Supervisor among uncontested races
WOODSTOCK, N.Y. » Voters on Nov. 7 will find a ballot with uncontested candidates for two Town Board seats, supervisor and town justice.
Democratic candidate Bill McKenna, of 1 Hutchin Hill Road, Shady, will also have the Working Families Party endorsement in seeking the supervisor’s position. He was appointed as supervisor earlier this year following the death of Jeremy Wilber.
McKenna, 52, is a selfemployed general construction contractor, who was previously a Town Board member for one term between 2004-07 and did not get a party nomination for reelection. He returned to the board after winning in 2009 and won reelection in 2013.
McKenna has lived in the town for 26 years and with wife Hilary, and has two children. He is a 1983 graduate of Union Catholic High School, in Scotch Plains, New Jersey, and earned a bachelors degree in business administration from Seton Hall University. He is a member of the Woodstock Chamber of Commerce and of Woodstock Fire Department Company 1 in Lake Hill.
“I think the most important issue right now is to see the (comprehensive) plan completed and follow through with it,” he said.
“We have the (bed and breakfast) issue,” McKenna said. “We has a lot of great positives and it needs some tweaking and regulation to keep a lid on the worst parts of it.”
McKenna said projects should include improvements to the Comeau property office building to have it become handicapped accessible.
Lorin Rose, 61, of 12 Rose Lane, Bearsville, will be on the Democratic and Working Families ballot lines. He is a retired owner of a construction company who ran unsuccessfully for supervisor in 2009.
He is a lifetime resident of the town who graduated from Onteora High School in 1974. He is a former town Planning Board member and a volunteer with Woodstock Fire Company No. 3 in Lake Hill.
“AirBnB is probably our biggest problem,” Rose said. “I believe they should be (required to have permits)
with a cap on the number. That gives us a revenue stream and that gives us leverage to control it.”
Rose would also like to develop a parking plan for the business hamlet, including paving the Mountainview parking lot and developing a lot on the lower Comeau property.
Richard Heppner, 65, of 22 Neher Street, is the town historian and a firsttime candidate who was appointed to the Town Board earlier this year. He is a retired academic administrator and teacher for Orange County Community College. He has lived in the town for more than 50 years and with wife Deborah and has two children.
Heppner graduated from Onteora High School in 1969, earned a bachelors degree in political science and history from SUNY Albany in 1973, and later received a masters degree from the New School for Social Research in New York City.
Heppner said he is evaluating needs of the community as the Town Board goes through the proposed 2018 spending plan.
“This is my first budget process so I’m still learning,” he said.
“Part of the problem is we’re out of control with the health care costs,” Heppner said. “You don’t have much control over that, but I’d like to advocate for lower costs.”
Democratic incumbent town Justice Richard Husted, who is also on the Working Families line, is uncontested in seeking a sixth four-year term.
Husted, 68, of 29 Gitnick Road, has lived in the town since 1978 and with wife Francesca has one child. He is a 1963 graduate of Roy C. Ketchem High School. He is a retired union iron worker.
He was on the town Zoning Board of Appeals from 1985 to 1991, was an Ulster County legislator for two terms between 1992-95, and former president of the Ulster County Magistrates Association.