Become member of school board

As one of the two Unatego board members who chose not to run in the last election cycle, I think it is interesting that the most vocal members chose to sit on the sidelines in the last election. The entire Unatego Concerned Citizens Group has operated on half-truths, rumors and assumptions to the overall detriment of the Unatego school district for nearly a year now.

I can tell you that board members spend many hours outside of meetings on district duties; in particular, the board president and the senior board members disparaged in Ms. Sherwood’s letter. The only compensation is the deprecating attitude of the ill-informed UCCG.

The time a board member must invest in a superintendent search was the primary reason I chose not to run in the last election. However it may look on the outside, the board worked very well and to the academic and financial benefit of the district to resolve the last major personnel issue that took more than a year to resolve. This was in spite of the repeated attempts at interference on the part of the UCCG and other vested groups in the district. Was there an impact to the district? Absolutely, but not of a financial nature.

The very nature of the issues that the UCCG seems overly concerned with preclude it from having access to them, unless, of course, they choose to run for the board. Board members are obliged not to speak to personnel issues outside the confines of executive session.

If you have more time on your hands than you seem to know what to do with, I urge you to run for the board. You will see in reality how well things were run and handled in the past, instead of making poorly based assumptions.

Mike Mitchell

Otego

Let Elections know of change

While I applaud Holly Clare Beaudet of Oneonta for her enthusiasm regarding elections, I must point out that she is laboring under a misapprehension regarding how a change of residence affects a person’s right to vote. The only time a person is required to re-register is when the move is out of the county.

If a person moves within the county, he or she remains registered. A voter is required to vote at the polling site for the new residence and his or her name may not be in the poll book if the Board of Elections was not notified of the change. In that case, the voter will be given a paper ballot and the change of address will be noted.

When yellow mail check cards are returned to the Board of Elections, the voter is not automatically purged. The voter’s record is placed in a special file and will not be purged unless he or she missed two federal elections. Again, if because of a mail delivery problem the name is not in the poll book, a paper ballot is offered to the person. A determination will be made by the commissioners as to the validity of the ballot and appropriate action will be taken.

It is always best to include the Board of Elections on the list of agencies to be notified of changes in physical or mailing address. This includes adding or removing a post office box number.

William J. Buccheri

Roxbury

Buccheri is Democratic elections commissioner for Delaware County.