"This guy went down pretty good," said NYS DEC police lieutenant Jim Hays shortly after the landing. Hays said the bear appeared to hit the ground softly while zonked on tranquilizers. "They're like a big bowl of jello when they land."

The black bear had climbed a a large tree in the front yard of a house on Meadow Dr, just across Williams Road from the North Greenbush Town Park. DEC had originally planned to let the bear come down on his own. But after he seemed content to sit in the tree for hours, DEC decided it was time to move things along.

Hays said they were worried about the situation becoming a public safety issue. Williams Road was filling with rush hour traffic. A large crowd of media and onlookers had gathered just on the other side of road. And Hays said people had started to circle around the scene for a better look, cutting off potential escape routes for the bear.

This most recent bear is the third one captured in the the core Capital Region in the last couple of weeks -- the other two were in Albany and Schenectady. There was also a bear spotted in Rensselaer Tuesday, and one in Guilderland Wednesday. Hays said they weren't sure if this bear was the same as the Rensselaer bear, but guessed it probably was. [AOA][WNYT] [Fox23] [Daily Gazette]

"We need to learn how to live with them," Hays said, describing Albany and Rensselaer counties as bear country. "They're not going to go away."

As with the other recently captured bears, DEC will keep the North Greenbush bear overnight for observation. If he checks out OK, Hays says they'll take him some more bear appropriate and release him.

There are a bunch of photos from today's scene after the jump.

That result isn't really surprising -- a few other polls in recent years have also registered support for medical marijuana. The only subgroups in this new Siena poll not responding with majority support: Republicans and conservatives. Also, the income group registering the most support for it: $100k+ at 68 percent.

There have been bills in the legislature over the last few years that would legalize medical marijuana. And state Senator Diane Savino has picked the issue up again this year. But the chances of a bill making it through are probably small without support from Andrew Cuomo -- and he appeared to indicate last month he's not on board. [WSJ] [State of Politics]

We're curious to see the results if people were asked about straight out legalization or decriminalization of pot.

A few other bits from the poll...

[I]nnovative Capital Region chefs [will be] imaginatively preparing and pairing dishes with fine Ommegang ales. Each chef creates two dishes showcasing their skills in bringing Great Beer and Great Food to exuberant life. ...

COMPETING CHEFS INCLUDE

Brian Bowden of Creo
Elliot Cunniff of Colonie Golf & Country Club
Marcus Guiliano of Aroma Thyme Bistro
AJ Jayapal of The Mallozzi Family
Rachel Mabb of Bitches Kitchen Catering
Ric Orlando of New World Home Cooking & New World Bistro Bar
Jaime Ortiz of Mazzone Hospitality
Paul Ozimek of Taste

This is the brewery's second "Hop Chef" competition -- the first was in DC this past April (photos, recap).

The Albany event is June 8 (a Friday) at 11 North Pearl from 5:30-8:30 pm. Tickets are $55. If you buy a ticket before May 23, you'll be entered in a drawing to sit at the judges' table.

Albany voters also approved the more than $9 million library plan. [TU]

Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver is calling for public pressure to persuade members of the State Senate to pass the minimum wage increase. Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos blasted the $1.25 raise at a press conference on Tuesday, but refused to rule out an increase altogether. [News10] [Capital Confidential]

Mark Ruffalo, Melissa Leo, Natalie Merchant, Jon Sebastian and other famous names performed at last night's Anti-Fracking concert at The Egg, following a New Yorkers Against Fracking rally on the grand staircase at the Capitol. [News 10]

DEC officials are preparing to remove a bear from a tree on Meadow Drive in North Greenbush. [TU]

One of the interesting things in a recent NYT package about student debt is an interactive listing that includes school-by-school breakdowns of the average student debt for each school.

We were a bit surprised by the numbers from Capital Region schools (above). Even though Skidmore and Union College both have expensive sticker prices (both locally and nationally), their average graduate debt figures were among the smallest in this area -- and they had the lowest percentage of grads carrying student debt.

That result probably speaks to a few things about those schools: a) a not insignificant share of the students attending come from families that can help them cover the price and/or 2) many of the students whose families can't cover the cost probably aren't paying the full sticker price. In fact, Union says more than 60 percent of its students "receive some kind of financial assistance."

Contrast that to St. Rose and UAlbany. CSR had the highest average graduate debt -- with 86 percent of its graduates carrying debt. And UAlbany, though having one of the lower debt numbers probably as a result of its relatively inexpensive tuition, had by far the highest debt-to-tuition ratio.

The NYT interactive feature has more info and is worth checking out.

Noted: Americans now owe more in student debt than they do in credit card debt -- the total amount of outstanding student debt in the country is roughly $1 trillion. [USA Today]

Fine print: All the tuition and debt total numbers are for 2010 and via NYT, with one exception: NYT didn't have a tuition number for Union. So we pulled it from College Grotto's rankings for 2009-2010. It appears NYT pulled the numbers from The Project on Student Debt, from which we pulled the "grads with student debt" percentages. The debt:tuition ratio is our own calculation.

The video embedded above is a short documentary about Caroline Street by Skidmore student Patrick Klimaszewski. It's interesting in the way it charts the century-long confluence of factors that have resulted in Caroline Street becoming "a home for debauchery in the Spa City." Klimaszewski told the Spotlight back in April he's been researching Caroline Street as part of his anthropology major. [Spotlight]

The Saratoga Springs city council is expected to vote tonight on whether to move last call from 4 am to 3 am, a proposal driven by the frequent unruliness on Caroline. The choice may not end up with the city, though -- the State Liquor Authority recently issued an opinion that the city can't change the last call time unless Saratoga County does the same. [Saratogian] [TU]

[video via Saratoga Seen]

And it's sold out.

But five people are getting a free ticket thanks to the combinations they posted as comments here at AOA when we first announced the event. Their combinations will be tasted a panel of judges, and the winner burger will be added to the Central Steak menu.

Here are the tasty-sounding combinations that made it to the final round...

My birthday is coming up at the end of the month and what better way to celebrate than to skydive on my birthday?! Know of any good places around here that offer skydiving at a reasonable price?

Know of a good place for Veronica to take the leap? Please share!

photo: Flickr user flawedartist

The state Assembly is expected to pass a bill today that would increase the state's minimum wage from $7.25 to $8.50. But "officials" say the increase is dead because the state Senate has no plans to take it up. Earlier: a recent Siena poll reported strong support for a minimum wage increase. [YNN] [AP/Troy Record]

A federal jury has found former state Senate majority leader Pedro Espada guilty of stealing half a million dollars from his Bronx-based non-profit healthcare org. The jury didn't reach reach a verdict of a handful of other counts against Espada, after what sounds like some unusual discussion in the jury room. The verdict quickly became grist in the local Senate race between Neil Breslin and challenger Shawn Morse. [NYT] [TU] [YNN] [State of Politics]

An independent audit of the city of Schenectady's finances concludes that the situation isn't as bad as previously described. "The city is not anywhere near a position of being broke," said McCarthy after the new audit. But the audit also concluded that the city has been using budgets that planned to spend more than they bring in. One of the ways the city is planning to bring in more money: squeeze people behind on their property harder in order to get them to pay up. [TU] [YNN] [Daily Gazette] [WNYT]

The Saratoga-based Thoroughbred Retirement Foundation, recently accused by the state attorney general's office of not properly caring for its horses, says the AG's complaint is "a product of misinformation and incompetence." The AG's office says it's received additional complaints about TRF since filing the lawsuit. [Saratogian] [TU]