To the Editor:

I am writing in support of Amie Burnside, who is running in next month’s election to be re-elected to the Westerlo Town Board.

Amie is just what we need In Westerlo. She is level-headed and seeks facts from all sides of an issue before she resolves, then she sticks with what she sees to be right even when there’s a lot of opposition or distraction.

For many years, Westerlo Town Board meetings had very few townspeople if any in the audience, and the board voted whatever way Dick [Rapp, long-time supervisor who resigned in March] wanted. Serious issues were ignored or tabled indefinitely.

This began to give way when the townspeople rejected the wildly expensive and poorly planned project to spend millions on buildings but, since then, Amie’s presence on the town board has helped to get us near to having a town board that does and will deal with serious issues, and does so by including the townspeople through provision of information and genuinely open meetings.

Amie’s first project was the Hometown Heroes banners. The town attorney fought this and so did Dick, but Amie saw it through. She worked steadily, quietly but effectively, with a committee of townspeople to plan the project and carry it out.

She made sure all legal and other issues put in her way got resolved by working with the authorities and utilities. She then went out and got the veterans’ families to sign up.

The result was the beautiful array of banners all around town and the thrilling and heartwarming ceremony last November about the banners and veterans. Amie continues her work on this, and we’ll see more banners and another beautiful ceremony next month.

That is how Amie works. She gets all the facts, works with patience and grace through the negatives to find what should be done, then sticks with it to get the right things done.

Amie is just what Westerlo needs. She has my support. I encourage all of Westerlo to vote for Amie Burnside for Town Council on Nov. 5.

Leonard Laub

Westerlo