ITHACA, N.Y. — It’s been two weeks since Tompkins County opened its temporary winter homeless shelter in a converted bank in downtown Ithaca. In the shelter’s first week of operation, fewer than half the people seeking shelter county-wide were housed there.

The temporary facility is part of a state-mandated program called “Code Blue” that requires counties to provide shelter, no questions asked, on nights when the temperature dips below freezing. 

The newly opened facility is the result of a major last-minute effort to stand up Code Blue services after the county was unable to hire a non-profit organization to manage the program, as it had in the past.

Tompkins County Administrator Lisa Holmes said on average, about 38 people sought shelter under Code Blue per night — roughly equal to the same period last year. Of those people, between 7-15 people a night stayed in the shelter.

The rest were housed in motels, as they had been prior to the opening of the temporary shelter on Nov. 25.

County officials have said one of their goals for the Code Blue program this year was to shift away from usage of motel rooms, citing concerns over cost and safety. Officials have also expressed a desire to encourage people to get shelter via a separate program that requires participation in job training and addiction treatment, among other prerequisites.

In prior years, the non-profit that operated Code Blue chose to house people almost exclusively in motel rooms during the winter months.

The county’s approach to the Code Blue program is decidedly spartan compared to last year. The former bank is set up as a congregate shelter, where beds are laid out in an open room with little privacy. 

People staying there must check their belongings in plastic storage bins and cannot bring any bags into the main shelter. There are restrooms but no shower facilities, and there are strict limitations on who can enter the building and when.

Some advocates and elected officials have questioned whether the county’s “tough love” approach will dissuade people from seeking shelter from dangerously cold weather.

Last week, a man died sleeping outside, just one block away from the new emergency shelter. A county spokesperson could not confirm or deny if the man, Roland Hoyt, visited the shelter that night, but said that if he did, he would not have been turned away.

Tompkins County Department of Social Services Commissioner Kit Kephart said while housing people in motel rooms may be more compassionate, doing so comes with additional costs and risks.

“[One] challenge with hotels is that once the door closes, you don’t know if that person is safe,” Kephart said at a recent press event. “They might be using substances and overdose.”

The county likely will not be able to fully phase out the use of motels any time soon. Many traditional, congregate shelter facilities are not able to accommodate certain people, like families with children, people with certain disabilities and those convicted of certain crimes. 

Ultimately, Kephart said, the goal is to have people apply for shelter through the more rigorous application system that is in place year-round — known as Temporary Housing Assistance (THA) — rather than through Code Blue. 

Currently, the people who apply and qualify for shelter through THA are almost exclusively housed in motel rooms. The county’s only year-round homeless shelter shut its doors in November after the county was unable to renegotiate a contract renewal with its non-profit operator.

While day-to-day numbers vary, the number of people who got shelter through THA was roughly double that of those seeking shelter through the lower-barrier Code Blue program. Some 74 people received shelter through THA, including four children.

When people seek shelter through Code Blue, they do not need to meet requirements they’d ordinarily face during the rest of the year. Such requirements may include limits on income, sobriety or participation in addiction recovery counseling. People also need to show that they’ve exhausted all other options for housing. 

Some advocates have said the requirements can be difficult to navigate, even with assistance from a caseworker.

Kephart said that while the THA program has more hurdles, it provides more comprehensive assistance than Code Blue.

“There’s much greater services that go along with the THA sheltering than there are Code Blue,” Kephart said. “Code Blue [sheltering] is really a mechanism to keep people off the street and warm and to get them through the night, whereas THA is really about building people’s ability to get into permanent housing.”

If you anticipate you may need to access emergency shelter, you can find more information and resources here or by calling or texting 2-1-1. During normal business hours, visit the Department of Social Services at 320 W. State Street, Ithaca, NY. After 5 p.m., go directly to the shelter, located at 300 N. Tioga Street, Ithaca, N.Y.

New York State requires counties to provide shelter to anyone who asks when evening temperatures drop below 32 degrees Fahrenheit, regardless of disability status, income, sobriety or other factors.

