LEROY, N.Y.- For a small town, this is a lot of spotlight to handle. As LeRoy makes national, even international, headlines, all the attention is quite the adjustment for a place that considers being the birthplace of JELLO it's biggest claim to fame.
"Different folks handle it in a different way," said Town Supervisor Steve Barbeau of the media attention. "Some find it distasteful....other folks say it's a good thing perhaps that's what it's taken to maybe move towards finding answers."
Answers regarding a strange illness that has affected more than a dozen of the town's residents, almost all of them teenage girls who attend or attended LeRoy Junior - Senior High School.
We spoke with several business owners on Main Street in Leroy that say parking is scarce enough on Main Street as it is, and with all the news crews, there's not enough parking spaces for their customers.
Meanwhile, the girls' doctors say conversion disorder is what is likely causing them to experience severe tics, but the diagnosis has been publicly questioned, and very publicly debated. Some residents say all that publicity and uncertainty breeds fear.
"It's disturbing what's going on there, but I'm afraid to send my children, they went once this week, you know because I don't know what's going on at that school," said Leroy resident Amy Klusek.
"We're thinking about buying a house, and I'm almost afraid to buy a house out here because I don't know what's going on," said Becky Clarke, another resident.
Administrators insist the school is safe, and a newly released report from the state health department backs that up.
Barbeau says he and the town board have been reviewing reports of a 1970s train derailment and chemical spill that some - including famed activist Erin Brockovitch-- have speculated could be related to the strange symptoms. For the past week, he says they have been in touch with officials from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
"The evidence I've been looking for so far doesn't seem to lead to an association, or at least from a train derailment," said Barbeau.
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