Stories indexed with the term ‘2010 general elections’

Only a few minutes after voting ended at 8 p.m. on the evening of Nov. 2, CNN used exit polling conducted throughout the day to call the Michigan governor’s race in favor of Republican Rick Snyder. Even before polls opened, the only real question for most analysts was the margin of Snyder’s expected victory.

Margin of victory was also the main interest offered in local races, but with expectations for the identity of the victorious party reversed from the gubernatorial contest. Ann Arbor voters returned Democratic incumbents to five city council seats and the mayorship. For Steve Bean, who mounted an independent campaign for mayor, and for city council challengers Republican John Floyd (Ward 5), independent Newcombe Clark (Ward 5) and Libertarian Emily Salvette (Ward 2), the final raw tally did not offer many bright spots.

Bean managed about 18% of the vote in the mayor’s race. Floyd and Clark drew 22% and 9%, respectively, in the Ward 5 city council race, and Salvette received 21% in the Ward 2 council contest. Unless they are robots, it’s hard to imagine that any of their egos escaped completely unscathed. And despite the fact that Newcombe Clark’s door hangers depict a very cheerful robot with an NC insignia, I do not believe that Clark himself is a robot. So at some level, given their sheer humanity, the results must feel at least a little bit like a personal rejection by the electorate.

On the flip side, it’s hard to imagine that an incumbent like mayor John Hieftje, or Carsten Hohnke (Ward 5) or Tony Derezinski (Ward 2) – perhaps even more so Sandi Smith (Ward 1), Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) and Margie Teall (Ward 4), who were all elected unopposed – could interpret the results as anything less than an overwhelming endorsement of their job performance.

Challengers and incumbents alike would be wrong in those interpretations, I think.

But as far as local races go, far more interesting to me than performing a postmortem on the council and mayor’s campaigns would be to take a look at the race for the library board, where there was little campaigning by the candidates. The outcome was not completely clear until the votes from outside the city and all absentee ballots from the city of Ann Arbor had been counted. That came at around 4 a.m. – almost eight hours after CNN had already called the governor’s race.

Vivienne Armentrout would have been a winning choice of city of Ann Arbor voters who voted in person at the polls. But once absentee ballots and votes from outside the city were included, she narrowly missed joining the board. Instead, incumbents Barbara Murphy, Edward Surovell, and Jan Barney Newman retained their seats. [Full Story]

The four  Ann Arbor Democrats running for seats on the Washtenaw County board of commissioners were elected decisively on Tuesday. The group included three incumbents and a first-time candidate, Yousef Rabhi. Elsewhere in the county, Republicans picked up a seat on the board, according to unofficial election results posted by the Washtenaw County clerk’s office, bringing the GOP total to three of the 11 commissioners.

Rabhi defeated Republican Joe Baublis in District 11, with 5,663 votes – or 75% of the votes – compared to 1,821 for Baublis. The Aug. 3 primary election result was notable for Rabhi’s one-vote victory in a four-way race. Those results prompted a recount, giving him a final two-vote victory in the primary. District 11 covers parts of central and east Ann Arbor. Rabhi will take the seat vacated by Jeff Irwin, who ran a successful bid for 53rd District state representative on Tuesday, defeating Republican Chase Ingersoll by a vote of 23,436 to 5,692. [Full Story]

Nancy Kaplan won her first elected position on Tuesday when she defeated two opponents – including an incumbent – to take a two-year term on the Ann Arbor District Library board of trustees. According to unofficial results posted by the Washtenaw County clerk’s office, Kaplan took just over 55% of the votes in that three-way race against Lyn Powrie Davidge and incumbent Carola Stearns, who was appointed to that seat in 2008 following the resignation of Jean King.

In a separate, much closer race, three incumbents – Barbara Murphy, Jan Barney Newman and Ed Surovell – were re-elected to four-year terms. Challenger Vivienne Armentrout finished fourth in that four-way race, with 16,975 votes or 22.3% of total votes cast. Murphy got 20,404 votes, or 26.8%; Newman had 19,834 votes, or 26.07%; and Surovell got 18,415 votes, or 24.2%.

The four trustees elected on Tuesday will join three other current board members – Rebecca Head, Margaret Leary and Prue Rosenthal – whose terms expire in 2012. [Full Story]

Today The Chronicle crew will be filing reports from a sampling of polling places throughout the city of Ann Arbor, to give readers a sense of what’s happening around town on election day. We’ll update this report in chronological order – most recent material at the bottom.

