By Jason Klaiber
Staff Writer
A debate between incumbent Onondaga County Executive Ryan McMahon and challenger Tony Malavenda took place on Sept. 3 at the Westminster Presbyterian Church in Syracuse.
Presented by charitable organization Tomorrow’s Neighborhoods Today, the debate was preceded by a prayer given by interim pastor Harold Sanderson, Jr.
The debate was split into timed segments. McMahon and Malavenda both gave 10-minute introductions, 30-minute speeches highlighting approved topics and five-minute closing statements.
Audience questions were reserved for the conversational meet and greet after the debate.
McMahon, a Republican, became the Onondaga County executive in November 2018, succeeding Joanie Mahoney.
He had previously served as a city councilor in Syracuse and the chairman of the Onondaga County Legislature.
Running as a Democrat, Malavenda formerly co-owned Duke’s Root Control, a business that removes tree roots from sewer systems.
Route 81
McMahon said he believed an option consisting of a tunnel with a grid would have constituted the least disruptive but most expensive plan for the future of Interstate 81.
He said he wants to advocate for communities that would be impacted in negative ways by the planned $2.4 billion I-81 project and its community grid alternative.
McMahon said he intends to focus on traffic mitigation in areas like Manlius, help residents living near I-81 that would be displaced from their homes amidst construction and address the concerns of hotel owners in Salina that rely on customers making a stop off the highway.
McMahon said the project will, however, employ a workforce of Central New York residents.

Malavenda said he was an Onondaga Citizens League member in 2010 when that independent organization studied I-81.
He said he initially thought it would be nonsensical to tear down the highway since he used it for transportation every day.
“I was thinking about myself,” Malavenda said.
He said he later concluded that another suspended highway in the area would be “wrong” and that the community grid option would work best.
“I see the community grid as one of those things that helps propel us to become a model county,” Malavenda said.
He said the option will provide development potential and easier walkability around communities in the county but that it remains important to hear from area homeowners, business owners and others about possible inconveniences.
Malavenda said such concerns could relate to air quality resulting from construction tied to the project.
Consolidation
McMahon said he wants to see city and county departments interacting in a “one-stop shop” at Carnegie Library at 130 Sims Drive, a library he said he wants the county to refinish.
“It’s entitled to a new chapter of its life,” McMahon said.
He also said that the county’s recently approved STEAM high school centering on science, technology, engineering, arts and math would be a shared service.
In the abandoned Central Technical High School building on South Warren Street in Syracuse, 60% of desks would belong to city residents and 40% would belong to suburban residents, all of these students focused on securing what McMahon calls “the jobs of tomorrow,” like cybersecurity.
Malavenda also said that the county should invest more in information technology to minimize hacking risks and make for better communication among municipalities.
He said the correct level of service should be applied to the correct level of government.
“I don’t think it would make sense, and I don’t think anybody here would, that every state in the union had its own navy,” Malavenda said.
He said the snowplows in the county turn around after hitting the edge of a town or city.
“We don’t actually strategize together,” Malavenda said. “We don’t draw a plan that minimizes the amount of miles driven, hours that it takes [or] gallons of gas it takes to plow the route.”
Environmental policy
McMahon said his time as county executive has shown strides in the cleanup of the polluted Onondaga Lake in connection to the stormwater management initiative “Save the Rain.”
He also said the new “flirtatious” signs featuring pick-up lines on garbage cans has engaged younger people with humor and encouraged them to throw away trash lining the street.
McMahon said he hopes to look into solar energy options as well.
Malavenda said he would visit farms and country clubs and convince those living or working at such places to lower their use of certain harmful fertilizing chemicals.
He said he also seeks to help farmers to mold natural runoff barriers like berms.
Walkability
McMahon said he would invest in parks and small business districts like South Avenue and West Onondaga Street in Syracuse to strengthen the nearby neighborhoods.
He also said the development of hamlets and town centers would improve parts of Onondaga County.
Malavenda said biking accents walkability and that more walkable or bike-able routes should exist to places like downtown Syracuse, Destiny USA or North Salina Street.
Redrawing of districts
McMahon said he would turn down any proposed plan he believed was “truly gerrymandered.”
“Certainly if people are trying to be blatant in drawing lines that are hyper and super political, I will veto them,” McMahon said. “That’s my commitment.”
He also said he wants the next census to correctly portray the area.
“We want there to be an accurate count and make sure that we count everybody because that’s how all this money gets proportioned in Washington,” McMahon said. “It’s based off population.”
Malavenda said that he stands against gerrymandering and that Syracuse could act as an example in classrooms of a city with manipulated district boundaries.
“It is a question of politicians picking their voters, not voters picking their politicians,” Malavenda said.
Closing comments
McMahon said there has not been a more bipartisan elected official in Onondaga County in the last 15 years than him.
“I will work with anybody whose goal is to help move this community forward,” he said.
McMahon said he has helped to build the third fastest growing community for millennials in the country while introducing 7,000 private sector jobs and bringing the county down to a 3.5% unemployment rate.
Malavenda said that while more jobs have been created recently, such a rise in employment opportunities could be attributed to natural circumstances or outside factors.
“As of 2017, we had lost something like 25,000 jobs the previous 20 years,” Malavenda said.