KNOX — Although Democrats have not put up a full slate, the 2025 election in Knox will be more contested than it has been in several years with a race for town supervisor, town councilperson, and highway superintendent. There will also be  Republican and Conservative primaries for a highway superintendent candidate. 

Altogether, there are seven positions open: town supervisor, two town board seats, town clerk, highway superintendent, town justice, and tax collector. 

Republicans have put together a full slate of mostly incumbents or people with experience in the town:

— Conservative Town Clerk Traci Delaney (formerly Schanz) for town supervisor;

— Incumbents Karl Pritchard, a Republican, and Kenneth Saddlemire, a Democrat, for town board;

— Conservative incumbent Matthew Schanz for highway superintendent, being challenged in a primary by Joshua Gebe, who is not enrolled in a party; he works for the Berne highway department but lives in Knox;

— Conservative Zoning board of appeals secretary Tiffiny Snyder for town clerk;

— Republican incumbent Timothy Francis for town justice; and 

— Democratic incumbent Elizabeth Walk for tax collector.

Knox Republican Committee Chairman Dennis Cyr, who is a member of the town board, told The Enterprise that the party was supporting Schanz in the highway superintendent primary, saying he didn’t know Gebe, but had little to share about the rest of the slate. 

“People know pretty much who’s who on there,” he said. 

All of the Republican candidates are also running on the Conservative Party line, which too will hold a primary between Schanz and Gebe for highway superintendent.

Knox’s government, which had been dominated by Democrats for decades, shifted with the 2016 election. Currently, with 2,120 registered voters in Knox, 690 are Democrats, 590 are Republicans, 102 are Conservatives, 105 belong to other small parties, and 633 are unenrolled in a party.

Democrats, who have struggled in the last two cycles to find candidates for open positions, have put up:

— Former Berne-Knox-Westerlo Board of Education member and Democrat Chasity McGivern for town supervisor;

— Gebe for highway superintendent; and

— Chairman of the board of assessment review and Democrat Justin Zimmer for town board.

Democratic supervisor Russ Pokorny is not seeking re-election saying that, at 77, it’s time to hand over the reins, describing the two, two-year terms he served beginning in 2022 as somewhat unplanned for him. 

“Four years ago, the Democratic Party was looking for somebody to run for supervisor and really hadn’t found anybody, so I agreed to do it,” he said.

Pokorny said nobody expected him to win, but he beat his Republican challenger, Kregg Grippo, by three points. 

“So I ended up being supervisor, sort of with the proviso that the committee would find someone else to run … and they didn’t,” Pokorny said. 

He said that it seemed like he was going to have to run again, until McGivern stepped up. 

Pokorny’s wife, Amy, a former town board member who ran unsuccessfully for supervisor and who is currently treasurer for the Democratic committee, told The Enterprise that McGivern currently works as a real estate agent, which gives her negotiating and people skills that would be assets as supervisor.

“She really has the gravitas and demeanor of a person who can be a successful supervisor,” Amy Pokorny said. 

The first woman to serve on the Knox Town Board was Karin Busch, a Republican. She took office in May 1992.  Men have dominated on the board throughout the town’s history and, although two women have run for supervisor in recent years, neither were elected.