For those of you still researching candidates, here’s a link to The Chronicle’s coverage of 2010 general election races. Another useful resource is Publius.org – type in your name and some additional information, and the site serves up a sample ballot with links to news articles, financial reports and other details about the candidates and ballot issues. And if you’re not sure where your polling place is located, check this Secretary of State site to find it.

Polls close at 8 p.m. We’ll report results from selected races via our Civic News Ticker, and update a shared spreadsheet as all the results roll in.

And we’re off – see you at the polls. [Full Story]

Editor’s note: This column includes a request for help in logging early election results straight from polling locations after the polls close at 8 p.m. on Tuesday. If you’d like to help – by gaining editing access to a shared spreadsheet, or by texting, Tweeting, or calling in results to us – shoot us an email: dave.askins@annarborchronicle.com

The general election on Tuesday, Nov. 2 comes after eight games have been played on a 12-game schedule for the University of Michigan football team. The guys in the winged helmets are currently sitting at 5-3, which is better than the 2-7 record they’d achieved at the same point during their 2008 campaign.

For me, the 2008 general election – and because I am quick to generalize, all elections – will always be linked to UM football. They’re linked in the form of Jonas Mouton, a linebacker I met in the course of my election day travels in 2008. Mouton was nearly denied the franchise when he tried to vote at the Pioneer High School precinct, but was finally able to cast his ballot.

Elections are, of course, not one bit like a football game, let alone a football season – that’s purely a writerly ploy to set up some kind of thematic backdrop against which I can ask readers a favor: We’re asking for help in collecting precinct-level election results on Tuesday night.

Otherwise put, on Tuesday evening, we’d like to ask that you play for The Chronicle’s team. To quote legendary UM coach Bo Schembechler, when we collect the precinct level results, “we’re gonna play together as a team. We’re gonna believe in each other, we’re not gonna criticize each other, we’re not gonna talk about each other, we’re gonna encourage each other.”

Veteran consumers of local online information know that election results for all the precincts in Washtenaw County will eventually be available on the county clerk’s website. As results are filed with the clerk, election staff upload them incrementally. With polls closing at 8 p.m., and poll closing procedures taking roughly 30-60 minutes to complete, the first results typically begin to appear on the clerk’s website towards 10 p.m. and are generally uploaded for the entire county sometime in the early morning hours, if not sooner. That’s pretty quick, actually.

But it’s not Denard Robinson quick. [Full Story]

About 30 people gathered in the cafeteria/auditorium of Wines Elementary School on Oct. 21 for The Ann Arbor Chronicle’s Ward 5 city council candidate forum. Two of the three candidates participated: Republican John Floyd and Newcombe Clark, who’s running as an independent. Carsten Hohnke, the incumbent Democrat, chose not to participate.

Rather than a standard Q&A, candidates were given 10 specific topic areas in advance, and advised that on the night of the event, they’d be presented with list-making tasks on some of these topics that they’d be expected to complete collaboratively. The Chronicle offers a separate opinion piece about the format of the event and candidates’ participation in it.

In this article, we report the interaction of Floyd and Clark as they worked their way through the tasks, which began with a warm-up: Winnow down the 10 topics to four, to be tackled in 10-minute chunks. They settled on these topics: (1) development of downtown city-owned surface lots, (2) economic development, (3) appointments to boards and commissions, and (4) quality of life.

The two men arrived at a strategy for the winnowing task that persisted through the roughly one-hour event: Each proposed some list items relatively uncontested by the other, followed by a consensus check. In each case, the list-making per se was dispatched relatively easily by the candidates. Then with a list of items written on the white board, they used it as a starting point for a related conversation. [Full Story]

On Oct. 21 at Wines Elementary School, The Ann Arbor Chronicle hosted a forum for city council candidates in Ward 5. Two of the three candidates participated: John Floyd, a Republican, and Newcombe Clark, who is running as an independent. Choosing not to participate was the Democratic incumbent, Carsten Hohnke.

The format of the event was a departure from familiar question-and-answer schemes. Candidates were provided with 10 specific topic areas in advance, and advised that on the night of the event, they’d be presented with a list-making task they’d be expected to complete collaboratively for each topic area.

