Townie Upstate

09/24/2025

I’ve been thinking a lot about time lately and how valuable it is. Every week, I dedicate about four hours to putting together Townie—researching, organizing, fact-checking, finding photos, and writing this note—because I believe in the value of having one reliable place to see what’s happening in our community.

With local news outlets stretched thinner than ever, robust community calendars often fall by the wayside. But they matter. Knowing what’s happening helps us show up—to connect with one another, to support the organizations that keep our community vibrant, and to continue to make this a great place to live and visit.

The second anniversary of the first issue of Townie is coming up. I clicked “send” for the first time on October 7, 2023, a few months after I relocated back to Oneonta. Since then, I’ve published 109 editions, and today the newsletter is viewed around 4,000 times each month. That tells me people care about this work. Yet out of all those readers, just 70 are paid subscribers. My goal is to grow that to 100 by the end of the year.

When you subscribe, you’re showing your support in a meaningful way and helping keep Townie free for everyone. Paid subscribers make this work possible, and I want to celebrate you—with shout-outs in future editions and special invitations from event organizers who generously offer tickets.

Thank you for reading, sharing, and supporting this project. It means the world to me.

Warmly,
Cassandra

Sept. 24-30, 2025: Ideas for fun and frivolity in and around Oneonta, NY.

09/19/2025

I just gave to 5 of my favorite area organizations through Mohawk Valley Gives (Community Arts Network of Oneonta (CANO) Foothills Performing Arts & Civic Center Otsego Pride Alliance Cooperstown Concerts Butternut Valley Alliance)

The platform is super easy to use, and I love that it keeps donations local. You can filter by cause and location to make it even easier to find organizations you want to support!

Explore what Mohawk Valley Gives has to offer and support the organizations that mean the most to you.

09/17/2025

Editor’s Note

A lot of thoughts have come up this week related to civility and the First Amendment. Being able to express our thoughts and opinions—freedom of speech—is a hallmark of our democracy.

Words and finding community in sharing help us process horrific acts like the assassination of a public figure. They also help us reckon with that person’s history of using their influential platform to spread ideas that were harmful to many people. Words help us make sense of the disappointment in politicians on both sides who are using a horrific event as an opportunity for even more division rather than a unifying moment to reaffirm that violence is not what we’re about here in America.

In private, words are spoken in disbelief between friends that sharing the “wrong” opinions or thoughts publicly may get you put on a list where your rights can be stripped. It’s disheartening to see the First Amendment—the one that comes even before the Second—twisted or curtailed by those in power.

These national tensions can feel overwhelming, but here at home, we can choose connection over division. With all of this, I hope you can get out from behind screens and algorithms that serve biased content and connect with real-life people at events. We are human beings first, before any allegiance to ideologies. There are so many opportunities to find real-life community this week. I hope to see you around town.

Warmly,
Cassandra

Sept. 17-23, 2025: Ideas for fun and frivolity in and around Oneonta, NY.

09/12/2025

🗳️🎨 Design the Next “I Voted” Sticker! 🎨🗳️

In celebration of Constitution Day, Townie partner the Hartwick Institute of Public Service is making democracy fun again with an “I Voted” Sticker Design Competition!

✨ Open to all students—elementary, middle, high school, and college.
✨ One winner from each group.
✨ Winning stickers will be printed and handed out to real voters at Hartwick’s polling place this November!
✨ High school & college winners also receive a $100 prize.

📅 Deadline: Friday, Sept. 19 at 5 PM
📧 Submit by emailing your design (photo or digital file) to: [email protected]

👉 Details here: Hartwick Institute of Public Service Website: https://www.hartwick.edu/academics/academic-departments/political-science-department/institute-of-public-service/

Here’s a sneak peek at one of our first entries by Dylan Keays, age 7! 💙

09/10/2025

My top picks for this weekend are the City of the Hills Festival and the final Al Gallodoro Memorial Stage Concert Series with Blues Maneuver. Read on for more ideas for fun this week!

Sept. 10-16, 2025: Ideas for fun and frivolity in and around Oneonta, NY.

09/03/2025

I sat down to put together this week’s Townie thinking it would be a quick, low-key roundup… and two hours later, I was still happily lost in an endless stream of events. Oh. My. Goodness. There is so much happening in our area right now!

Here are a few highlights I’m especially excited about:

Brew to Brew 5K – The inaugural run starts at Wakeman Coffee in Sidney and ends at Muddy River Brewery in Unadilla. Coffee to beer over 3.1 miles? Brilliant.

Colorscape Chenango Arts Festival – Happening Saturday and Sunday in Norwich, this annual arts fest is always packed with talented artisans and fantastic live music, including perennial favorites The Slambovian Circus of Dreams.

Grand and Glorious Garage Sale – On Sunday, vendors will line the memorial walkway and wind through Neahwa Park. I’m in decluttering mode these days, but I may have to wander through—you never know what treasures will turn up.

Cannabis Film Festival at Foothills – Also making its debut this weekend, Friday and Saturday feature film screenings, talkbacks, and special events exploring cannabis culture.

And that’s just scratching the surface! Keep reading for even more ideas to fill your week—I hope to see you out and about soaking it all in.