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By now, you know about the endless speculation on whether the incoming Trump administration might close the U.S. Department of Education. It remains just that: speculation. Congress would have to be involved, and even a Senate and House controlled by the same party as President-elect Donald Trump would not necessarily go along with this idea.

However, in a statement about his nomination of Linda McMahon for education secretary, Trump underscored his campaign pledge to disband the department, saying, “We will send Education BACK TO THE STATES, and Linda will spearhead that effort.”

The mere specter of shuttering an agency that commands more than $200 billion has led parents, students, teachers, policy experts and politicians to wonder about (and in some cases plan for) the possible effects on their children and communities. Collectively, state and local governments spend far more on education than the federal government does. With federal dollars connected to many rules about how that money can be spent, however, the Education Department does play a significant role in how schools and colleges operate. Deleting the agency would not undo federal law providing money for students in rural places, with disabilities or who come from low-income families, but doling out that money and overseeing it could get messy.

This week, Republican Sen. Mike Rounds of South Dakota introduced a bill to unwind the Education Department and spread its work across other federal agencies.

The Hechinger Report tried to answer some of the questions raised by the possible dismantling of the department, consulting experts and advocates on student loans, special education, financial aid, school lunch and beyond. 

Nothing is out of the realm of possibility, however complicated. A much smaller agency that guided Congress on science, the Office of Technology Assessment, simply had its budget set to zero back in 1995 — and just like that, it was gone. The Education Department, created in 1979, reaches far wider and deeper, into essentially every community nationwide. Its impact is felt not so much in what students are learning every day but whether their schools can pay for the special equipment or training that might be essential for some students with disabilities; if they can pay to have an extra teacher to work with struggling readers; whether a student from a low-income household can get federal grant money to pay for college; and whether a college student with a federally backed student loan might ever have it forgiven.

Related: Become a lifelong learner. Subscribe to our free weekly newsletter to receive our comprehensive reporting directly in your inbox.

At the same time, many education programs, as well as some that touch schools, exist entirely outside of the Education Department. It doesn’t oversee the education of students whose parents live on military bases, for example, or students who attend school on Native American reservations. (Those programs are managed within the Defense and Interior departments, respectively.)

The Education Department also doesn’t run the school lunch or breakfast programs, which are overseen by the Agriculture Department. The nation’s biggest child care programs for low-income families? Those aren’t part of the Education Department’s job, either; they are managed by the Department of Health and Human Services.

We tried to explain all of that here. What questions do you have that we didn’t answer? Write to us: editor@hechingerreport.org. We will update this list.

Early education

What would happen to federal early education programs?

The most well-known and biggest federal early childhood programs, Head Start and the Child Care Development Block Grant, are not a part of the Education Department — they’re administered by the Department of Health and Human Services. So they would not be directly affected by an Education Department shutdown.

But Education does oversee and pay for some smaller early learning programs and early childhood research. For example, the Preschool Development Grant — Birth through Five, provides funding for state early learning programs and is overseen jointly with HHS. Other programs, such as Promise Neighborhoods and Full Service Community Schools, also address the early years and family support.

The Department of Education also is home to several research centers that focus on young children, many of which conduct long-term students or research aimed at improving the lives of infants and toddlers with disabilities. Those programs, if they were not cut, would have to move to another agency.

K12 Education

What happens to Title I and other money that the department doles out?

Closing the Department of Education would not undo it. Title I — a program established in 1965 that provides money to schools with large numbers of low-income students — is part of federal law. If the Education Department were to be eliminated, the most likely scenario is that Title I money would flow through another federal agency. Major cuts to the program are unlikely.

While Trump and others close to him have said they would like to cut federal education funding streams like Title I, any cuts would need to go through Congress — where that funding has broad political support among both Republicans and Democrats. That is especially true for Title I: Almost all school districts in the country get a share of that money.

So it’s unlikely Title I “would ever see an actual cut, and certainly not a substantial cut,” said Nora Gordon, a professor of public policy at Georgetown University’s McCourt School of Public Policy. She said even members of Congress who are hostile to other federal programs that allocate funds for low-income families would be reluctant to defund Title I.

Related: What education could look like under Trump and Vance

Do I have to worry about special education?