To give a flavor of the chemistry between the candidates at the forum, after the event one attendee wrote about John Floyd: “… the city would be lucky to have his service … but I’m still not voting for him.” That attendee was Newcombe Clark. Also during the event, the two candidates were able to find an effective strategy for working through the tasks. We’re reporting how they completed those tasks in a separate article.

In this column, we discuss why The Chronicle would invest its limited time and resources in the effort to stage a candidate forum for Ward 5 city council candidates, and why we would opt for a somewhat unusual task-based format. [Full Story]

About 20 years ago, after a stint in graduate school, I found myself faced with the challenge of learning some basic Chinese to prepare for a teaching appointment at the English Language Institute of Xi’an Medical University. So I drew on my previous experience learning a foreign language – German.

For eighth grade German class, I had memorized a conversation between two old friends, Hans Köhler and Walter Fischer, who accidentally bumped into each other in Berlin. Here’s how it started: “Ach, du, Walter! Du bist in Berlin?!” “Ja, ich bin zur Messe hier.” “Und deine Frau?” “Sie ist in Hamburg.”

Loosely translated: “Dude! It’s you, Walter!” “Yeah, I’m in town for a convention.” “What about your wife?” “She’s in Hamburg.” Hilarity ensued as the architect Hans Köhler and the businessman Walter Fischer regaled each other with tales of derring-do. The whole thing concluded with Hans showing off his car to Walter: “Dort ist mein Wagen!” [There is my car!]

So I found a book of Chinese dialogues, with the same expectations of success I’d had with German. My favorite one was called: “A Debate on Clocks and Watches.” To be perfectly honest, I don’t remember much of it  – there were no compelling characters like Hans and Walter. And the “debate” wasn’t really much of a debate. The controversy, as best I recall, involved opinions about the size of watches – are big watches or small watches better? And the two parties to the debate weren’t really committed to their positions. As best I recall the concluding line was: “Da biao, xiao biao – dou hau!” “Big watches and small watches – they’re both good.”

That’s not a conclusion to an authentic “debate” in any reasonable sense. I bring up these foreign language dialogues from my distant past, because I was reminded of them last Thursday morning at the regular meeting of the Main Street Area Association, which took place at Conor O’Neill’s. The MSAA gave all five city council candidates an opportunity to introduce themselves and take questions from the assembled Main Street merchants.

Attending for Ward 2 were: Tony Derezinski, the Democratic incumbent, and Emily Salvette, who is the Libertarian challenger. Attending for Ward 5 were independent Newcombe Clark, Republican John Floyd and Democratic incumbent Carsten Hohnke. [Full Story]

[Editor's Note: HD, a.k.a. Dave Askins, editor of The Ann Arbor Chronicle, is also publisher of an online series of interviews on a teeter totter. Introductions to new Teeter Talks appear on The Chronicle.]

The crash of the financial markets in the fall of 2008 was the best thing that ever happened to the Teeter Talk interview series. Why? Because the word on everyone’s lips two years ago was … “teeter,” which gave the awkward and vaguely dirty-sounding word some well-deserved airtime. On Oct. 12, 2008, the BBC reported the remarks of Dominique Strauss-Kahn this way [emphasis added]: “The world financial system is teetering on the ‘brink of systemic meltdown,’ the head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has warned in Washington.”

Closer to home, a week earlier, on Oct. 3, 2008, a dozen distinguished alumni from the University of Michigan Department of Economics had gathered for a panel discussion focused on the financial crisis. Linda Tesar, department chair and professor of economics, stated that “the financial markets are teetering.” [Chronicle coverage: "Economists Gather, Talk About Markets"]

That same financial crisis still persists, and it’s occupying a lot of Steve Bean’s attention. Bean is an independent candidate for mayor of Ann Arbor – the election takes place on Nov. 2. We talked recently on the totter, a few days after the League of Women Voters mayoral candidate forum. During our talk, he spoke about the need for the city to prepare for various worst case financial scenarios on the national financial scene – dramatic inflation or deflation. The coming decade could be worse than the last one, he believes, and that could be exacerbated by diminished worldwide capacity for oil production.

So if there’s a large theme to his campaign, it’s about the challenge of translating national issues to the local level in a way that best prepares our community for whatever unfolds in the next 10 years. Presumably, the way that Ann Arbor prepares for the next decade might look different from the way other communities prepare. Bean and I touched on that idea in the context of some recent environmental commission deliberations. Bean chairs that city commission.

