GUILDERLAND — Early Monday morning, before anyone was at Guilderland High School, “a threat came across on Instagram,” said Superintendent Marie Wiles.

The district worked with the Guilderland Police who investigated, she told The Enterprise, and it was determined the threat “was not credible.”

Each of the people at the rededication ceremony had a singular reason for being there.

Next Tuesday, Sept. 14, Guilderland residents are invited to a 6:30 p.m. in-person meeting at Town Hall to learn about a nascent Neighborhood Watch Program.

“We have the tools to combat the virus, if we can come together as a country and use those tools,” said President Joe Biden in his Thursday night speech. “If we raise our vaccination rate, protect ourselves and others with masking, expanding testing and identify people who are infected, we can and we will turn the tide on COVID-19.”

New York’s new $40 million Biodefense Commercialization Fund is now accepting grant applications.

Although the HERO Act was signed into law last May and went into effect in June, Governor Kathy Hochul said, “It never had any teeth …. It wasn’t operational.” She said that many workplaces did not take it seriously.

Governor Kathy Hochul, on Monday, Sept. 6, said that the state’s health commissioner, Howard Zucker, has designated COVID-19 a highly contagious communicable disease that presents a serious risk of harm to the public health under the HERO Act, requiring all employers to implement workplace safety plans.

Matthew Pinchinat was recently named as the director for diversity, equity, and inclusion — a new post for the Guilderland school district. 
Diversity, explains Pinchinat in this week’s podcast at AltamontEnterprise.com/podcasts, means recognizing people not from our background, and includes differences in thought as well.

The precipitous rise in COVID-19 cases, Whalen said, includes a rise in “breakthrough infections” — that is, vaccinated people getting sick with the virus. In April, breakthrough cases were very low, she said. Whalen cited rough data, which shows, of the 1,870 COVID-19 cases in Albany County between Aug. 1 and 31, eight-hundred-and-twenty-six of them were of vaccinated people. “That is a very high rate of breakthrough ...,” said Whalen. “This is a concern.”

The moratorium on evictions is in effect until Jan. 15. The new law keeps in place all protections of the Tenant Safe Harbor Act for residential tenants who are suffering financial hardship as a result of the pandemic; it also adds protections on commercial evictions.