This whole debacle is shocking and disappointing to me. I'm not local per se but I have a seasonal place down there ( I say down because I'm up in Canada) and have been going since I was a child. I spend and have spent my summers down there for years- decades really. I am not going down until this whole thing is settled however and it's a darn shame trying to explain to my kids why we can't go to the camp yet this year. I've been making up excuses about work etc... They are too young to be anxious about this kind of stuff. I however am very, and this whole thing has been an eye opener for me. Since I'm not exactly "local, local" maybe somebody who is will chime in.
Let me start by saying that a good chunk of my neighbours down here are CO's or LE. I'd say the majority are. And these are seasonal places for them meaning that they live in Malone, or Plattsburgh, or Altona etc.. And they come down to the cabin on weekends or for summer vacation. Honestly pretty much all of my neighbours here are either LE/CO or are older people from the southern part of the US who have had the camp in their family for generations. Many of the older folk are finding it hard to get up here every summer so there are a lot and I mean a lot of properties for sale around here (Lake Titus, Indian Lake, Mountain View, Chazy, the Upper and Lower Chatauguay lakes etc).
There are so few jobs here that you're really have no other choice but to work in the prisons, in border patrol, State Police or else you work at the Walmart in Malone.
What I have noticed in the past few years and I remarked to my husband last summer how uncomfortable it made me ( he laughed it off as I'm on WS too much) is the increase in methheads in the area. This seems to be becoming a huge problem around here. I remember actually driving up to Malone from our camp in order to get cell service and sitting in the Walmart parking lot and texting my friend how uncomfortable I was feeling and I have never ever felt that way here in the decades that I've been vacationing here. In a way it doesn't surprise me that all these revelations of corruption at Clinton are coming out. I think that despite the beauty and quietness of the area there is a lot of despair here.