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It’s harvest time here in Upstate New York. Pumpkins and apple cider, squashes and fall festivals, game suppers and Halloween. The leaves are turning and the crisp mountain air off the Adirondacks is like ambrosia. There are people out West who’d kill for a breath of our air. Compared to much of the nation, we’re pretty well off so far: Covid-19 infections are low, home sales are up, industry’s moving in. No drastic budget cuts yet. Much to give thanks for.
Here in our pastoral village of Herkimer, the community continues its good-hearted sharing of its abundance with our drug gang neighbors, notably the Kim Vargas gang, routinely delivering them free food, with the good stuff packed in ice.



The Vargases recently celebrated harvest season by destroying our bumper crop of squash with herbicide, with the added fun of slaughtering our sunflower plant. The sunflower taunted their inner ugliness with its beauty and grace for much of the summer.


“It’s obscene that in a time of national pandemic, hunger and growing homelessness, Herkimer continues to coddle its criminals.”
As we’ve noted before, throughout the spring and summer, our backyard was blasted with volatilized pesticide from the Vargases’ yard. Below is a video of a kind gentleman delivering food to the Vargases and to the drug trafficking gang on the other side of us, landlord Jay Smith’s Kyle Stone gang. The young gang guy taking the food boxes is Xavier Rowe. This is the most work I’ve ever seen Xavier do. Kyle himself makes a cameo appearance, carrying a box of Dunkin Donuts.
After that portion of the video, there’s an older clip of Joyce Barton of the Joyce Barton Gang delivering foodbank boxes to the Kyle Stones and some of her other neighbors before scooting into her house at 333 Pleasant Avenue with her own food. Photos of our poisoned crops and plantings are at the end.

Misplaced Charity Helps Sustain Herkimer Drug Gangs
It’s obscene that in a time of national pandemic, hunger and growing homelessness, Herkimer continues to coddle its criminals. Free food is but one example. Our Herkimer gangs are happily nested here, and why not? It’s been the good life for them for the long decades in which Upstate New York was the poor country cousin of Downsate. Supportive landlords give them sanctuary, and the community and the state of New York provide them SNAP and cash assistance, fuel subsidies, utilities’ help, top of the line Medicaid coverage and a world class Medicaid dental insurance. And all amid the comfort of extended family networks.
“Only New York would put up with these destructive social parasites. They traffic poison and poison their neighbors.”
We’re close to shopping and astride major transportation routes and near magnificent recreational areas. (Herkimer’s drug and child traffickers vacation throughout the summer; we’ve heard some chat about their camps in the hills.) Why ever would they move? Heck, I wouldn’t. Only New York would put up with these destructive social parasites. They traffic poison and poison their neighbors. In Florida, where we moved from, they’d be lucky to be merely homeless or in jail. And of course Herkimer’s gangs have long driven out many who opposed their domination of ours and other streets.
Herkimer Becoming A Refuge Amid Pandemic And Climate Relocation
Times are rapidly changing: the area’s becoming a relocation mecca for its climate stability. Nice houses here get snapped up as soon as they hit the MLS. Rents are absurd. Drive the village streets; longtime residents and newcomers are busily fixing up their houses. Look at the out-of-state license plates in the Walmart parking lot: California, Texas, North Carolina, Florida. Many are on upscale German imports. There’s money behind this. Two recent examples–artisans replacing a slate roof on one of the long neglected grand old homes in north Herkimer. Slate. (!) While down the street at another house, about an acre of brick exterior was being carefully repointed and cleaned.
“History may mark this time as the beginning of the largest mass migration since the fall of Rome.”
This isn’t a casual movement of a few, it’s a significant change in human geography in response to global crisis. History may mark this time as the beginning of the largest mass migration since the fall of Rome. A lot of people are coming here and they all need homes. Boomtimes banishes gangs as property values soar and slumlords send their tenants packing and sellout. Yes, even on Herkimer’s Pleasant Avenue. We saw it in Boston and we’re seeing it here, though the transition is much faster. There’s no room for gangs in this new world.
Jay Smith Gifts Herkimer Drug and Child Traffickers a Sanctuary