At their Sept. 23, 2010 meeting, the commission discussed a recommendation to the city council to create a task force to educate the community about peak oil. [Peak oil is the idea that worldwide oil production capacity will soon peak, if it has not already peaked, and then begin to taper off.] The resolution got support from only three commissioners – Bean, Kirk Westphal, and Anya Dale – and did not pass. One of the suggestions during commission deliberations was that commissioners could simply read the reports that other communities had produced about what local strategies would be appropriate – instead of asking the city council to appoint an Ann Arbor task force.

Portland, Oregon, is one such community that has produced such a report. But Portland’s population of more than half a million residents – compared to Ann Arbor’s 114,000 or so – makes Portland a substantially different kind of community from Ann Arbor, doesn’t it? Well, buried in the appendix of a new book – “Our Patchwork Nation” written by Dante Chinni and James Gimpel – is a way of looking at Portland and Ann Arbor that makes the Ann Arbor-Portland comparison … still seem a little crazy, but perhaps a little less so. [Full Story]

On the 11-member Washtenaw County board of commissioners, four districts represent different areas in the city of Ann Arbor. In the Nov. 2, 2010 election, one of those seats – held by incumbent Democrat Conan Smith of District 10 – is uncontested.

On Sept. 27, the League of Women Voters held a forum for candidates in the other three Ann Arbor districts – 8, 9 and 11. Four of the six candidates participated: Incumbent Democrat Leah Gunn of District 9; Republican Melinda Day, who’s challenging incumbent Democrat Barbara Bergman in District 8; Democrat Yousef Rabhi and Republican Joe Baublis, who are vying for the District 11 seat vacated by Jeff Irwin. Bergman had a scheduling conflict and didn’t participate. Republican Mark Tipping, who’s running against Gunn in District 9, did not respond to the League’s invitation.

The forum took place at Community Television Network studios and is available online through CTN’s video-on-demand service.

The hour-long event, bookended by the music of John Philip Sousa’s El Capitan, was moderated by Nancy Schewe. Questions covered a broad range of topics related to county government, including how to address upcoming budget shortfalls and the role of county government in providing police services. This report presents candidate remarks in the order that candidates responded. [Full Story]

On Sept. 28, the League of Women Voters hosted a combined forum for candidates for Ann Arbor District Library board.

Nancy Kaplan, Lyn Powrie Davidge and incumbent Carola Stearns are running for one two-year term. Vivienne Armentrout and incumbents Ed Surovell, Jan Barney Newman and Barbara Murphy are vying for three four-year terms. Five of the seven candidates attended the forum – Stearns and Davidge were out of town and unable to participate.

Terms for the three other current board members – Rebecca Head, Margaret Leary and Prue Rosenthal – expire in 2012.

The forum took place at Community Television Network studios and was recorded – it is available online through CTN’s video-on-demand service.

The hour-long event was moderated by Nancy Schewe, and questions covered a broad range of library-related topics, from the fate of the downtown building and thoughts on the next-door Library Lot, to issues of noise, security and technology. This report is presented in the order in which candidates responded. [Full Story]

In the mayor’s race, Ann Arbor voters are offered a choice in the Nov. 2 general election between Democratic incumbent John Hieftje and independent candidate Steve Bean. On the last Monday in September, the League of Women Voters hosted a forum for the mayoral candidates. The mayoral forum took place at Community Television Network studios and was recorded – it is available online through CTN’s video-on-demand service.

By way of general background, in Ann Arbor, the mayor is elected for a two-year term and is a member of the 11-member city council. The other 10 members of the council come from the city’s five wards – each ward has two seats on the council, one of which is elected each year for a two-year term. In addition to the rights and responsibilities of a councilmember, the city charter assigns the mayor other rights, including: a veto power, the responsibility to make appointments to committees, certain powers during emergencies, and the responsibility to preside over city council meetings. The management of the city is handled by a city administrator [Roger Fraser], who is hired by the city council. The mayor’s annual salary is $42,436.

Hieftje has served as mayor for the last 10 years, first elected in 2000 after serving half a term on the Ann Arbor city council representing Ward 1. At the League’s forum, Bean highlighted his own record of 20 years of service to the city on the energy and environmental commissions – currently chairing the environmental commission. Board and commission service for the city is not compensated.

