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Ray Pratt, former sports director for the 1980 Olympic Winter Games, will act as interim president and CEO of the state Olympic Regional Development Authority.

Pratt replaced Bob Fries, who is resigning effective Nov. 2. Pratt was a teacher and athletic director at Lake Placid High School for 15 years before retiring to take the job as sports director for the 1980 Winter Olympics.

After the games, he was appointed by the governor to the committee which was eventually responsible for creating ORDA and became one of the authority’s first employees.

From 1982 to 1991, Pratt was ORDA’s vice president for events, responsible for scheduling and planning sports events at the venues. He retired in 1991 but became part of the transition team that was put in place in the wake of the resignation of former ORDA President Ned Harkness. Since September 1993, Pratt has served as a consultant for ORDA.

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School expansion

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Lake Placid School Board members had mixed opinions after seeing a third plan for a proposed elementary school expansion on Tuesday, Oct. 18.

Rensselaer architect Ed Luzine presented the board with his latest plan, after he was told at a Sept. 29 meeting to “make the plan come as close to $1 million as possible.”

Luzine’s proposal at the time, the first revision, had an approximate cost of $1.6 million. His latest proposal, which has board members wondering about the project altogether, carries a preliminary cost estimate that is only about $100,000 lower at about $1.5 million.

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Dentist in Russia

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Before Lake Placid dentist Del Warner left for Russia earlier this month with seven other dentists, he was told by friends that he would be drinking buttermilk or vodka with almost every meal.

It wasn’t quite true.

“There was no buttermilk, but they drink a lot of vodka,” Warner said.

Other culinary differences took some getting used to.

“Sometimes for breakfast, we got plain yogurt, which none of the Americans liked except me. Most of the time for breakfast, we had homemade bread with thin ham or summer sausage and very strong teas. One morning, they gave us hot dogs, coleslaw and porridge,” he said.

He did have to use his own towels and to wear some of his clothes more than once because there were no washing machines. The toilet paper was roughly the same quality as a newspaper.

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Four-year degrees

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Paul Smith’s College is seeking approval from the state Department of Education to offer bachelor degrees in addition to the two-year associate’s degrees now offered.

College President Arthur Linkins called the arrangement a “two-plus-two” program, meaning students can earn a two-year degree and then engage in a second two-year program to earn a four-year degree.

Bachelor degrees will be offered in natural resources, hospitality management and liberal studies.

The college currently offers associate’s degrees in pre-professional forestry, forest technician, forest recreation, urban tree management, surveying technology, hotel and restaurant management, culinary arts, tourism and the travel industry, business administration, ecology and environmental technology, environmental studies, liberal arts and other related areas.