There would be bureaucratic upheaval if another agency took on oversight of education of students with disabilities, but the special education law itself, and the money allotted to it, would not change without an act of Congress.

The law now known as the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act was passed in 1975, four years before the Education Department was formed. At that time, it was administered by the department of Health, Education and Welfare (now known as the Health and Human Services department).

About 7.5 million children are now served under the IDEA. For fiscal 2024, the department oversaw about $14 billion in funding for school-aged children, with smaller pots of money going to infants, toddlers, and other special education-related programs.

Through the Education Department, the government sets rules for states, districts and schools about how children should be identified for possible disabilities and how families, parents and schools should work together to create a child’s “individualized education program,” a menu of the supports and services they should receive.

Does this mean everyone will get a private school voucher?      

Regardless of the future of the Department of Education, Trump could, with the support of Congress, take some action to expand school choice nationwide. Republicans in their official party platform made universal school choice, in every state, a top priority. The idea didn’t go far under Trump’s first education secretary, but political headwinds may make it easier for him to achieve some policy wins this time.

During the first Trump administration, then-Secretary Betsy DeVos pushed to expand school choice, largely through charter schools and private school vouchers. Congress, however, ignored her budget request in 2018 for $400 million to fund their expansion. A year later, DeVos pitched $5 billion in tax credits for individuals and businesses that contribute to scholarships for students to attend private schools. Trump resurrected the idea in early 2020, and again as an option for parents frustrated with prolonged school closures during the pandemic. A bill to create the tax credits died in committee.

As part of the agenda for his next term, Trump has pledged to allow families with a 529 college savings plan to spend up to $10,000 a year per child on homeschool education. The GOP also wants to expand education savings accounts, or ESAs — a polarizing program that allows families to pull their children out of public school and use a portion of state per-pupil funding on private school tuition, homeschool supplies and other educational costs. At least a dozen states since 2020 have created ESA programs, with some offering universal enrollment regardless of a family’s income level and with few restrictions on taxpayer money being spent on religious education.

Rural opposition has stalled such legislation in states like Texas, and voters in November rejected school choice measures on ballots in three states. But in recent years, the Supreme Court has expanded the religious rights of parents and sectarian schools. Trump’s next education secretary is also likely to have an easier time clearing school choice legislation with Republican control of both the House and Senate.

Related: School choice may have its biggest moment yet

What would happen to school lunch, and free and reduced-price school lunches?

Nothing. Eliminating the Department of Education would likely have little or no impact on the school lunch program. The U.S. Department of Agriculture, not the Education Department, runs the vast National School Lunch Program, although the data collected by schools about the number of students who qualify for low-cost or no-cost breakfast and lunch powers a lot of the education agency’s work. About 30 million kids participate in the program on a given school day — including students at public charter schools and some nonprofit private schools.

During Trump’s first term, as part of a collection of pandemic-related measures, he approved providing school lunches to all students, regardless of their household income. Several states have since kept up that effort since the pandemic option expired, offering free meals to all students no matter their family earnings. And a growing number of schools in other states now offer meals to all students if a large enough number qualify for free lunches. Earlier this year, a Republican budget proposal, called Fiscal Sanity to Save America, said that option should be eliminated.

Trump has distanced himself from Project 2025, created by the conservative Heritage Foundation, but that document also calls for reining in spending on school meals. “Federal school meals increasingly resemble entitlement programs that have strayed far from their original objective and represent an example of the ever-expanding federal footprint in local school operations.”

What happens to education research and the tracking of students’ academic achievement?

The work of the Institute of Education Sciences, the research and statistics arm of the Education Department, is mandated by law and would not disappear overnight even if the agency were abolished. IES collects and aggregates data from more than 19,000 school districts around the country to give the public a national picture of our decentralized educational system, from counting the number of students and dollars spent on schools to tracking class sizes and years teachers stay in the job. IES disburses millions of dollars each year to researchers to develop new ideas for improving instruction, and it evaluates programs afterward. One-fourth of IES’s $800 million a year budget goes to administering the National Assessment of Educational Progress, or NAEP, which is an important yardstick for measuring academic achievement among fourth and eighth graders.

