Ridgerunner Consulting

Photos from the 17th Annual Blossburg State Coal Festival

I found something very cool on Picasa - you can search for Blossburg in all Picasa's public photos and look through them - here.

In this post about the origin of the name "Ridgerunner Consulting," I posted a link to the book's amazon.com page. I got an email yesterday from Kevin Coolidge, owner of From My Shelf bookstore in Wellsboro

Heidi

I found your website through WNBT and I see you got your idea for Ridgerunner Consulting from Jim's book. We sell Flatlanders & Ridgerunners here at From My Shelf Books. Actually, we helped get it back into print. Instead of a link to Amazon, how about a link to a local ridgerunner's store?

Kevin Coolidge
From My Shelf Books
www.wellsborobookstore.com

So, here ya go, Kevin.

Kevin & Kasey's store can also be found on Facebook (or Kasey Cox's profile) and their blog is at
http://frommyshelf.blogspot.com/.

As long as I am linking to Wellsboro business friends... here's Wild Asaph Outfitters. Liz & Jennie are real outdoor pros. You should go talk to them.

I updated my resume to incorporate my educational aspiration and my new mediation certification. I also cut well over two pages, increased the margins and the font size. It was strange to cut the details of the work I've been doing as Ridgerunner Consulting. I hope the resume still conveys the important stuff.

Resume 2/20/09 (PDF)

Here's the voters-by-hour chart comparing the 2007 general election (Nov.), 2008 primary election (April), and 2008 general election (Nov.). There were 566 in-person voters plus 43 absentee ballots. The largest number of voters, 71, came between 7 a.m. and 8 a.m.

Click to see larger version.

I don't have any nifty party breakdown data this time because I didn't get a new copy of the registration list to crunch.

Thanks to Rose Wesneski for keeping track!!

I don't have the voters-by-hour data yet, but here's a little bit to reflect upon.

In Tioga County, John McCain beat Barack Obama 62 percent to 35 percent, but in Blossburg, Obama lost by just six votes. Six! 275 to 269 with five Nader votes, three Bob Barr votes and five write-ins.

See this PDF for details here.

http://buffalolawjournal.com/article_view.asp?IDNO=1014200815

Law school seeks prospects, proponents from outside NY

BY JODI SOKOLOWSKI
BuffaloLaw Journal

First-year student Heidi Jones feels comfortable at UB Law, in part because of an atmosphere she describes as noncompetitive.

The law school had to be within five hours of her hometown, in north-central Pennsylvania, have fewer than 300 students in the incoming class and offer courses on community and economic development and mediation.

Jones narrowed her options down to two choices — the University of Pittsburgh and University at Buffalo.

She visited both and immediately felt comfortable with the Buffalo region, UB and its law school. But the final decision came down to the covers of the schools’ respective alumni magazines. Pitt Law featured a photograph of an alumnus working for NASCAR. UB Law’s highlighted a student interning in Tanzania for human rights.

“That was the final piece of evidence. It was progressive,” said the first-year UB Law student.

What’s in the mix

UB Law’s recruiting efforts rely on a variety of factors that may influence a prospective law student’s decision. They include a relatively low tuition, non-competitive and collegial atmosphere, a variety of educational clinics, a New York City program and a wide alumni network.

“I think it’s a combination of those things. Students are looking for a complete law-school experience,” said UB Law’s vice dean for admissions and financial aid, Lillie Wiley-Upshaw.

Jones said UB Law’s Community Economic Development Clinic and meeting with its director, Lauren Breen, on her one-day visit here, coupled with finding Pitt Law’s clinics to be “marginalized” and “not integrated,” helped in her decision-making.

Although she hadn’t heard about UB Law before her search, once she was on its radar, “they did a good job of outreach,” she said.

Through direct-mail campaigns and e-mails, as well as appearances at law-school recruiting fairs and legal conferences, UB Law staff stress the school’s culture and the quality and affordability of its legal education to prospective students. Its fall recruiting tour goes statewide and coast to coast.

