General Election results are in for the township and a quick congratulations to all of the winners from yesterday’s election. Also, a quick thanks to all of those who ran for office - your dedication and love for this township is immensely appreciated.

Obviously there were no surprises in the race for Supervisor and Treasurer as those seats were uncontested. Walt Wilburn (Supervisor) and Sherri Meyer (Treasurer) will serve another four years for our township.

In what I won’t call an upset but perhaps a surprise Clerk Bob Schockman held onto his post for another four years. Mr. Schockman held off George Welling who ran a tough and spirited campaign for the Clerk’s office. Mr. Schockman won 9 of 14 precints but the clear advantage came in absentee ballots (I am guessing that is what the AV stands for on the pdf sheet) where Schockman picked up 525 votes over Welling; considering the total margin was 818 this was huge. Write in candidate Dennis Steinman reportedly garnered 15 votes.

In the race for Trustee I would say there were some surprises, serious surprises. Former County Commissioner Gail Hauser-Hurley ran away with the vote total and will serve her first term on the board as will former Bedford Public Schools Superintendent James Goebel (the big shocker). Both Larry O’Dell and Paul Francis will be holdovers from the previous board.

The surprise in the trustee race, to me, is the elimination of Rick Steiner from the board, and the selection of Goebel and not Tom Covrett who is the chairman of the Planning Commission. I do think that Mr. Covrett perhaps lost some votes over his handling of the PC meeting on the Whitman property rezoning. I had assumed that Mr. Goebel would struggle due to the notion that he did not effectively lead our schools. Maybe I am the only one surprised, maybe not.

Finally, for the first time in 28 years of township board will not feature a familiar face in Dennis Steinman. I hope that, regardless of how you may feel, that we will all take the opportunity when we have it to thank Mr. Steinman for the years and countless hours he has given to this community. Not only has Mr. Steinman given back to this community he has raised his family to do the same; Tim has given generously of his time and I know was recently involved in landscaping at the Pocket Part and Doug is a volunteer fireman at the Lambertville station. Allow me to be the first to publicly thank Mr. Steinman and his family for all they have done and I am sure will continue to do for our township, thank you.

What does everyone else think? Surprised, disappointed? Share your thoughts, thanks!

It has been roughly a week since the Primary election has passed and I just got around to printing off the unofficial results (I hate unofficial … I mean aren’t we all 99.9% sure the winners int he unofficial tally will still be the winner in the official tally, erg, I digress).

The biggest shocker was George Welling thumping Dennis Steinman in the Republican race for Clerk. We’ve all heard that the percentage tally was somewhere around 62% to 38% and a total of 450 votes. What came as more of a surprise is that Mr. Steinman only carried one precint, the 12th precint (which is where he resides and only by 6 votes). I think in my earlier post, An Open Letter to Dennis Steinman, I made my thoughts on the matter clear enough; these are thoughts I am sure are shared by more than a majority of Township residents.

Some other thoughts on the Republican side of the Primary:

• Walt Wilburn ran unopposed for Supervisor and will do so again in November. I am largely okay with this as it seems to me that Mr. Wilburn has done an excellent job leading this Township; especially through the Steinman-Schockman debacle (of which has been determined to be a politically motivated attempted Crucifixion of Mr. Schockman). While the orange barrels have been quite annoying the improved roads are something I surely appreciate.
• Sherri Meyer also ran unopposed for Treasurer and like Mr. Wilburn will also run unopposed in November. This I am not largely okay with. Ms. Meyer decided to join the fray in the Steinman-Schockman debacle on the side of Steinman and further joined in on the finger-pointing and partisan political blaming of one individual for all the problems going on in Bedford. Furthermore, Ms. Meyer, sat on information that was used in Mr. Steinman’s allegations for over 3 years before it was ever made public. If this doesn’t scream of politics I don’t know. While I appreciate Ms. Meyer’s years of service to this Township and everything she has done for us I feel like it is time for her to go; it’s unfortunate that this won’t be the year.
• For the four spots up for the General Election in November for Trustee I don’t think there were any surprises in who moved on. In order of vote totals moving on to the November ballot are: Paul Francis, Rick Steiner, Nancy Tienvieri (former Township Clerk), and Tom Covrett. Arnold Jennings, a former Trustee himself, and political newcomer Aaron Wiens were left on the outside looking in.
• At this moment in time I am supporting Paul Francis and Rick Steiner but am keeping a very close eye on Tom Covrett and what he says he will have to offer. I could see, if Mr. Covrett makes a compelling argument for his inclusion on the board, Mr. Steiner falling off my list and being replaced with Mr. Covrett.
• I don’t think Aaron Weins has anything to hang his head about. A complete political newcomer whose ties to one of the Township’s least popular residents (see: Walmart, Whitman Ford land sale) probably hurt his stock in this election. Aaron found himself running against five individuals who gave serious name recognition in this Township and at age 26 he has a lot to look forward to.

On the Democrat side of the Primary there is far less to talk about. The Democrats offered no candidate for Supervisor or Treasurer (a big mistake), incumbent Clerk, Robert Schockman, ran unopposed for his third consecutive term (he’ll face off with George Welling in November), and with four sports available to make the ballot in November for Trustee only three individuals chose to run. My thoughts on the Democratic Primary:

• Robert Schockman garnered a total of 1,528 votes and impressive figure for a couple of reasons - One, there were several individuals who chose to vote in the Republican primary to help George Welling knock off Dennis Steinman in their race for Clerk. Two, with nobody running against Mr. Schockman undoubtedly several individuals placed no vote at all.
• A quick note on one of the aforementioned points. There was no organized movement by the Schockman campaign to convince their voters to switch to the Republican Primary and vote for George Welling. I can say this for one major reason … I work on the campaign (as a writer and volunteer) and this has never once been discussed. It was, however, discussed by many Schockman supporters not associated with the campaign. A very strong testament to the feelings towards Mr. Steinman’s political assault on Mr. Schokman.
• For Trustee each of the candidates will move on to run in November and in order of their Primary results they are: Gail Hauser-Hurley, Larry O’Dell, and Jim Goebel. Goebel didn’t say much in the Primary race and my guess is that is largely due to the fact that he could conserve money for the General Election knowing he’d be moving on (I believe Ms. Hauser-Hurley and Mr. O’Dell also used this strategy but we know more about them as elected officials to date).
• At present I am supporting Ms. Hauser-Hurley and Mr. Goebel for Trustee. Mr. O’Dell also joined in the political fray and I am of the frame of mind to eliminate those individuals from our board as soon as we can and that is November.

Ok, to recap my present endorsements (which are open to change as new information comes out from Trustee candidates … my other endorsements are set):

For Township Supervisor: Walt Wilburn

For Township Treasurer: any available write-in candidate

For Township Clerk: Robert Schockman

For Township Trustee: Paul Francis, Rick Steiner, Gail Hauser-Hurley, James Goebel (Tom Covrett is on the cusp of replacing Rick Steiner should he have some great ideas and an excellent vision).

So that pretty much sums up my thoughts on things as of this moment … care to share your thoughts Bedford?