The two men share many similar views – they occasionally expressed their agreement with each other’s views during the forum. They get along well socially – in fact, they carpooled together to the League of Women Voters event. Still, it’s possible to discern some differences between the two candidates on local issues as well as in their national perspective.

For example, Bean’s take on the proposed Fuller Road Station is that a citizen vote is needed and that the accompanying parking deck doesn’t move us in the right direction of alternative transportation. Hieftje, on the other hand, promoted the location as the best place in all of Michigan for a transit center. Hieftje’s focus on the city’s budget is to continue to find efficiencies to reduce expenses in the face of declining state and federal revenues, while Bean’s perspective seems to include more prominently the possibility of a severe national financial crisis that could be further complicated by declining world oil production capacity.

Bean and Hieftje’s responses are described in greater detail below. [Full Story]

In the race for the state House of Representatives District 53, which covers the majority of the city of Ann Arbor, and parts of Scio and Pittsfield townships, Republican Chase Ingersoll is running against Democrat Jeff Irwin.

At the Sept. 28 League of Women Voters forum, however, Ingersoll was the only candidate to appear, and after waiting 10 minutes past the scheduled start time, organizers decided to carry on without Irwin.

“We hope nothing untoward has happened,” said Sue Smith, League president. She noted that in Irwin’s absence, they’d be following the “empty chair” format, meaning that the timing for each question would be the same, and the forum would simply be half as long. It lasted 15 minutes.

Questions were selected by a committee from a pool of questions submitted by community members. The forum, held at the studios of Community Television Network, was moderated by Judy Mich. The event was recorded and is available online through CTN’s video-on-demand service.

Irwin later emailed The Chronicle saying he had apologized to the League – he had thought the forum was on the following night. Irwin’s views on some statewide issues can be found in a Chronicle report of a June 2010 candidate forum during the Democratic primary between Irwin and Ned Staebler. [Full Story]

On the last Monday in September, the League of Women Voters hosted a forum of candidates for Ann Arbor city council at Community Television Network studios. Ward 2 and Ward 5 are the only two wards where more than one candidate is on offer to voters on Nov. 2. The respective incumbents in Wards 1, 3 and 4 – Sandi Smith, Christopher Taylor, Margie Teall, who are all Democrats – are unopposed. The Ward 2 and Ward 5 forum was recorded and is available online through CTN’s video-on-demand service.

While the five candidates for the two wards participated in the same 45-minute forum, this report covers only responses to questions from Ward 2 candidates – incumbent Tony Derezinski, who is the Democratic Party nominee, and Emily Salvette, the nominee of the Libertarian Party. Responses from Ward 5 candidates Carsten Hohnke, John Floyd and Newcombe Clark are reported in a separate account.

As stipulated in the city charter, Ann Arbor wards divide the city into roughly pie-shaped wedges. Ward 2 is a wedge covering roughly the area between the 1 o’clock and 4 o’clock positions on the “city pie.” Each ward is represented on the city council in two council seats, one of which is up for election each year for a two-year term. Stephen Rapundalo serves in the Ward 2 seat that’s not up for election this year.

The four questions posed by the League were confined essentially to two topics: the budget and parks. Candidates uniformly identified the most important challenge facing the city as the budget, and that fit thematically with a specific question about the budget. The remaining two questions focused on specific parks: Huron Hills golf course, which is currently the subject of a request for proposals for private management; and Fuller Park, part of which is a proposed location for a new parking deck to be built primarily for the University of Michigan, and which has a possible future as a train station. [Full Story]

In Ann Arbor city council races for the general election, Ward 2 and Ward 5 are the only two wards where more than one candidate is on offer to voters on Nov. 2. On the last Monday in September, the League of Women Voters hosted a combined forum for all candidates for Ann Arbor city council. The Ward 2 and Ward 5 forum took place at Community Television Network studios and was recorded – it is available online through CTN’s video-on-demand service.

The respective incumbents in Wards 1, 3 and 4 – Sandi Smith, Christopher Taylor, Margie Teall, who are all Democrats – are unopposed.

This report includes just the Ward 5 candidate responses – independent Newcombe Clark, Republican John Floyd and Democratic incumbent Carsten Hohnke. Ward 2 candidate remarks are reported in a separate acccount.