How did I choose "Ridgerunner Consulting"? Well, I consult for ridgerunners. What's a ridgerunner? The smart, crafty folks who live on the ridges of mountains in northcentral Pennsylvania. I got the idea from Jim Glimm's Flatlanders and Ridgerunners, a wonderful little book of folk tales that Glimm collected. He died a while ago of cancer and Mansfield University has a scholarship fund in his name. Each spring there's a bluegrass concert at the university to provide funds for the scholarship program. I also consult for flatlanders and folks who live on meadows and such. "Flatlander" is a somewhat derogatory term for folks who don't live in the mountains, particularly those from the Philadelphia area. Flatlanders are known for their lack of skill in navigating life in the mountains.

This afternoon I was interviewed by a reporter for Buffalo Law Journal for an article about my decision to attend UB Law. (BLJ isn't affiliated with the university, it's where Erie County legal notices are published. Tioga County doesn't have a law journal; we just publish in the Wellsboro Gazette. I'll let y'all know if my interview is included in an article this week.

Profile of UB Law Class of 2011

For comparison purposes, I got a 163 on the LSAT, my undergrad GPA was about 3.39, and I'm 36.

Here are some pictures of the Blossburg V.I.B.E. community garden on Main Street in Blossburg.

The board of directors of the Blossburg Memorial Library held a fundraising garden party July 25 at the Hamilton Club in Morris Run.

(Roll over the bottom and click on the balloon to see some captions.)

If you're interested in prints, contact me.

I've been preparing for major transitions in my life, I bought a camera, and I'm no longer a V.I.B.E. officer.

Transitions I sold my share of my house to my brother and I'm heading to law school at University at Buffalo. I move Aug. 15 and start orientation and classes Aug. 21. I'll be keeping several clients in Tioga County, but not accepting new projects. Why law school? I need the skills to match my vision for community and economic development in Tioga County and the region. I love the community development work I do with V.I.B.E. and other nonprofit organizations and UB has an awesome community development law program. I received excellent scholarship offers from University of Pittsburgh and University at Buffalo - it worked out that even with out-of-state tuition the first year at UB, the cost of attending would have been the same at either school. So I visited each campus. I immediately felt comfortable at UB, met with professors and other students and wandered around the city some (Albright-Knox! Elmwood! Allentown! Falafel Bar!) . Visiting Pitt was pleasant, but the atmosphere was significantly more corporate and less progressive, and their community development clinic, while very good, is not nearly as well integrated into the core academics as UB's. The city is a lot larger than Buffalo. As I was sitting in the admissions office at Pitt waiting to speak with an admissions officer, I perused a copy of their law school alumni magazine. The cover featured NASCAR, the story was about an alum who works on corporate advertising/sponsorship of NASCAR cars. In comparison, the UB alumni mag cover featured human rights interns in Tanzania. Hmmmm... which school do you think Heidi would be more comfortable at? Then Buffalo offered me more money and the decision was obvious... The plan is that in three years I'll be back.

New address beginning 8/15/08:
Heidi I. Jones
131 Allen St., Apt. 15
Buffalo, NY 14201

Telephone: I'll probably keep 570-638-2486 (that whole local # portability thing might be useful)

V.I.B.E. and Blossburg Improvement Association will continue to use PO Box 126, Blossburg, PA 16912-0126.

Email: heidi.i.jones@gmail.com

Camera I've been lusting after a digital single-lens reflex camera since they first came out at the consumer level a few years ago. I finally bought an Olympus E-520. With a little adapter ring, I can use all my old Olympus OM lenses that I used to use on my Olympus OM-G SLR. I took pictures at the Blossburg Memorial Library's annual garden party fundraiser on Sunday. If you want prints, email me!

V.I.B.E. Kelly Rossell, a recent transplant to Blossburg from the Philadelphia suburbs, has taken over as treasurer.
I'll still be working with V.I.B.E. but just not as actively.

Left to right: Jackie Smith, secretary; Tonya McNamara, president; Jill Nickerson, vice president; Kelly Rossell, treasurer.

Here's a nice photo of the reusable grocery bags and water bottles V.I.B.E. produced:

My friend Ken Cooper of Covington says he monitors this blog. We'll see :-)

Visit www.blossburg.org/alumni for the details on this unique event in Blossburg: the opening night of the 2008 Endless Mountain Music festival Aug. 1 and the 20th annual Blossburg-North Penn alumni reunion on Aug. 2.

Credits:
Liz Berkowitz - cover/top graphic
me - brochure design, web design, grant writing
Tioga Publishing for printing, thanks especially to James Monks!

Make plans with old friends to enjoy a weekend in Blossburg!