Above: You may start running into candidates for Town government looking for a little love from registered voters (in the form of signatures) starting on Valentine’s Day. (image edited using logo from the old Town website)
If you’re interested in running for Town Office, the window opens tomorrow to pull nomination papers. Potential candidates can pull papers from Friday, February 14th through Monday, March 24th.
The deadline to file papers with enough signatures1 is Tuesday, March 25th.
This year, the following seats will be up for grabs in the May election. (Unless otherwise specified, each have one seat available):
- Board of Assessors – 3 year term
- Board of Commissioners of Trust Funds – 3 year term
- Board of Health – 3 year term
- Board of Trustees Southborough Library – vote for two – 3 year term
- Moderator – 1 year term
- Housing Authority – 3 year term
- Northborough-Southborough Regional School Committee – Southborough candidate – 3 year term2
- Planning Board – 5 year term
- Select Board – vote for two – 3 year term
- Southborough School Committee – vote for two – 3 year term
The last on the list is one that should have at least one open seat to fill.
When Kamali O’Meally applied to be appointed to a vacancy on the Southborough School Committee, she told committee members and the Select Board that she didn’t plan to run for election this spring.
It’s too early to know who else will or won’t be running for re-election. So, those who choose to run this spring may be up against (or filling an open seat left by) the following incumbents whose terms are also expiring:
- Board of Assessors – Jeffrey Klein
- Board of Commissioners of Trust Funds – Nicolas McCoy
- Board of Health – Safdar Medina
- Board of Trustees Southborough Library – Marguerite Landry & Janet Maney
- Moderator – Paul Cimino
- Housing Authority – John Wood
- Northborough-Southborough Regional School Committee – Matthew Spencer
- Planning Board – Jesse Stein
- Select Board – Kathy Cook & Sam Stivers
- Southborough School Committee – Roger Challen
As always, I’ll update readers if races start to brew or if it appears we’re in danger of ending up with a vacancy.
In the meantime, if you want to keep tabs on who has pulled or filed papers you can look to see if there is an update on the Town Clerk’s election page here.
For readers just interested in voting, make sure you’re registered by May 5th. (Though, if you want to vote in Annual and/or Special Town Meetings this spring, do it sooner.)
And save the date to vote on May 13th between 6:30 am – 8:00 pm at Trottier Middle School. (Or apply far enough in advance to vote by mail.)
If you have questions about the responsibilities for each board, you can find information here. For many of the boards/committees, you can also view/stream their recent meetings. (For details on viewing options, see my notes at the bottom of my regular Week in Government posts.)
- Based on the formula, until the next Gubernatorial election, the minimum number of registered Southborough voters’ signatures is technically 48. But the Town Clerk’s office always advises to get at least 60, in case there is an issue with any names/addresses not matching the registration list.
- There are also Northborough seats available on the Regional School Committee, but obviously Southborough residents can’t run for that.
