I find it fascinating that we can't get enough volunteers anymore for our more rural VFD's, but spending millions on a new radio system seems like a good idea. The economy in Upstate NY is very poor now, many of those more rural districts don't have the tax base anymore to finance such big capital projects. What is happening, is that people from downstate (NYC) are buying these properties for cheap, moving out to the "sticks", but suddenly realizing they are In The Sticks...meaning they don't have the services anymore that they got used to in the Big City. These transplants get on the Town Board, Gov't Office, School Board, etc and wrongly use Big City thinking for small town issues. They want to bring all the services they got used to in Urban areas, out to the Rural areas. And of course a big dollar developer comes along and speaks their language, enticing them to buy something very sophisticated (expensive). Whether it is correct or not is irrelevant. But they know better, of course.
Schoharie is not near New York City! It is a beautiful area full of rolling hills and farmland, about 40mi or so west of Albany, similar latitude. But it is within driving distance of NYC and many folks do venture out that way. Again, middle class economy is shrinking upstate, people die off, move away...land becomes very cheap in those towns.
Rensselaer County (where I live) ditched their VHF-Low system many years ago for an 800mhz trunked, is similar in topography to Schoharie Cnty. But Renss Cnty is nearby to the Capital District, uses sites in ALb county (which also has big hills/mountain, Helderbergs) to cover in-county comms. Schoharie is quite a bit more vast, I think it would require a larger amount of hilltop sites to cover well. Renss cnty is also part of "Capital District", has a bit more economic strength to warrant such an expense. Aside from a bunch of wealthy NYC transplants, the balance of the residents probably can't handle the increased tax hikes. The only real economy out that way is the Amsterdam or Schenectady areas, middle class people have to drive quite a bit to make decent wages.