Consolidating government - making it more efficient by cutting out layers of bureacracy and streamlining services - is a popular idea.

But actually doing it is another, far more difficult proposition.

Case in point: the village of Potsdam, where voters on Tuesday soundly rejected the concept of dissolving the village into the town.

What drove the rejection? Opinions vary, but experts see in Potsdam some of the practical difficulties that stop government from being leaner and meaner.

Some of them include:

- Fear of what comes next. Charles Zettick, from the Center For Governmental Research, noted "There are certain things in the future that can't be defined with certainty and so folks who want to know specifically what's going to be guaranteed cannot get guarantees."

- Fear of losing your identity. Potsdam's village administrator, David Fenton, sees identity as an issue : "I think they're (voters) very, very protective of that and want to make sure that doesn't change a whole lot."

So who might be a good candidate for consolidation? Political scientist and former Canton mayor Bob Wells argues smalller villages (as in, smaller than Potsdam) might be.

"It's those villages that have to seriously (consider dissolution), because they don't have a financial base, and to a large extent, they don't have the kind of money to be able to give the services."

One Jefferson County village, Mannsville, (population 400) may fit that description, and has just been given a government grant to study dissolution.