Most New York cider makers already treat their product to keep people from getting sick because of E. coli contamination, but some low-volume operations don't pasteurize their cider.

New York Apple Association spokesman Peter Gregg says their smaller cider makers aren't happy because of the cost of complying with the new rules. Gregg says ultraviolet machines can cost up to 15,000 dollars, and pasteurization equipment is even more expensive.

A handful of Pennsylvania-based investors have purchased the Big Tupper Ski Area as part of plans for a major development in the central Adirondacks.

Preserve Associates and Big Tupper LLC are behind the Adirondack Club and Resort, a proposed development that would re-open the Big Tupper Ski Area and build 700 new homes over 6,400 acres. The developers paid about 1.3 million dollars for the Ski Area and another 4 million for the surrounding timber land.

Lawyers for 12 sex criminals who are being held in mental hospitals after completing their prison terms say the state is holding them illegally.

The sex offenders were ordered held by Governor Pataki. After years of failing to get a bill that would allow civil confinement of sex offenders when their sentences end, he said he would "push the envelope" legally and hold them anyway.

Pataki's plan uses the state's involuntary commitment law, which normally deals with the noncriminal mentally ill, to win extended confinement of the sex criminals.

Yesterday at 12:35am, the State Police in Herkimer arrested Anthony A. Jackson, Jr., 19, of 1016 Churchill Ave, Utica. Jackson was charged with criminal possession of a controlled substance in the 5th-degree, a class D felony; criminal possession of a weapon in the 3rd-degree, a class D felony; and unlawful possession of marijuana, a violation.

The arrests are pursuant to a vehicle stop that was made on State Route 5 in the Town of Herkimer. Jackson was found to be in possession of cocaine, marijuana, and a loaded handgun. Jackson was arraigned in the Town of Herkimer Court and was remanded to the Herkimer County Correctional facility en lieu of $25,000 bail/ $50,000 bond. He is to reappear in the Town of Herkimer Court on 11/14/2005.

The study found that more than a third of New York smokers regularly avoid the state's high cigarette taxes by buying from Indian reservations, the Internet or duty-free shops.

The state in 2002 increased the excise tax on a pack of cigarettes from one-dollar-and-eleven-cents to a dollar-fifty to discourage smoking. Researchers say the strategy has worked, but it would be even more effective if smokers did not have access to cheaper cigarettes.

The Hudson Valley is supposed to be a blaze of glory this time of year, but many trees are still green, and the fabled reds of autumn are disappointingly dull.

Some leaf-lovers are wondering why this year's fall color is so late and lackluster. Meteorologists blame a summer drought, record October rains and a lack of nighttime frosts, but some scientists suspect global warming.

Paul Huth is director of research at the Mohonk Preserve near New Paltz. He says a warming climate is making trees stay green longer. It's also having other effects on the natural environment, such as causing lilacs to bloom earlier.

David Gergen, who served in the Nixon, Ford, Reagan and Clinton administrations, was the moderator. He said the critical point was for the leading educators of New York to come out with a sense of urgency about change.

Gergen and other presenters called for dramatic changes in schools, teacher colleges and families. He said the state must pursue closing the gap and girding for foreign competition simultaneously.

The Democratic Assembly members, Richard Brodsky of Westchester County and Donna Lupardo of Broome County, joined union members yesterday afternoon outside a Verizon office near Binghamton.

Brodsky, who chairs the Assembly corporations committee, told a Binghamton radio station (WNBF) that he's concerned about American jobs being exported to other countries.

About 300 Verizon Information Services workers in New York went on strike Monday. The employees are based at 9 offices, including locations in Albany, Syracuse and Buffalo.

Sean Timoney and Jae Seu, of Glenside, Pennsylvania, were arrested Tuesday night in Spring Valley, New York. They're charged with conspiracy to possess and distribute a controlled substance.

The complaint said the men met in a Spring Valley hotel room with a DEA agent and handed over the cash as a "partial payment" and were arrested.

Referee Pat Driscoll whistled Boeheim for a technical, but Boeheim continued to rant. Mike Kitts, the lead referee, eventually gave Boeheim his second technical and kicked him out.

The State Board of Elections gave tentative approval to rules governing new voting machines that are supposed to replace the lever-action booth.

The lever-action voting machine first appeared in 1892 and soon became the dominant system all across New York and much of the nation, but under provision of the federal Help America Vote Act, adopted in the wake of the disputed 2000 presidential election, the lever machines are supposed to be replaced in time for the 2006 election.

The regulations approved yesterday by the board mirror orders given them by the State Legislature. The regulations will allow electronic voting machines, including touch-screen models, and optical scan machinery as long as it includes a backup system that would serve disabled voters.

The rules follow car emission standards first issued by California. They seek to lower emissions of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide by improving the fuel efficiency of cars. The rules take effect with the 2009 model year.

New York and the other New England states, except New Hampshire, are expected to finalize similar rules shortly. New Hampshire will get cars that comply with the rule, anyway, because it is part of the Northeast vehicle market.

A state judge agreed to block the sale of a historic former church in Syracuse yesterday. A local developer complained the contract was improperly awarded by Mayor Matt Driscoll's administration in a flawed bidding process.

State Supreme Court Justice Thomas Murphy issued a stay stopping the City of Syracuse and Syracuse Bangkok LLC from proceeding with work to renovate Mizpah Tower, a 91-year-old downtown landmark. Murphy said he would hold a hearing in early December to review the award process.

In a lawsuit against Driscoll and the City, developer Alan Isserlis said Syracuse Bangkok's proposal did not include information required by the city and contained elements of earlier proposals submitted by his development group.

Mayor William Johnson conceded in an interview with the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle that it was a mistake to have claimed the money-losing Lake Ontario ferry would never need a subsidy.

The accident happened yesterday morning in Fishkill Plains in the Hudson Valley, 75 miles south of Albany. Emergency personnel found the workers pinned beneath 2 elevated mechanical platforms that had toppled over at Summerlin Plaza on Route 376.

East Fishkill Police Sergeant Kevin Keefe said one of the men appeared to have a head injury. The men were taken by helicopter to Westchester Medical Center. Their names were not immediately released.

Several Binghamton University students had to flee when fire struck the off-campus apartment building used by a fraternity, which lost its university recognition this year.

Federal prosecutors say 58-year-old Salvatore Spatorico of Niagara Falls was sentenced to 27 months in prison followed by 2 years supervised release.

The sentence is for Spatorico's role in an attack on a truck driver for Alliant Food Services in April 1998. Spatorico pleaded guilty last June to attacking the driver and disabling the truck.

Prosecutors say the charges arose from a lengthy criminal investigation into the activities of Laborers International Union of America, Local 91, based in Niagara Falls. According to the indictment, a substantial number of Local 91 members engaged in repeated acts of extortion at a number of construction projects in Niagara County over a 6 year period.

A new study finds that interracial relationships are on the rise, but are significantly less likely to lead to marriage than same-race relationships are.

The study found interracial relationships were most common among young people. As people moved from their teens into their 20s and 30s, the percentage of interracially involved individuals declined.

Many senior citizens don't need the broad range of medical services their nursing homes provide, but despite new legislation allowing nursing homes to provide less costly levels of care to these residents, no facilities applied for certification by the October 14th deadline.

The legislation was signed in January to allow nursing homes to provide assisted-living care, which would be half the cost of full nursing home care.

Of New York's 112,000 nursing home residents, 75% are on Medicaid. The state's Medicaid spending on nursing homes in 2003 was 7 billion dollars, or 18% of its total Medicaid spending.

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