Geography and proximity to water make the difference. The Great Lakes create weather patterns due to them being heat sinks and humidifiers. Air that passes over the lakes gets a lot more moisture in it than air passing 200 miles to the south and will dump that moisture (in the form of snow) over areas of NY state. The Finger Lakes are in that region that get "Lake Effect Snow". Buffalo NY got over 60 inches of snow in December 2022, Elmira NY (just 150 miles to the south) got 3.5 inches. So small geographic distances can have different weather patterns.