All three of these functions — statistics collection, research and assessment — theoretically could be transferred to other agencies, according to former IES director Mark Schneider, whom Trump appointed to a six-year term during the former president’s first term. Education research could shift to the National Science Foundation, which already awards grants for educational research along with the Department of Education. The statistics unit, also known as the National Center for Education Statistics, could be folded into the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which is the main statistical agency of the federal government. A new home for the NAEP test is less obvious.

Schneider said that talk of eliminating the department may invite more scrutiny into what its research arm does. Advocates could try to capitalize on this scrutiny as an opportunity to lobby for an overhaul of the research division, he said.

Higher Education

What happens to student loans if the Department of Education is abolished?

Student debt won’t disappear even if the Education Department does. The federal agency contracts with the loan servicers that manage nearly $2 trillion in student loan debt and oversees the programs that can lead to loans being forgiven, such as for teachers and people who work in public health. “The terms and conditions of the loans don’t change just because the agency changes,” said Betsy Mayotte, president of the Institute of Student Loan Advisors, which offers advice and guidance on student loans to borrowers. If there is no Education Department, it’s likely that student loan oversight and debt collection would shift to the Treasury Department. “I expect that at least initially the servicers wouldn’t even change.”
Aside from that,Republicans in Congress, who will soon control both chambers, have proposed a College Cost Reduction Act, which would increase the amount of federal Pell grants for third- and fourth-year college students pursuing bachelor’s degrees in fields considered to be in high demand. It would also simplify the student loan repayment process and end certain kinds of loans available to parents, graduate students and low-income learners. It would hold colleges and universities, rather than taxpayers, responsible for loans on which their students have defaulted.

The Biden administration’s relentless and embattled attempts to forgive some student loan debt are almost certain to come to an abrupt end. Many have been blocked by courts anyway, and Trump and his allies have characterized them as an unfair transfer of wealth from people who didn’t go to college to people who did.

What about grants and aid for paying for college, and the FAFSA?

Even without an Education Department, it is unlikely that the Pell grant — which most low-income students use to help pay for college — would disappear. Congress controls who is eligible for Pell, so the Trump administration couldn’t decide on its own to change or take away the grant. Pell has long had bipartisan support in Congress, and it is very unlikely that a Republican-controlled Congress would get rid of a grant that is relied on by so many constituents.

House Republicans have, however, proposed changes to eligibility and the award amount. A version of the College Cost Reduction Act has a chance of passing since Republicans will soon control Congress. The bill would peg the Pell award to the median cost of a college program, instead of basing it on the particular cost of the program or college where a student is enrolled. In practice, this means students enrolled in a program that is more expensive than average, whether due to the price set by the institution or due to a higher cost of living in that area, could see their award reduced. In addition, the determination of financial need would no longer take into account a family farm where the family resides or a family-owned small business that has fewer than 100 employees.

McMahon, Trump’s nominee for education secretary, also supports changes to Pell. She wrote an opinion piece in September promoting what’s known as “short-term Pell.” Right now, for the most part, Pell can be used only to pay for education programs that last 15 weeks or more (about one semester). McMahon supports a bill, which has some bipartisan support, that would allow federal aid dollars to pay for short-term programs that train students for particular jobs.

Critics worry such an expansion could take Pell dollars away from traditional programs. They note many short-term programs (for example, welder and HVAC programs) are already Pell-eligible and that shorter programs, including many run by for-profit companies, often don’t have good results. A recent report showed no improvement in employment for students who used short-term Pell.

While last year’s FAFSA rollout was broadly criticized, there seems to be no appetite to further complicate students’ ability to access federal financial aid. In fact, the College Cost Reduction Act includes a requirement that would simplify and standardize college financial aid offers so that students have an easier time understanding and comparing them.

Related: How four universities graduate their low-income students at much higher rates than average

This story about the Education Department was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for the Hechinger newsletter.

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ITHACA, N.Y. — An elderly woman accidentally drove her small car through the window of the poll site at the Linderman Creek apartment complex around noon Tuesday. There were no injuries reported and none of the election equipment was affected. Officials moved the polling site to a different community room located elsewhere on the property.

