All Over Albany

Percoco sentenced to prison, the people who stopped a knife attack, Watervliet road diet, in the end it's just stuff

Percoco sentenced
+ Joe Percoco -- the former top advisor to Andrew Cuomo who was convicted of taking more than $300k in bribes from companies with business before the state -- was sentenced to six years in prison Thursday. [TU]
+ Valerie Caproni, the federal judge in the case: "Frankly, it's not surprising that the citizenry of this state have absolutely lost faith in their government." [NYT]
+ Andrew Cuomo: "Joe Percoco is paying the price for violating the public trust. And it should serve as a warning to anyone who fails to uphold his or her oath as a public servant. On a personal level, the human tragedy for Joe's young children and family is a very sad consequence." [News10]
+ Republican gubernatorial candidate Marc Molinaro: "Andrew Cuomo was sentenced today -- he just doesn't have to do the time." [TU]
+ NYPIRG's Blair Horner: "It's hard to believe that Albany has learned anything. If they have, they've been keeping it a secret. There have no meaningful measures to reduce the corruption in state government." [Spectrum]

Child endangerment allegations against top state mental health official
+ "People familiar with the case" tell the Times Union that the high-ranking state Office of Mental Health official facing 29 counts of child endangerment for alleged incidents in which he had a 12 and 13 year old wear diapers in his Westerlo home had the boys do yard work before the diapers. [TU]
+ A neighbor who wouldn't go camera told WNYT she thinks the allegations are made up. [WNYT]

How the state health commissioner gets paid
By law the state health commissioner's salary can be no higher than $136k which is thought to be too low to attract a doctor to the job -- so the state has been supplementing that with about $60k per year a from sort-of-public agency, which became an issue recently on disclosure reports. [TU]

Sex offenders and people with development disabilities
A frequent critic of the state Office for People With Developmental Disabilities is calling attention to the placement of people with development disabilities who are sex offenders in state-run group homes and facilities. [TU]

Gubernatorial election
Former Syracuse mayor Stephanie Miner, a Democrat, on why she's running for governor on an independent ticket. [TU]

Colonie salon knife attack heroism
Piecing together the story of how co-workers and passers-by helped stop the stabbing of a woman at a Colonie salon in August. [Daily Gazette]

Schenectady police shooting range
Schenectady police are getting $450k from the state to fix up an indoor shooting range used for training. [Daily Gazette]

Clifton Park roundabout
The state Department of Transportation is proposing to build a roundabout at the busy intersection of routes 146 and 146a in Clifton Park -- and residents are split on that idea. [News10] [WNYT]

South End Rite Aid
The Rite Aid in Albany's South End neighborhood has closed. It's announced closure had prompted protests from community members who said the store played a key role in the neighborhood. [TU]

Watervliet road diet
Capital Roots helped reconfigure a section of Second Ave in Watervliet to include two lanes instead of three, along with bike lanes. [TU]

Horse deaths
Eleven horses have died at the Saratoga Race Course this year. [TU]

Silver Fox
Talking with Camille Gibeau of Silver Fox Salvage about the decision to close the business. [TU]

Stuff to do this weekend

Check out the big list of things to do this weekend around the Capital Region.