All Over Albany

Troy PD releases audio & 911 transcript from Kokopellis incident, National Grid to defer hike in electric bills, new supermarket proposed for Clifton Park, Watervliet company helps the USA luge team go faster

The Troy police department has released 911 transcripts and radio transmissionsfrom the incident at Kokopellis on Saturday. The recordings indicate a bartender called and reported people were fighting before police arrived. (The 911 transcripts are posted below.) Also: Troy city council president Rodney Wiltshire posted security video from the club on YouTube -- said Wiltshire to the Times Union of the video: "It raises questions and provides some answers." [WNYT][TWCN][Troy PD]

Andrew Cuomo has directed multiple state agencies to look at ways to strengthen state oversight of oil trains. [TU][TWCN]

Union leaders, workers, and lawmakers rallied on Wednesday against Andrew Cuomo's plans to close disability centers, psychiatric hospitals, and prisons in the state. There was a fair amount of name calling at the rally, with the CSEA president Danny Donohue referring to Andrew Cuomo as a moron and a monkey. Assemblyman Jim Tedisco said that Cuomo presides over "a government in darkness, government by fiat, government by coercion - a government where you would see in a state where they have a dictator, a totalitarian state." [TU][News 10][NYSNYS/Saratogian]

National Grid says customers can expect a 20-30 percent increase in electric bills this winter,
but the company has gotten permission from the New York Public Service Commission to defer the increase until later in the year when bills will be lower, to spread payments out for customers. [WNYT]

Andrew Cuomo's office has announced that a Pennsylvania-based communications company will open an operations center in the Glenville Business and Technology Park and is expected to create 150 jobs. The firm will get $800,000 in Excelsior Jobs tax credits, but the project will not be eligible for the START-UP tax-free zone program.[TU][WNYT]

State Senator Cecilia Tkaczyk is pushing her colleagues in the Senate to move the state primary from September to June in order to allow troops overseas time to vote -- or put up $50 million she says it would cost to reimburse cash strapped counties to have a second primary in September. [TU]

The DEC Commissioner said at a budget hearing on Wednesday that his agency has no money set aside for fracking, and no plans to issue fracking permits within the next year.[News 10]

Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand have announced $1 million in FEMA money to pay for new rain and sewer gauges along the Mohawk and Oswego Rivers and the Upper Hudson River basin to help alert communities to flooding. [WNYT]

A developer has proposed a new shopping mall for Clifton Park that would include a new Price Chopper. [TU]

A veteran guard at the Schenectady County jail resigned last week after a two-month investigation concluded that he allegedly divulged personal information about inmates and guards and jail security features to prisoners at the jail. [TU]

An Albany man is headed to prison for eight years after pleading guilty to second degree robbery for holding up a convenience store on Washington Avenue last year. [TU]

A Greenwich man has pleaded guilty to assault charges for beating a Mechanicvlle man unconscious on a sidewalk outside a Saratoga County bar last spring.[TU]

A number of rural areas in Upstate New York have access to high speed internet now that a $50 million fiber project is complete. [Record]

The Dolomite company is suing the town of Ballston for blocking its proposal to build a blacktop producing plant at the Curtis Industrial Park on Route 67, arguing the ban on heavy industry that stopped them from building is "arbitrary and capricious". [TU]

Neighbors of Skidmore College's proposed Greenfield solar energy farm are challenging the project, alleging a half-million-dollar payment from the school was negotiated by town officials out of public view. [Gazette]

After three decades of service, Schenectady's fire chief is retiring today.[News 10]

Upon further review of the incidents surrounding Saturday night's fight between RPI and Union hockey teams, the ECAC has now suspended Union coach Rick Bennett for two additional games -- for a total of four -- and RPI coach Seth Appert for one game for their part in the brawl. [TU]

A two-year-old program called Katie's Coats will be handing out coats to Albany's homeless on Friday. [Record]

A Watervliet company makes the sand paper that is used to polish the runners in the sleds for the USA luge team to make them go faster. [WNYT]

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TPD: Kokopellis 911 Transcript

Call received 2:37 am

911... where is your emergency?
Hi we need the Troy police at Kokopellis 124
What's going on there?
Ah... we got a bar fight goin' on here
Inside the bar?
It's inside movin' out
Okay, are there any weapons there or anything like that?
Uh... someone got hit with a bottle (????) bottle
Do they need any... ambulance or anything?
(Speaking to other persons) uh... (????) you need an ambulance or anything?
No we're good.
How many people are fighting?
Ahhh.. (????) more... about a hundred
Okay what's your name?
XXX
XXX?
Yes
XXX, what's your telephone number?
518
Yep
###
Okay
####
Okay, we're gonna get 'em right over there okay?
Thanks

Call received 2:37 am

911... where's your emergency?
Hey, um... I'm a bartender at Kokopellis, we need, um, a few cops down here we got like a ton of people fighting right now and our bouncers are getting punched in the face and everything...
Inside or outside?
Eh... inside
What's your first name?
Uh... what's that?
Your first name
My name's XXXXX, XXXXXXXXX
Thank you... we'll send 'em right down
Thanks