Two seats are open on the school board here. Current board member Doreen Saia said that she will run, again. Nominating petitions are due in the district office April 20.
Democrats, who outnumber Republicans in Berne nearly 3 to 1, will need to surmount 17 votes held by the Republican Randy Bashwinger as absentee ballots are counted for the election of a new highway superintendent.
The position was decided several months ago when Bates, a Democrat and deputy sheriff, was endorsed by all four parties. Sitting Judge Timothy Miller, a Democrat, didn’t run for another term.
A second special election asking voters to allow the sale of a fire truck was passed on Tuesday night, with 136 ballots cast. The first referendum was defeated in August, 15 to 15. A town wide letter might have been the key.
Voters gave another three years to Vasilios Lefkaditis — who has driven much of the board's discussions about the role of a school board — and ousted a member that voted in the majority for split votes.
With three seats at play in the Guilderland School Board elections, only three petitions have been taken, two by incumbents; candidates' petitions are due back on April 21.
Less than a third of the town's registered voters went to the polls on Election Day and, of those, a large number did not cast votes for local offices. All of the incumbents were unopposed as the GOP put up no candidates.
The Independence Party endorsed Michael Hammond, the current Democratic supervisor in Knox, but Pamela Fenoff is an enrolled member. The Independence line will be determined in a September primary with just over 100 Knox voters — the third largest enrolled group in the town — able to decide.