Warmly,
Cassandra

Sept. 3-9, 2025: Ideas for fun and frivolity in and around Oneonta, NY.

08/27/2025

They’re back. After the Train concert Saturday night, by 11:15 p.m. a mostly townie bar suddenly filled with young people—not young professionals, but college students. I recognized several from my SUNY Oneonta classes, and one recent graduate even hugged me and told me how much she’d enjoyed my class last semester.

Classes started this week, and the buzz of adolescent freedom around town is palpable. I’m not only teaching this semester, but I’m also taking an economics class to broaden my knowledge and complement my studying for securities certifications in stocks, bonds, and insurance.

Through Townie, I’m partnering with the Hartwick Institute of Public Service (HIPS) on an interview series with candidates running for public office in Oneonta this fall. Our first meeting is next Friday, and I’m excited to help voters get to know the candidates and where they stand. I’ll share more as the project evolves.

The colleges are a valuable part of our community—not just economically and culturally, but also in the engagement they bring. For example, this coming Tuesday HIPS is hosting a conversation about democracy with students and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, who will join virtually. The event is free and open to the public.

Other top event picks this week include the second annual Beatles tribute rooftop concert by Mopar Cams, performing the Fab Four’s songs from the deck of the Autumn Café. South Main Street will be closed starting at 5:30 p.m. Saturday for the 6 to 8 p.m. concert. This weekend also brings the 42nd Annual Iroquois Arts Festival at the Iroquois Museum in Howes Cave, just a mile from Howe Caverns.

For more ideas of things to do, read on—I hope to see you out and about this week!

Aug. 27-Sept. 2, 2025: Ideas for fun and frivolity in and around Oneonta, NY.

08/20/2025

This summer has been stacked with entertainment. With live music in and around Oneonta most nights of the week—often outdoors—and summer theater performances popping up from Franklin to Richfield Springs, there have been more than enough options to get out and enjoy our area in this golden time of the year.

This week is no exception, with lots of events capturing that end-of-summer magic.

Aug. 20-26, 2025: Ideas for fun and frivolity in and around Oneonta, NY.

08/17/2025

Oneonta has new public art! James McIlroy created a plan and raised money from grants and community members to make this gorgeous blue heron happen.

08/06/2025

August is the year’s golden month—everything from corn and summer squash to sunflowers glows with that late-summer light, and even the air feels gilded. It’s the apex of our hot and steamy upstate summer when you can’t be bothered by applying makeup or doing much more than floating in an inner tube on a lake. Still, there’s so much happening in and around Oneonta this month that it’s worth toweling off and heading out.

My top picks for fun this week include several county fairs. Schoharie, Chenango, and Delaware counties all offer 4-H exhibitions, demolition derbies, live music, and midway rides this week. It’s quintessential Americana. Treat yourself to a corn dog and a round or two of ring toss. My white eyelet corset top is practically begging to be paired with cut-off jean shorts and pigtails for a trip to Cobleskill, Norwich, or Walton.

Also this weekend, for those more inclined toward landscape paintings than Ferris wheels, there's Art by the Lake at the Fenimore Museum, a juried art show of works by local artists, shaded by a tent, overlooking beautiful Otsego Lake. The Fenimore is also hosting special events alongside the art show, including a Native American Festival and a talk and book signing inspired by its 2025 summer exhibition, “Mary Cassatt / Berthe Morisot: Allies in Impressionism.”

This week marks the final four performances of “The Gazebo” at Foothills. This 1950s-set comedy combines subtle humor with a fun murder mystery to solve. So far, audiences have been loving the show. According to my hip and discerning friends, it’s not only entertaining but also well-written—they also offered glowing, completely unbiased reviews of my performance as a realtor who wears fabulous hats and dresses. Performances are:

Thursday, August 7, at 7:30 p.m.

Friday, August 8, at 7:30 p.m.

Saturday, August 9, at 7:30 p.m.

Sunday, August 10, at 2 p.m.

I hope to see you out and about!

Aug. 6-12, 2025: Ideas for fun and frivolity in and around Oneonta, NY.

08/03/2025

Best sign on Main Street

06/10/2025

Again this year, a local meme has been circulating the socials that succinctly expresses a sentiment some townies have toward baseball families.

In it are three men in royal finery looking down their noses at an unknown subject. The bougiest of character actors, Michael Sheen, is in the center. The text above the photo reads: “Baseball families when they arrive in Oneonta.”

The photo is from the “Twilight” movies of the Volturi, “the largest and most powerful coven of vampires,” according to twilightsaga.fandom.com. The meme has resonated with locals, I imagine, because of how baseball families ooze otherness–and sometimes “better-than-you-ness”–when they replace our town’s college population every summer, asking questions in Facebook groups like “Is there a grocery store in the town?” as if Oneonta weren’t a real place.

The local impression is that baseball families come from wealthier cities and towns with more resources and amenities. It costs thousands of dollars for a single 12-year-old to play at one of the baseball camps, so it’s not an inexpensive week, especially if the whole family comes, too.

Resharing a post that remains relevant this year, plus top things to do in Oneonta this summer