The fierce rain and wind storms that swept through the region had a major impact on Cazenovia this past weekend, damaging and closing roads, uprooting trees, flooding basements and impacting local events.
The annual CAVAC arts and crafts fair was not only rained out but torn apart by the wind; the Fourth of July fireworks were dampened slightly by swampy viewing conditions in Lakeland Park; and the Lorenzo Driving Competition has announced the cancellation of its 41st annual event, scheduled for July 15-16.
The storm began with heavy rain Friday night, June 30, continued into Saturday morning, July 1, and was followed up Saturday afternoon with heavy winds and a continued downpour.
“That’s what did us in — once the wind came in and water [Saturday afternoon], the ground just wouldn’t take anymore. Everything was just overwhelmed,” said Bill Carr, village public works administrator.
The Madison County Sheriff’s Office issued a travel advisory throughout the county on Saturday due to the conditions caused by the heavy rain, including flash flooding and debris covering road surfaces. Some lanes were closed on Route 20 at the south end of Cazenovia Lake after the lake flooded through the parking area and into the road.
The annual CAVAC Arts and Crafts Fair on the grounds of Lorenzo State Historic Site was torn apart by the high winds on Saturday and then canceled for the scheduled second day on Sunday.
“If the storm would have stopped after the first two it would have been fine, but that third one had tornado-like winds that just ripped through there — it took out 25 to 30 vendor tents down front; took out the big CAVAC food tents, just totally took everything down,” said Cindy Underriner, CAVAC administrator and co-Chair of the arts and crafts fair. “It wasn’t pretty, that’s for sure.”
Underriner said they had two “very minor” injuries during the storm, but it could have been “a lot worse.”
The annual Cazenovia Sidewalk Sale also found itself rained out by the storm, with its June 30 and July 1 sales days forced to be indoor events, said Anna Marie Neuland, executive director of the Greater Cazenovia Area Chamber of Commerce. The Balloon Magicians, scheduled to walk the downtown streets on Saturday, worked through the torrential rains under an open 10-by-10 tent and passed out several balloon animals and balloon hats, Neuland said.
Once the storm passed, village and town public works crews started the clean-up, with the staffs of both municipalities coming to work on Sunday — even if it was a day off or even a vacation — to help restore the community.
The village was hit harder than the town, according to both Carr and Tim Hunt, the town highway superintendent. According to Carr, the village experienced several large trees being uprooted and broken apart; Route 20 was flooded with some lanes closed; upper Fenner Street was temporarily closed because the Carriage Lane retention basin flooded over Fenner Road; Carpenter Street flooded; and part of the Chittenango Creek retention wall in Lakeland Park fell away.
“The main deal is still picking up after the trees and fixing roads where stones and shoulders have washed away,” Carr said.
He said the entire storm clean-up will be a couple of weeks of work for the village DPW crews. He has also announced that the village will conduct a limited pick-up of branches and brush from July 3 to July 14 because of the storm.
Carr said he does not yet know what the financial costs of the storm will be for the village.
On the town side, Hunt said there were some temporary road closures during the brunt of the storm, some trees down on Ridge Road, a few inaccessible driveways needed culverts added or fixed for drainage and there was “a lot” of damage to road shoulders.
“It was quite the storm … I’ve never seen anything like this, honestly,” Hunt said. “We were fortunate compared to a lot of other places; our infrastructure held up very well.”
Hunt said town clean-up from the storm would also take a couple of weeks fixing road shoulders, cleaning road ditches and opening up culverts. He had no cost figures for the town work, but said he did not expect it to be significant.
“We were pretty lucky for amount of rain we got,” said town Supervisor Bill Zupan. “I give a lot of credit to our highway department for coming out and everybody showing up when the call when out for people to work. Nobody hesitated; they all jumped on it. It really shows they’re all really committed to the well-being of Cazenovia.”
Mayor Kurt Wheeler also praised the village DPW crews for the “amazing job” they did recovering the community from the storm.
“I’ve had a number of comments from citizens who were impressed and very appreciative of how quickly the guys cleaned up the village and hard they worked over the weekend,” Wheeler said. “The village bounced back really quickly, and it didn’t impede the July Fourth celebrations.”
The village July Fourth parade, July 4 Foot Race and evening fireworks all went on as planned, with a bit of sogginess in Lakeland Park that fireworks spectators had to avoid being the only real effect of the storm, Wheeler said. Many of the downtown shops also opened their doors on July 4 to accommodate visitors and those that had to work on Monday and to make up for the July 1 storm, Neuland said.
Unfortunately, the weekend storm will have an impact on a future village event — the 41st annual Lorenzo Driving Competition, scheduled to occur July 15-16, has announced that it will cancel because of the “substantial damage to the showgrounds” by the rain.
“While the decision was difficult to make, it was very clear that it was the right one for all involved,” said Carol Buckhout, president of the LDC Board. “We did not make this decision without significant discussion and deliberation by all board members and key management personnel at the Lorenzo State Historic Site.”
The driving competition will return in 2018, Buckhout said.
CAVAC arts and crafts fair cancels for first time in 42 years
The July 1 storm that tore through Cazenovia wreaked havoc at the annual CAVAC Arts and Crafts Fair and caused the fair’s cancelation for the first time in 42 years.
Only about half of the fair vendors were set up on Saturday because the weather was so bad Friday night, said Cindy Underriner, CAVAC administrator and co-chair of the arts and crafts fair, which turned out to be a lucky thing — especially since some of the vendors not only lost their tents but some of their products as well.
Both during and after the storm, CAVAC put out a call for volunteers to help clean up the wreckage and help pack up the vendors and they received vast amounts of assistance, Underriner said. She said Cazenovia Equipment donated the use of two gators because it was so muddy cars could not drive onto the field, while the entire staff at Lorenzo State Historic Site was “phenomenal, amazing, they went above and beyond in what they did to help.”
Underriner said that, as far as anyone in CAVAC knows, this year was the first time in 42 years that the arts and crafts fair has been canceled.
CAVAC has created a page on its website listing all the vendors that attended this year’s event, including as many web addresses as they could find, and ask that people consider purchasing items from the shops’ website to help support them since the fair was cancelled.
To view the list of vendors and their websites, visit cavacambulance.org/crafts-fair.
