NORWICH – Congressman Anthony Brindisi met with members of the public last night and spoke about a variety of topics including minimum wage standards, decreasing volunteer firefighter numbers, and legalization of marijuana.

Brindisi’s open town hall meeting started at 6 p.m. on Wednesday at Stanford J. Gibson Primary School in Norwich.

The event was free to attend, and the auditorium seats were packed with supporters and citizens from Chenango County with questions about national and local issues, and what congress can do to help.

One concern discussed at the event was Chenango County’s poverty level.

“Many people only have bicycles and lawn-tractors as modes of transportation,” said the concerned citizen. “Every city in this county has people who need help.”

Brindisi said the concerned citizen raised an excellent point that comes back to the need for raising minimum wage.

“You bring up a great point, and there’s lots of debate right now in the House of Representatives because there’s a bill that’s working its way through to raise the federal minimum wage,” said Brindisi. “Which is something I believe needs to happen.”

The challenge is different regions of the country have different economics, he said.

“You have a lot of businesses or not-for-profits, or farms that can’t really control their costs because they may be dependent on reimbursements from the state or Medicaid,” said Brindisi. “If you’re a dairy farmer you’re subject to federal milk pricing guidelines, if you’re in a hospital you’re subject to Medicare or Medicaid reimbursement so when the minimum wage goes up and you have to pay more.

“When you have to pay your workers more, you can’t just raise the price of your service to cover that cost.”

He said the small “mom and pop” businesses that you might find on a city’s main street are especially susceptible to increasing prices to cover for minimum wage increase costs, but he advised against doing so.

“People who are already struggling can’t afford to pay another three or four dollars for a cup of coffee or a slice of pizza, so that shop or small business owner is going to just close the door, and the people that work there are going to lose their jobs,” said Brindisi. “I am supportive of raising the minimum wage, but I think we should look at how we can do it on a more regional basis because we have areas of the country that are thriving economically, and we have areas that are still struggling like the Southern Tier.”

He said small business owners are the backbone of the Southern Tier economy and that’s something that should be considered when raising minimum wage.

Another concern raised was about declining volunteer fire fighter numbers and what congress is doing to address the issue.

“I think a lot of people don’t realize that without our volunteer fire departments, we certainly could not survive in some of these smaller communities who could not afford paid services,” said Brindisi. “We have to make sure we are doing what we can to support our volunteer services.”

He said this is recruit week in New York State, but it’s a challenge for many departments to find new members.

“We’re looking at what kind of programs or bills we can pass to maybe help incentivize people who want to go into the fire service, maybe with tax credits or student loan debt forgiveness, things along those lines,” said Brindisi. “It’s very important that we maintain our volunteer fire services, because without it many communities will go without service and that’s a public safety concern.”

He said for fire departments who might need help with funding, grants are available and he asked for those departments in need to reach out to his office for more information.

The legalization of marijuana was another topic discussed at the meeting, and Brindisi said he supports the right for states to make that decision on their own.

“My stance is, it should be left up to each state to decide if they want to legalize marijuana, and more research should be done on marijuana,” said Brindisi. “The FDA needs to do more study around marijuana and the benefits of medicinal marijuana helping treat certain disorders such as post traumatic stress disorder and things like that.”

He said if a state decides it would like to legalize marijuana, he supports its right to do so, and is opposed to the federal government going after banks or credit unions who chose to transact business with companies that are growers or retailers.

(Zachary Meseck photo)