The Swans

Responsible environmental management and equitable justice collide in the perfect small town story

Roughly 15 minutes from the heart of the city of Syracuse lies the town of Manlius. It is an unremarkable, relatively affluent suburb whose biggest claim to fame is probably its high school’s nationally dominant cross-country program.

For reasons no one understands, towns in New York can contain villages, which are legally distinct entities yet wholly subsumed by their towns. The most meaningful consequence of this inane division happens when your neighborhood falls on the town/village line and one municipality’s Department of Public Works is more efficient than the other, leading to varying degrees of snow plowing all within a single suburban neighborhood.

The town of Manlius is composed in part of three villages — Minoa, Fayetteville, and Manlius — with the second, more Manlius-y Manlius centered around a village park known as the Swan Pond. As is belied by the name, the Swan Pond hosts a pair of mute swans. As mute swans mate for life, Manlius residents look forward to new descendant…