As stipulated in the city charter, Ann Arbor wards divide the city into roughly pie-shaped wedges. Ward 5 is a wedge generally covering the area between the 8 o’clock and 10 o’clock positions on the “city pie.” Each ward is represented on the city council with two council seats, one of which is up for election each year for a two-year term. Mike Anglin serves in the Ward 5 seat that’s not up for election this year.

The four questions posed by the League were confined essentially to two topics: the budget and parks. Candidates uniformly identified the most important challenge facing the city as the budget, and that fit thematically with a specific question about the budget. The remaining two questions focused on specific parks: Huron Hills golf course, which is currently the subject of a request for proposals for private management; and Fuller Park, part of which is a proposed location for a new parking deck to be built primarily for the University of Michigan, and which has a possible future as a train station.

The report is organized chronologically by candidate response. After the candidate responses, we offer some background on a few of the candidates’ remarks, including: the closure of one of the city’s fire stations, a tax “loop hole” identified by Newcombe Clark [about which he has issued a written clarificational statement], short- versus long-term public service, and participation in candidate forums. [Full Story]

Editor’s note: The monthly milestone column, which appears on the second day of each month – the anniversary of The Ann Arbor Chronicle’s launch – is an opportunity for either the publisher or the editor of The Chronicle to touch base with readers on topics related to this publication. It’s also a monthly reminder to readers who read The Chronicle’s material with a feed reader or some other ad-free mechanism to click through to have a look at the recent ad archive. Some of them are very pretty.

Physically attending various events for The Chronicle has its rewards. Had I stayed home and watched a recent League of Women Voters candidate forum on television, I would have missed the pre-event sound check at CTN studios where the event was taped. The Ward 2 and 5 city council candidate debate is now available online offered through CTN’s video-on-demand feature. [Chronicle coverage of that debate is forthcoming.]

The city council forum combined the races for the two wards. Seated on the CTN stage – at a table decked out with red-white-and-blue bunting – from left to right were the Ward 2 candidates, Democrat Tony Derezinski and Libertarian Emily Salvette, followed by Ward 5 candidates: independent Newcombe Clark, Republican John Floyd and Democrat Carsten Hohnke.

Before taping at the CTN studios, the mic check began with a request from CTN studio technicians for candidates to say something. They began with Tony Derezinski, seated farthest to the left. He deadpanned: “Doe, a deer, a female deer.” [Full Story]

Accomplishments of the Ann Arbor District Library – and challenges the system faces in the coming years – were among the topics discussed at an informational session on Wednesday evening for library board candidates who’ll be on the ballot in November.

Four of the seven candidates attended: incumbents Ed Surovell and Jan Barney Newman, as well as former Washtenaw County commissioner Vivienne Armentrout and Nancy Kaplan, who hosts a local talk show on community issues called Other Perspectives.

Kaplan, Lyn Powrie Davidge and incumbent Carola Stearns are running for one two-year term. Armentrout and incumbents Surovell, Newman and Barbara Murphy are vying for three four-year terms.

Terms for the three other current board members – Rebecca Head, Margaret Leary and Prue Rosenthal – expire in 2012.

The session on Wednesday was informal, following the format of a similar meeting held on July 27 for people interested in running. Head, the current board president, and AADL director Josie Parker were on hand to answer questions, as were associate directors Celeste Choate, Eli Neiburger and Ken Nieman. [Full Story]

Just two prospective candidates turned up for an information session held at the Ann Arbor Public Schools Balas administration building on June 30. Both of them are current board members – Christine Stead and Andy Thomas – who were recently appointed to the board to fill vacant positions due to resignations.

The replacement appointments received by Thomas and Stead, along with a third board member Simone Lightfoot, last only through December, 2010.

So for just over an hour, Stead and Thomas asked questions and heard campaigning advice from AAPS director of communications Liz Margolis, AAPS election liaison Teri Williams, plus fellow board members – secretary Glenn Nelson and vice president Irene Patalan.

This will be the first time the AAPS district elects its board of education trustees as part of November’s general election. The board voted this year to move their elections from May to November as a cost-saving measure. Five of the seven seats on the AAPS board will be open – two four-year terms, one two-year term, and two one-year terms.

Nelson and Patalan are the only two members of the seven-member body who do not need to be elected in November to continue to serve on the board. [Full Story]