| Watershed Post

Recount overturns Walton election results

The results of a village board of trustees election in Walton that were announced on Tuesday evening were wrong, according to a recount conducted Wednesday morning by village election inspectors.

The recount found that John Clark, with 223 votes, and incumbent Al Reynolds, with 179 votes, were elected to the village board. Third and fourth vote-getters were former mayor Ed Snow, with 172 votes, and Andrew Rutherford, with 84 votes. The votes will be counted again on Friday by the Delaware County Board of Elections.

The results contradict Tuesday's announcement that Clark and Snow were elected to the board.

Snow is accusing village election officials of not following proper ballot-handling protocol, and is seeking to have the results of the election thrown out and another election held.

Election inspector Sylvia Fancher said that Tuesday night’s results were inaccurate.

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Neversink rallies to save its covered bridge

Photo from the Halls Mills Covered Bridge blog. Reproduced by permission.

The Halls Mills Bridge in Neversink was luckier than the Old Blenheim Bridge over the Schoharie Creek -- it survived Irene's ravages mostly intact.

But the stone pier that supports the bridge took heavy damage in last year's floods, and since then, the bridge has been closed to the walkers and horseback riders that have been using it to cross the Neversink River since it was built in 1912.

It will take hundreds of thousands of dollars to repair the bridge, and FEMA rules state that New York State and Sullivan County must come up with a quarter of the cost. But if it's not done soon, the bridge could collapse entirely, never to be rebuilt.

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Catskills municipal officials gather to discuss emergency response today

Above: Carl Chipman, supervisor of the town of Rochester, and Art Snyder, the director of Ulster County Emergency Management, displaying a map of Rochester Chipman used during Irene to coordinate emergency response at the disaster officials workship this morning. Photo by Julia Reischel.

This morning, 70 municipal officials from towns and villages across the Catskills are meeting at the Fire Hall in Margaretville to discuss how to respond to devastating disasters like Tropical Storms Irene and Lee. (The meeting is being sponsored by the Catskill Watershed Corporation.) I'm here at the meeting today, so if you have any questions you'd like me to ask, comment on this post and I'll do my best to raise them.

Some of the speakers talking at the meeting today:

Art Snyder, the director of Ulster County Emergency Managment

Carol Chipman, Supervisor of the town of Rochester, which impleented a comprehensive action pmlan during the storm

Michael Sterthous, a partner at Whiteman Osterman & Hanna, an Albany law firm that specializes in municipal law

Rich Bell, the coordinator of Delaware County Emergency Services

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catskill watershed corporation

disaster

hurrican irene

relief

Upstart 25-year-old beats incumbent mayor in Middleburgh

Above: Matthew Avitabile coordinating volunteers at the Middleburgh Municipal Offices five days after Tropical Storm Irene flooded Main Street Middleburgh in Schoharie County. Photo by Marty Rosen for the Watershed Post.

A 25-year-old who earned his community's trust during Tropical Storm Irene ousted the sitting mayor in the Village of Middleburgh last night in one of the most heated races of the Catskills village election season.

After last fall's flood, Matthew Avitabile -- then a village trustee -- coordinated a massive volunteer effort to help his neighbors rebuild. For ten days, he was a fixture at the village offices, dispensing help and advice to anyone who needed it. One night, he slept there.

When a correspondent for the Watershed Post visited the Middlebugh village office five days after after the flood, Avitabile was the village official she encountered.

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Middleburgh Fire Department

Fleischmanns trustees keep their seats

A last-minute write-in campaign for the Fleischmanns village board by planning board chair Larry Reilly and local businessman Martin Morales failed to get either candidate enough votes for a seat on the board. Incumbent trustees Fred Woller and Harriet Grossman won yesterday's election.

The results from village clerk Lorraine DeMarfio, also posted on the Fleischmanns village website:

Harriet Grossman: 49

Fred Woller: 43

Larry Reilly: 35

Martin Morales: 26

Reilly told the Watershed Post that he has already asked the Delaware County Board of Elections for a recount. The county should complete the recount within the next five days, he said.

