Maximilian Eyle, Executive Director
Max joined the Central Current team in 2024 and manages the business side of the organization. He brings more than a decade of experience working in the communications sector. Previously, he served as the grants & communications specialist for The Gifford Foundation, where he oversaw audience engagement and helped secure funding for a variety of regional nonprofit initiatives.
Max is a native of Syracuse and a graduate of the Syracuse City Schools. In 2015, he earned his B.A. in history and American Studies from Hobart College. Max lives on the south-west side of Syracuse with his partner and dog. He can be reached at meyle@centralcurrent.org
Chris Libonati, Managing Editor
As managing editor, Libonati oversees Central Current’s editorial production and newsroom. He graduated from Syracuse University with degrees in magazine journalism and public policy. He worked for three years as an editor and a reporter at The Daily Orange, an independent nonprofit news organization run by SU students. He has worked as a journalist in Syracuse for the first six years of his career – first as a crime reporter, then as a City Hall beat reporter and finally as the first reporter at Central Current.
Libonati’s work as a reporter has caught the Syracuse Police Department gifting officers pay for not working, a failure by the department to punish officers accused of abuse, and failures that lead to an infant’s death at the local jail. After the departure of Central Current’s previous editor-in-chief in 2023, Libonati became the managing editor of the publication. In the last two years, Libonati has won six Syracuse Press Club awards, twice for investigative journalism. He can be reached at libonati@centralcurrent.org
Patrick McCarthy, Government & Politics Reporter
Patrick is a staff reporter at Central Current covering government and politics. A graduate of Syracuse University’s Maxwell and Newhouse Schools, he was born and raised in Syracuse and attended Nottingham High School. Before joining the Central Current team, he worked as a writer at Friends of the Rosamond Gifford Zoo and wrote concert reviews for syracuse.com | The Post Standard.
Patrick also served as a contributing writer for TriplePundit, a publication focused on sustainability and corporate responsibility. In his role with Central Current, he provides access and transparency to elected officials – helping raise accountability and connecting readers to the decisions that shape Central New York. Patrick can be reached at pmccarthy@centralcurrent.org
Sean Kirst, columnist
Sean Kirst is a columnist with The Central Current. He has been an Upstate journalist for more than 50 years. He held his first reporting job as a teenager and worked for newspapers in Dunkirk, Niagara Falls, Rochester and Syracuse, where he spent 27 years before joining the Buffalo News in 2016.
He is the recipient of many national and state journalism awards, including the Ernie Pyle Award, given annually to one American journalist for writing about the dreams and struggles of everyday people. He received the national excellence in column writing award from the Society for Professional Journalists, Capitolbeat’s top national award for column writing about state government and the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence national media award. Between 2016 and 2024, in Buffalo, he received the New York News Publishers Association distinguished column writing award seven times, in its largest circulation category.
Kirst, who serves as a journalist-in-residence at Le Moyne College, was named a civic Wisdom Keeper by FOCUS Greater Syracuse and his name was placed on a Wall of Distinction by the Syracuse Press Club for lifetime achievement in journalism. Kirst has been honored by the federal Department of Justice for sensitivity to victims of violent crime. He has received honorary degrees from Le Moyne and Onondaga Community College, and was honored by SUNY Fredonia in 2022 for outstanding achievement by alumni. He is a recipient of the Onondaga Historical Association medal, the OHA’s highest award for preserving and interpreting local heritage.
Kirst, a TedX speaker, has given many talks about the importance of storytelling in journalism, especially in a digital age, and he is the author of three books: The Ashes of Lou Gehrig, Moonfixer, and The Soul of Central New York, published in 2016, the fastest-selling book in the almost-80-year history of the Syracuse University Press. The England-based Tolkien Society credits Kirst with serving as founder of international Tolkien Reading Day, now celebrated around the world.
Kirst and his wife Nora, a retired city schoolteacher, have three grown children: Sarah, Seamus and Liam.
Sean can be reached at skirst@centralcurrent.org
Debadrita Sur, Housing & Infrastructure Reporter
Debadrita Sur is a Report For America Corp member who reports on the I-81 project and public housing for Central Current. In 2023, Sur graduated with a master’s degree in journalism from Columbia University, where she reported on housing and homelessness, and co-produced a short documentary on food insecurity in the South Bronx.
After graduating, she joined The Buffalo News as a general assignment reporter, where she covered daily breaking news and long-term enterprise stories on pedestrian safety, homelessness in Erie County, and Jewish and Arab families in Western New York reacting to the Middle East conflict, among other topics. She later joined Reach PLC in New York City, where she worked on tight deadlines to cover breaking news on a myriad of topics, but mainly focusing on the Russia-Ukraine war as well as the Trump administration across three publications. Sur grew up in Kolkata, India, and completed her undergraduate degree in English literature from Presidency University, while also working for a London-based cultural magazine, Far Out, on the side. Deb speaks Hindi, Bengali, English, and German.
When she’s not reporting, Sur is either reading, trying to recreate her mom’s chicken recipes, making adventure bucket lists, or playing with her cat, Mountain Dew. She can be reached at dsur@centralcurrent.org
Laura Robertson, Onondaga County Reporter
Laura Robertson is a staff reporter covering Onondaga County. Prior to joining Central Current, she lived on the edge of the Bering Strait in Nome, Alaska, where she worked as a reporter for a year. She graduated from Princeton in 2024, and speaks English, Farsi, and some Thai. She grew up just west of Binghamton in Tioga County and is excited to return to upstate New York.
Laura won the 2025 Nellie Bly Cub Reporter Award from the New York Press Club for her story on an infirmary profit model that led to dozens of deaths in New York State jails.
A 2024 recipient of an Overseas Press Club scholar award, she’s interviewed Alaskan gold miners, Russian draft dodgers, and former Syrian freedom fighters, and reported from Tajikistan. She’s particularly interested in money flows, the intersections of business and politics, and how those things affect people on the ground.
You can reach her at lrobertson@centralcurrent.org with tips about things going on around the county, or with recommendations of ways to get to know Syracuse better!
Kari Cotter, CPA, Finance Director
Kari joined Central Current as Finance Manager in March 2024. She has spent the past 25 years assisting business owners and nonprofit organizations maximize their financial potential. Kari earned her bachelor’s degree in accounting from the State University of New York at Oswego.
Outside of work, Kari enjoys spending time with her family, serving on the Board of Directors of a local charity as well as the Audit Committee of a public school district. She can be reached at kcotter@centralcurrent.org
Frequent Contributors
Photojournalist
Mike Greenlar
Photojournalist
Michelle Gabel
Freelance Journalist
Eddie Velazquez