Voting resumed at 1:57 p.m., just 87 minutes after the incident was reported. Voters who still need to cast their ballot can do so at 101 Conifer Circle, downhill from the original polling center. 

County officials said they “can confirm no malicious intent related to the accident.”

Ithaca Fire Department (IFD) Chief James Wheal said that while no one was harmed, the structural damage to the building made it unsafe for voting.

“That dispatch made us nervous,” Wheal said. “It sounds troubling on a day like this.”

Wheal said IFD received the initial call at 12:30 p.m. 

“Fortunately, it’s early in the day, so there’s time for people to figure out their plans,” Wheal said. 

If anyone was prevented by from voting by the incident, they can go request an affidavit ballot, said Tompkins County spokesperson, Dominick Recckio.

The driver, Debbie Strite, said she accidentally crashed her car while trying to park. She said she intends to vote for Kamala Harris.

Strite said protecting women’s rights and their securing access to abortion were the biggest issues driving her to the polls. She accidentally stepped on the gas instead of the brakes and ended up driving through polls instead, she said.

Dave Smith, a poll worker, was walking through the polling site when he heard a big crash.

“I saw glass coming down on the car inside the building,” Smith said. “Everything as I watched was being spread across the room.”

The debris did not hit the voting machines, he said.

After a brief examination, first responders deemed Strite in good health. She was taken home by a Sheriff’s Deputy. 

“I think the other guy is not good,” Strite said before leaving the poll site. “Anything [Harris] does, I think will be better than him.”

Correction 5:15 p.m.: A previous version of this story misspelled the word “brakes.”

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ITHACA, N.Y. — On Thursday night, Ithaca may be greeted by a rare geomagnetic spectacle, potentially showing residents the Northern Lights and bringing possible impacts to critical infrastructure technology. 

A solar flare erupted from the sun Tuesday evening and arrived to Earth at 11:15 a.m. Thursday. The latest predictions anticipate the storm will go on until Friday, according to the NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC). Those interested in viewing the Northern Lights will have the best chance overnight from Thursday to Friday, though it will depend on weather conditions at the time.  

The flare that erupted Tuesday was rated as X-class, the strongest category of flare. 

A Coronal Mass Ejection (CME) accompanied the solar flare, sending “solar material and embedded magnetic fields” hurtling through space and toward the Earth, said Shawn Dahl, the service coordinator for the SWPC. 

The sun is nearing its peak level of activity during the 11-year solar cycle, a period generally marked by an increased number of sunspots during which the sun experiences more solar flares and more CMEs. Last May, the Earth was hit by a historic geomagnetic storm, causing auroras to be visible as far south as Florida, but Dahl does not think Thursday’s storm will get this strong. 

Regardless, Thursday’s CME may prove strong enough to paint the night sky with the glow released by molecules of oxygen and nitrogen in our atmosphere. The molecules are excited by the energetic electrons brought here by the storm. When these molecules relax, they glow, Hysell said. 

For the best opportunity of catching a glimpse of the light show, Ithaca residents may want to travel southwest to avoid the less stable air northeast of the city, said meteorologist and Ithaca Voice development reporter Brian Crandall. 

For ideal conditions, residents will also want to avoid places with light pollution and too much foliage, he said. 

The aurora may be visible as far south as Alabama and northern California, but with the advances in smartphone photo technology, people have been able to readily see the red aurora much farther south than previously.

Geomagnetic storms are measured on a scale from G1-G5. Since arriving this morning, the storm’s intensity has been observed at G4, but there’s a slight chance the strength will increase to G5, according to the SWPC.

At this level of intensity, the storm could not only pose problems to the power grid, but also for spacecraft operations, radio communications and GPS. Passengers and crew high altitude airplanes flying through polar latitudes may also be exposed to solar radiation. As of Thursday afternoon, there’s a 40% chance of a strong to extreme radio blackout, according to the SWPC.

To reach Earth, this CME traveled 93 million miles, crashing into the Earth at one and a half million miles per hour. Luckily for humans and all other living beings on Earth, the planet is very good at shielding life from the impact of solar storms, said professor David L. Hysell, who studies ionospheric plasma physics at Cornell University. 