The vote-counting last night took an hour and fifteen minutes, Reilly said.

"I think we might've made the Guinness Book of World Records for the longest vote-count in Fleischmanns history," he said. "Last year, it took 15 minutes."

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Margaretville's budding Picassos

Wondering where the brillant art in the windows of businesses in Margaretville, Arkville and Fleischmanns this month came from? Look no further than Margaretville Central School, where artists from every grade level competed to have their creations showcased in this year's Central Catskills Chamber of Commerce-sponsored MCS Art Month art contest.

MCS's fine art teachers, Jennifer Wentland and Michele Dietz, have sent us photos of the winners and honorable mentions -- you can ooh and ah at them all by clicking through the Flickr photo album above or checking out our collection on Pinterest. A few of our favorites are below. Make sure to see the art live at the participating businesses, listed below.

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Central Catskills Chamber of Commerce

Margaretville Central School

MCS Art Month

Congressional district lines drawn at last

Above: New York State's new 19th Congressional district. Detail from a document posted on Scribd by Politicker reporter Colin Campbell; embedded below.

It took a federal court to get it done, but New York State finally has its Congressional districts mapped -- with hours to spare before candidates could start gathering signatures. The New York Times reports:

The judges acted with a sense of urgency because Tuesday is the first day that New York candidates for Congress can collect signatures to qualify for a spot on the state’s primary ballot. The primary was previously moved up to June 26 by order of another federal judge, who acted to ensure that New Yorkers serving overseas in the military would have enough time to vote by mail.

On March 19, a panel of three judges finalized the lines on a map of New York State Congressional districts. Unless they are challenged in court, these districts will stay in place for the next ten years.

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Village elections today

"Vote" poster by Flickr user Eric Perry. Published under Creative Commons license.

Today, March 20, is Election Day in most of New York State's incorporated villages.

Many of the village trustees and other officials running in today's local elections are unopposed. But in a few villages, there are contests afoot. Here's a quick roundup of news coverage of the races to be decided around the Catskills today.

Ulster County

Of Ulster County's three villages -- Ellenville, New Paltz, and Saugerties -- only Saugerties holds its elections in March.

This year, three incumbents are running unopposed for Saugerties trustee seats.

Daily Freeman: Village elections take shape in Ulster County, Greene County

Greene County

Athens has three candidates running for two seats on the village board.

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Government

Regal eagle

Photographer Christopher Mooney got this beautiful close-up of a golden eagle (or immature bald eagle?) near the shore of the Pepacton Reservoir yesterday.

Posted to the Watershed Post Flickr group. (Local photographers, if you'd like to see your photos on the Watershed Post, feel free to post them to our group pool.)

3/22/12 Update: Eagle-eyed reader Kevin Millar tells us via email that this handsome fellow is an immature bald eagle:

Looks like a third winter Bald Eagle. It looks like the top of the head is starting to turn white. I don't think Golden Eagles ever get the white feathering on the breast that this bird has, either.

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Fleischmanns in an uproar over open-meeting law

A January 9 meeting of town, county and village officials held to discuss flood recovery in Fleischmanns has become a political punching bag, as the village gets close to its improbably heated board of trustees election.

The problem? Too many Fleischmanns village trustees were at the meeting, making a "quorum" of public officials. Since the meeting wasn't advertised to the public beforehand, it was held in violation of open meeting law -- as village trustee Harriet Grossman pointed out publicly last week.

On Monday, March 12, Grossman read a letter (embedded below) into the minutes of the village board meeting, blasting then-mayor Dave Morell and current trustees Ben Fenton and Todd Pascarella for holding "secret meetings":

The meeting violated a law essential to any democracy and any free people. It raises a question as to whether or not other secret meetings have been held. When? With what agendas? Leading to what decisions?

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