Politics & Government

Northborough Needs Candidates

Filing deadline is Friday for Board of Selectmen, school committees, and Planning Board.

The Northborough town election is coming up in May and right now, there aren’t enough people running for seats on a number of the town-wide boards, according to Town Clerk Andy Dowd.

The Planning Board has two open positions with one incumbent, Rick Leif, not seeking re-election. While four candidates have taken out papers to run, only one, Amy Poretsky, has returned paperwork and been certified for ballot access.

Fifty signatures of registered voters are needed for all the races, according to Dowd. The deadline to obtain signatures papers to run is March 21.

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There are also vacant school committee positions available.

Incumbent Joan Frank is running again and has been certified for ballot access for the Northborough School Committee, overseeing the town’s elementary and middle schools. Shirley Lundberg has decided not to seek re-election. There are two open seats this year.

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Also, on the Northborough-Southborough Regional School Committee, which oversees the high school, Patricia Kress has signed up to run for one of two open seats. Lundberg and Scott Michael Karpuk will not be seeking re-election.

Dowd said it wasn’t unusual to see open seats for town offices during his decade in the clerk’s position but added it was difficult to pinpoint an exact reason why people chose not to run. He said he was spreading the word about the vacancies in an effort to “generate interest” in the positions.

“(Lack of candidates) happens with some regularity,” he said. “It’s always nice to get new folks interested in serving in either elected or appointed positions.”

Boards tend to meet regularly and there is a time commitment, which could be keeping some people from running. The school committees meet monthly but have subcommittees that members are required to attend. The Planning Board also meets monthly and handles oversight of development, regulations, and other issues, “as they try to work to make the town what it wants to be,” Dowd noted, an important function in any community.

In the Board of Selectmen’s race, incumbent Aaron Hutchins has decided not to run again. Two candidates have taken out papers to run – incumbent Dawn Rand and Jason Perreault – for two seats. If no other candidates emerge, they will win by default. The same is true for incumbent Town Moderator Frederick George, who is also running for re-election and is the only candidate certified.

Dowd said to run for Northborough town offices, candidates needed to live in the town and be registered to vote. Expenditures for money raised and spent getting elected would need to be filed with the town clerk’s office. If not enough candidates gathered signatures to gain ballot access and run for office, write-in efforts could be mounted by candidates. If those candidates aren’t successful, committees could meet later to appoint someone to serve in a vacant position until next year, according to Dowd.

The clerk's office is open from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Wednesday and Thursday; from 8 a.m. to noon on Friday, to signup. For more information, visit the Northborough town website

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