By David S. Lewis

VOORHEESVILLE – When the polls closed at the middle school at 9:30 p.m. on Tuesday, voters had approved two budgets and elected three new representatives.

The $22 million school budget for Voorheesville passed with 61 percent of the vote, 620 to 391. 

Mike Snyder lost the lone seat open on the board to Lisa Henkel who garnered 65 percent of the vote.

Henkel, a former elementary-school principal, received the personal endorsement of Kathy Fiero, president of the Voorheesville Teachers’ Association.  Making her first run for the board, she said she was thankful for everyone’s support, and she said she was looking forward to doing the best job she could.  She will fill the seat vacated by Thomas McKenna, who served on the board for a decade.  Snyder, the president of a meetings-professional group, was making his second run for the board.

On a proposal to shorten the length of terms for members of the school board, voters made their strongest statement.  The proposal passed by an overwhelming 81 percent.  The terms for new members of the board, including Henkel, will be four years; the proposal will not affect the current board members, who were elected to five-year terms.  Board members hoped to increase interest in the unpaid posts by shortening the term. 

The proposition to acquire two new school buses for the district passed, as did a proposition to transfer $95,000 from the general fund into the district’s school lunch fund, by just over two-thirds.  The money will be used to pay debt accrued by the lunch program over the last five years. 

The $1 million Voorheesville Public Library budget passed with 64 percent of the vote 647 to 356.  The budget, which represented a 1-percent increase of the library’s operating costs, was raised 4.4 percent; the remaining 3.4 percent represented an annual payment of $30,000 on the land the library purchased last year for its expansion.

Rebecca Pahl won the most votes in the tightly-contested three-way race for two seats on the library’s board of trustees.  She received 492 votes, or 37 percent.  Incumbent Richard Ramsey, a retired state worker, won the other seat, acquiring 457 votes, or 34 percent of the vote; challenger Bryan Richmond, a Voorheesville attorney, was defeated but won 371 votes or 28 percent.

Pahl, mother and former teacher, said she was thrilled.

“I’m looking forward to improving the excellent services the library provides, and I’m looking forward to a time of growth for the library,” she said.