“At the same time, humanity has gotten much better with making its systems resilient to phenomena like what’s taking place today,” Hysell said.

However, if the storm is sufficiently intense, Hysell said there’s a possibility it could blow out transformers, though it is more likely that it will just trip breakers.

That being said, alerts have been raised in the wake of Hurricane Helene and Hurricane Milton because the geomagnetic storm has the potential to put increased stress on the region’s already precarious grid and communications system. 

“We’ve already been engaged with FEMA. […] This time, with all the hurricane relief efforts going on and the inbound hurricane going into Florida and across the peninsula, we found it prudent to immediately contact them now,” Dahl said during SWPC’s Wednesday night presentation.

This Monday, a less severe G3 geomagnetic storm hit Earth. As far as SWPC knows, the storm had no significant impacts to communication when it came to hurricane response.

If residents choose to stay up until midnight and chase the lights out into the country, Hysell suggests avoiding self-driving cars because the storm may impact the vehicle’s positioning system.

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This story contains crude language, including racist, sexist and homophobic slurs.

CAROLINE, N.Y. — About a hundred people gathered at the Caroline Town Court Monday evening in support of local Black farmer, educator and business owner, Amanda David.

Dozens of David’s supporters packed into the old white wooden courthouse, with more still spilling out into the hall and onto the building’s steps. As the court’s small parking lot and adjoining field filled, parked cars began to line the streets of Slaterville Springs.

The crowd was there to witness the arraignment of David’s neighbor and Brooktondale resident Robert Whittaker Jr. on hate crime charges and contempt of court.

Court filings and other documents reviewed by The Ithaca Voice indicate a pattern of threats, harassment and vandalism targeting David and her children that has played out over the last three years. 

Of the documented incidents reviewed by the Voice, Whittaker, who is white, frequently used racist, sexist and homophobic slurs and language.

“I just did not feel safe or comfortable outside. At any point [if I went] outside, I would be yelled at, my kids would be yelled at,” David said. “My daughter won’t go outside alone. Everyone carries their phone at all times [in case they need to] to record [an incident.]”

Late last year, Whittaker was convicted of harassment and is currently under a two-year restraining order. However, David said that has not deterred her neighbor, who she said continued to yell at her family when outside even after that court date

David said the verbal harassment against her and her children occurs on a near daily basis, sometimes for extended periods of time.

The conflict is also the subject of a separate federal civil rights lawsuit, which David filed in May.

Monday’s charges relate to an incident on Feb. 17, when Whittaker allegedly shot a pellet gun over the fence at David’s security light. An investigator with the Tompkins County Sheriff’s Office found a ricochet mark and set of footprints in the snow suggesting Whittaker fired the shot. At the time, Whittaker had already been convicted of harassment and was under a restraining order.

Whittaker was charged Monday with fourth-degree stalking, which was designated as a hate crime. He was also charged with second-degree criminal contempt for violating the orders of protection placed against him. Both charges are misdemeanors.

He will be held in the Tompkins County Jail without bail until his next court date on Oct. 21, a clerk told The Ithaca Voice.

The conflict began in 2021, shortly after David moved onto the nearly 1.4 acre property abutting Whittaker’s, which she later purchased.

David said she felt the conflict ratcheted up in intensity after she opted to put up a fence along the property line. She said prior to the fence, Whittaker would frequently come onto her property, sometimes making rude comments and at one point shooting at a chipmunk while her family was in the yard.

Contacted at his property before Monday’s arraignment, Whittaker would not elaborate on the situation from his perspective.

“I’m the one who’s been harassed here, that’s all I have to say,” Whittaker said.

He declined to comment further and said he wants his lawyers to handle the rest. 

Syed Omar Shah, Whittaker’s lawyer in the separate, federal civil case, did not respond to an interview request but offered a brief emailed statement.

“When everyone hears the facts in the courtroom, they will realize that this is a neighborhood dispute and not a hate crime,” Shah wrote.

Multiple attempts by Whittaker’s legal team to have the federal case dismissed have so far been unsuccessful.

On Feb. 14, Whittaker told sheriff’s deputies that he “feels harassed because the police have been called on him so many times” and that there “had been ongoing issues with David since she moved in.”

