDonald /Marchione absentee ballot count starts Thursday, 3 bears killed in separate Saratoga County accidents, Emancipation Proclamation to be displayed in Albany

Tallying of absentee ballots in the McDonald / Marchione Republican primary battle will begin on Thursday in Washington and Rensselaer counties and on Monday in Saratoga and Columbia Counties. [Saratogian]

In a letter from State Budget Director Robert Megna, yesterday, State agencies and localities across New York were warned that they should not expect any budget increases in the 2013-2014 fiscal year. [TU]

Yesterday's storm brought high winds and record rainfall, causing flooding and road closure and leaving 18,000 businesses and residences without power for a time. [TU]

Coeymans police say they've identified the person who crashed an SUV into a vacant building this weekend -- and then, improbably, was able to leave the scene. The alleged driver is the son of an RCS school board member. [Fox23] [TU]

An 86-year old Albany man was killed in a one car accident on New Scotland Avenue at Hackett Boulevard on Tuesday afternoon. An 86-year old passenger in the vehicle was injured. [APD Press Release (Full release below)]

The trial of a motorist charged with slamming a man into a parked car and stabbing him in a fit of road rage, began yesterday in Saratoga County. [TU] [Saratogian]

When he was attorney general, Andrew Cuomo's office authorized the settlement of a racial discrimination case that included a confidentiality clause similar to the one Sheldon Silver approved for two women who charged Assemblyman Vito Lopez with sexual harassment. [NYT]

A 16-year-old Schenectady High School student is charged with 2nd-degree reckless endangerment for allegedly discharging a firecracker inside a school bus full of students. [TU] [YNN]

An Albany jury convicted a 45-year-old Schenectady man for sexually abusing and robbing a college student on Lark Street last year.[TU]

Three bears, believed to be a mother and two cubs, were struck and killed by motorists in two separate accidents on and around Middle Line Road in Milton on Sunday night. [WNYT] [TU] [Sartogian]

An Albany man was indicted on felony animal cruelty charges for allegedly confining and starving a 3-year-old American bulldog to death over a four month period. [TU]

Three rain soaked, shivering kittens were discovered covered up with a plastic garbage in a basket in the south end of Troy. [Record]

A Clifton Park homeowner had a near miss with a fallen tree during yesterday's storm. [WNYT]

The Capital Region rainfall this summer was was about 25% less than a typical summer.[TU]

The chairman of the Saratoga Housing Authority Board of Commissioners says immediate action was taken to address a small resurgence in bedbugs at the Stonequist public housing. [Saratogian]

School bus routes inthe Lansingburgh Central School District have been reconfigured again in an effort to shorten student commutes, but some students are still riding the bus for nearly two hours in one direction.[Record]

Twenty-six cases of whooping cough identified in Rensselaer County this year -- 11 Since early August -- and the county asking residents to take precautions against the disease. [Record] [YNN]

Attorneys reached a plea deal in last year's Schenectady Trustco bank robbery. The bank was robbed on film in The Place Beyond the Pines only a few weeks before being robbed in real life. [Gazette]

The slow recovery of the Capital Region housing market continued in August with 13 percent more homes sold than in August of 2011.[YNN]

The Communications Director for NYRA is leaving the racing association to take a job at Penn National Racecourse.[Capitol Confidential]

A public hearing is slated for tonight on a proposed Schenectady charter school. [TU]

The last surviving copy of the Emancipation Proclamation, and the manuscript of Rev. Martin Luther King's 1962 speech in New York City are part of an exhibit created at the State Museum that will tour New York State, finishing up with a showing in Albany in November. [TU]

The 69-year-old Niskayuna Co-op is unveiling $500,000 in renovations this week.[TU]

__________________

APD Press Release: Motor Vehicle Fatality

Albany police responded to a one car accident yesterday afternoon that claimed the life of an 86 year old city resident.

Officers responded to New Scotland Avenue at Hackett Boulevard, at approximately 12:30 p.m., after receiving a call for a car into a tree. When the officers arrived they found George Chrysogelos, 86, of Albany, unconscious at the wheel of his GMC van.

He was treated at the scene by Albany firefighters and transported to Albany Medical Center Hospital where he was later pronounced dead.

A friend of the victim, 86 year old Bessie Anastas, of Albany, was in the front passenger seat at the time of the accident. She is currently being treated at Albany Medical Center Hospital for non-life threatening injuries.

An autopsy conducted this morning confirmed that Chrysogelos had a medical episode prior to the accident that caused him to leave the road and crash. Investigators also confirmed that he died as a result of blunt force trauma.