“With the Democrats in control of the State Senate, we are going to draw the lines so that Republicans will be in oblivion in the state of New York for the next 20 years.”
Brilliant. Thank you, Senator Smith, for reminding us all what the object of the game in Albany is, Democrat and Republican alike: Clinging to your tenuous position of power atop a putrid heap of corruption. After all, this is New York State, home to a fabulous bestiary of deformed electoral districts that would have turned Elbridge Gerry's hair white, including the notorious NY-51, also known as "Abraham Lincoln riding a vacuum cleaner." Read more
[Eric] Dinallo is the only candidate with a serious plan for making the Attorney General's office work for rural New York. [Kathleen] Rice attempted to get in on the action with her own rural plan, but it lacked the teeth of Dinallo's plan in the form of deputy AG's for each county. Rice's plan simply offered "regional offices" and "advisory councils." A free bit of advice for people running for statewide office--the rural counties are used to getting blown off and fed shiny words that mean nothing, because the person saying them has no intention of committing. We can recognize when you're telling us something that sounds good but will end up being irrelevant to the day to day operations of the office. Read more
If he runs for re-election, state senator John Bonacic will face at least two challengers this fall, in a race that is shaping up to be a referendum on natural-gas drilling in the region (which Bonacic emphatically supports).
Sullivan County legislator Dave Sager, who switched party affiliations from Republican to Democrat in order to challenge Bonacic, announced his candidacy yesterday. From the Times Herald-Record:
"Our current state senator is part of the problem," Sager said. "He is behind on flood mitigation, he is wrong on gas drilling and he has done nothing on ethics reform."
Sager's party switch is giving the Bonacic camp plenty of easy fodder. In Bonacic's campaign-trail thesaurus, "Democrat" is a synonym for "New York City," and the Senator isn't wasting any time painting Sager as a pawn in the hand of city interests. From the Daily Freeman: Read more
Looks like staff shortages at the DEC are delaying the completion of a review of the agency's plans for Marcellus shale gas drilling until at least late summer right in the middle of campaign season. From the Ithaca Journal:
"As with every agency, we are understaffed," Grannis said. "Men and women at the DEC are putting in collectively about 50 hours a day, all told, in going through the comments and writing up the responses. I guess if you had to pick a time, I think late summer, early fall we'll be nearing the end of the review process."
Morley's total was originally announced as 165 votes, winning him one of the two available seats, but the actual number should have been 65, placing him last among the four candidates
At a budget meeting Wednesday, Morley resigned, and Snow announced that he would appoint Andrew Rutherford to the position.
Rutherford received 149 votes in the March 16 election, which placed him third. After the correction in the results, he finished in second place, winning the second seat.
Morley said resigning his position was "the right thing to do. It's just one of those things, but it's bittersweet. I guess in the long run, all's well that ends well, but we had a rocky road getting to that point.'' Read more
When Walton Village Clerk Jody Brown tallied the votes, she announced that Patrick Meredith won election with 209 votes, and incumbent Richard Morley retained his office with 165 votes.
Also running were Andrew Rutherford, who garnered 149 votes, and incumbent George Ostrowski, who received 105 votes.
When the votes for all the candidates are totaled, the result is 628 votes, 70 votes too many.
Alas for Rutherford and Ostrowski, the Delaware County board of elections says it's too late to challenge the results. Neither town or county officials noticed that the figures didn't add up; the mistake was apparently spotted by a sharp-eyed village resident. Read more
Now they're closing an elementary school. The Times Herald-Record reports that a school board meeting on whether to close Duggan Elementary School attracted 300 people and ran for six hours last night: Read more
It's election day in villages around New York State. Most polls opened at noon today, and close at 9pm. Here's our guide to the races in and around the Catskills. Note: Races are grouped by county (Delaware, Greene, Schoharie, Ulster and Sullivan) and by whether the race is contested or unopposed. In the Candidates column, "Inc." means the candidate is an incumbent.
Have we missed a race? Let us know by leaving a comment, and we'll update the post.