The incident with the pellet gun occurred just days after.

David provided several cell phone videos to The Ithaca Voice documenting Whittaker’s conduct towards her and her family. 

In one clip from October 2022, Whittaker walks towards David shouting profanities and a racial slur. In an Aug. 22, 2023 clip, Whittaker can be seen yelling at her from her driveway.

“Go ahead, call the cops, you stupid f*cking stupid c*nt,” Whittaker said in the video. “You’re the worst f*cking thing to happen to the f*cking neighborhood. Used to be a nice little spot before you f*cking handouts came around.”

In an incident report from Aug. 28, 2023, a Tompkins County Sheriff’s Office investigator describes Whittaker as inebriated and notes that his anger towards David was fueled by “what sounded to be racism.”

“Whittaker continued to state that there were ‘three types of people in this world: whites, colored people and [f*gg*t-ass n*gg*rs],’” the sheriff’s report reads. “He then conveyed that he believed David was of the third grouping he described.”

Whittaker had posted signs in windows facing David’s property that read “No knotheads needed,” “No rain-bows [sic] needed” and “No freak-farm needed,” among others, according to photos reviewed by The Ithaca Voice.

David used to offer agriculture and ethnobotany workshops on her property as part of her business, Rootwork Herbals. She said she founded the business to offer botany and agricultural programming more inclusive to Black, brown, queer and trans people.

“It’s been extraordinarily hard,” David said. “It’s negatively impacted my work in pretty serious ways. People who have come out for events or things have been yelled at while they’re in the garden. […] We usually hold retreats and workshops and stuff, but I canceled all of those for this year just because it didn’t feel safe to have people out.”

Her property is also host to a community garden that aims to primarily serve Black, Indigenous and other people of color. 

“It was meant to be a safe, healing place for [Black, indigenous and people of color] to come together in nature and learn about gardening and herbalism and make medicine and build community,” David said.

The two properties are located in a census tract where 84.4% of residents identified as “white alone” in the most recent census. In Tompkins County overall, white residents make up an estimated 72.5% of the population.

As of Monday’s hearing, Whittaker now has yet another order of protection against him. It is at least the fourth such order granted by the Caroline Town Court, federal court filings show.

Police incident reports show Whittaker has on several occasions engaged in behavior that would likely violate the previous restraining orders. David said the verbal harassment, which is explicitly prohibited in the restraining order, has continued on an almost daily basis. 

In an interview following the arraignment, David, upon learning that Whittaker would likely be detained until Oct. 21, appeared astonished.

“Oh my god,” David said. “Oh my god. I am finally going to be able to sleep at night. I’m going to sleep. I’m going to frolic in my yard.”

David said it was a relief to hear the town judge reject the argument that Whittaker was not a physical threat to her safety. Nevertheless, she said she still plans to sell her property and relocate her family and business, as Whittaker has not been deterred by past legal action.

“I feel like I’ll have respite and relief that I haven’t had in years, just for a minute,” David said. “But yes, I’m still gonna go forward with moving. It’s not like he’s gonna be [in jail] forever.”

David has amassed considerable community support. A crowdsourced fundraiser set up to help David purchase and move onto a new property has raised $130,639 and has over 1,300 individual donors — several prominent Ithaca leaders among them.

The overwhelming response to David’s case is the latest in what has been a flurry of attention on harassment targeting Tompkins County’s Black community. Members of an anti-racist community group recently organized by local pastor Peaches Gillette were well represented in the crowd, along with a number of current and former local elected officials.

David said she has also been in meetings with State Senator Lea Webb, Tompkins County Sheriff Derek Osborne and Tompkins County District Attorney Matthew Van Houten on the matter.

After the brief arraignment, David’s supporters filtered out of the courtroom in a jovial mood. Some carried signs, others wore buttons. Someone produced a tray of cupcakes — the arraignment also happened to coincide with the birthday of a child who attended the rally. 

The group sang “Happy Birthday” to the toddler on the steps of the courthouse as Whittaker was escorted out through a side door in handcuffs. He was accompanied by his lawyer and law enforcement officers.

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