There were tears of joy, sighs of relief, plenty of smiles and lots of hugs at the Haugh For Mayor campaign party held last night at the Wellsville Alumni Activities Center. The air was kind of tense with apprehension until a little after 8 o'clock last night when Jeff Haugh read the numbers for the first run-off. With an 80 point lead at that time things began to loosened up a little. It's amazing what can be accomplished with cell phones getting those results from a remote location.
Wellsville went to the polls yesterday. They elected a new mayor and three replacements for Council seats. Mrs. Susan Haugh took 41% of the 844 votes cast for Wellsville mayor yesterday. Mrs. Nancy Murray came in second with 30% of the vote. Haugh currently serves as a member of Wellsville Council. She is midway through her term on Council. A replacement will be named to fill her unexpired Council term. Murray is a political newcomer and is presently a part-time Village employee.
Out of three incumbents running for Wellsville Council only one was re-elected. There was a total of seven names on the ballot for Village voters to choose from to fill four spots. Tony Cataldo is the only incumbent winning re-election, getting 15.5% or 404 of the votes. Two former Council members will be returning. Don Brown garnered the most votes with 405. Diane Dinch came in third with 393 votes and political new comer John Morrow picked up the remaining spot with 376 votes. Losing in bids for re-election was Randy Allmon and John McMahon. Joe Soldano gave up his chance to be re-elected to Council and threw his hat in the ring in an unsuccessful bid for the Mayor's seat.
All the numbers quoted above have to be certified by the Board of Elections. The pictures in the collage are some of those attending the party last night. It's impressive to see the support of family, friends, cohorts and old classmates being shown for Mayor-elect Haugh last night. Mrs. Haugh is still nearly two months away from being sworn in and she has already made Wellsville history. She is the first female to ever be elected as Mayor of Wellsville.
Looking over the numbers Mayor-elect Haugh remarked the people of Wellsville have spoken. They want change.
Amen to that...
ole nib
28 comments:
I am very pleased with the new candidates (mayor & council). I believe that Sue Haugh will bring excitement back to our village. Change will come. Now, maybe council and our new administrator will get off their lazy butts and actually do something to improve the ville. The current mayor and council are such a big disappointment.
Congratulations to Susan, hopefully we can get a council that will work with the mayor, together and for the village of Wellsville. Change is needed.
i really don't know why the current council and mayor are a "disappointment"
explain what you think they should have done that they didn't and what you think will be accomplished by the new council and mayor that hasn't been done?
Are you kidding me!!! Be careful what you ask for it's a very long list. Ranging from inability to follow proper protocol, poor financial decisions, mistreatment of residents, need I go on? I would get more specific but that would take a few hours.
John Marrow replacing McMahon was the best thing to happen as well.. Congrats to Mr. Marrow...He got my vote as well as MANY others simply because he made himself visible to public, got out and approached the citizens. Mcmahon was never seen, except maybe driving down main street. I feel that the village has a great start to begin moving forward..Hopefully williams does his job better as well, or can he be replaced?
i really don't know why the current council and mayor are a "disappointment"
explain what you think they should have done that they didn't and what you think will be accomplished by the new council and mayor that hasn't been done?
Many changes need to be made in different departments as well.
yes actually i WOULD like you to be "more specific." Its very easy to point fingers generically. I'd like to know what protocol wasn't followed, what poor financial decisions were made and how residents were mistreated. Just really curious.
Key words, having the ability to work together
First, I would like to say congratulations to the victors, most are great choices for our village. Secondly, our current administration probably has made some mistakes along the way, but I really feel that their hearts were in the right place. Thirdly, best of luck to the new administration because the job ahead of them will not be easy.
I really hope that the new mayor and new council goes up to the flood wall and really takes a long look at the painting's of the way Wellsville was, and still should be today. It paynes me to come home to my beloved home town and see it in the state that it is today. Please live up to what you are so proud of on the flood way paintings. It also takes the resident of the village to pitch in and take pride in thier homes, and community. You just can't leave up to the the village goverment alone.It takes action from everyone to accomplish beautifull village again! Going out and helping your neighboor and cleaning up trash off the street is free. It doesn't coast any money to be a good citizen.
We're not going to publish any more "slamming" of our present village administration. Yea, some costly mistakes were made alone the way but who among us hasn't made mistakes??? They're usually costly in one way or another. We'll freely admit we've made some dillies in our lifetime.
Let's look forward to a bright tomorrow and working toward a better future in Wellsville. All the ingredients are there. We just have to get them off the shelf, mix them together and make something good.
nib
Very well said nib...We can now be on the road to recovery. Fix-up, clean-up...make our ville nice again.Let's go to council meetings and volunteer on various projects around town.
It amazes me that people have such lofty ideas for the village...do you really expect it to ever be like it was on those floodwall pictures?
Those paintings depict 50-60 years ago, a completely different society, when the mills and potteries were still going strong, people had good paying jobs and the cost of everything wasn't through the roof.
It would be nice if things could return to those good old days but it will never happen, and it's unfair to blame the current (or any recent) administration and council for their demise.
It was a sign of the times. Check most towns up and down the river. They're in the same boat. No industry left.
The best any council can hope for is to keept afloat financially and try to patch a few holes here and there. unless baard comes through, then there might be a chance.
keeping my fingers crossed for that!
until then, wellsville is a nice little town the way it is.
I hope the newly elected have learned from mistakes. We all make them and some more will probably be made,but let's not turn our heads the other way or ignore them ,work together to fix it .The people of Wellsville have spoken and want to see this village moving in the right direction .This group of people are capable of doing this.Good Luck newly elected.Let's move forward,make wise decisions,and have the village's best interest's at heart.
I think the citizens indeed need to voulenteer their time and stop complaining that the village goverment does nothing. Pitch in and help and be pro active. Take pride in your village!.........Maybe it's time to look at Wellsville's past and start marketing the town on it's historical begings and start erecting and perserving it's historical sites...... I think the 1st order of buisness is to have the Whitacre House plaque and stone not to be disrespected next to a bar that needs shut down and ousted from the village. That palce is just plain trouble. With a capital T.
Pray tell how do you "erect" a historical site? ;-) All kidding aside the ville is rich with a historical background in transportation, pottery and the rail industry. We even had a tin mill at one time.
Today it is all gone but there is an abundance of potential here to market. There is a ready labor pool and locations for new industry to build. There is promise of a natural gas boom. A brighter future is in sight and very possible. All it takes is the right attitude and taking positive action. We can't afford to live in the past or wallow in self pity.
nib
To the poster above a few, saying please, that was 50-60 yrs ago, and no industry left. That is true, the mills and potteries are closing. But do your research, and you too can see the new found potential in this Natural Gas discovery. The potential jobs and spin off jobs from this, by far out weighs any mill or pottery of any era. This can be the salvation of 100's & 100's of small towns in this region. It is the cleanest fuel source so far, and it's job creation can drain the entire area's unemployment rate. It can give 1000's of peaople jobs in positions they never even heard of. In the news, you can see for yourself, how the jobs are so abundant that there's not enough people to fill them. That jobs at McDonalds starts out at $14/hr. Take a look around, at places other than here, and see what we have, in lines of POTENTIAL.
Congratulations to the newly elected administration and perhaps a recommendation to them in their future endeavors... that they try to do a better job at securing help from the county and state officials whose salaries are being paid with our tax dollars who are supposed to be committed to serve our best interests.
The new sidewalks uptown are a prime example of the fact that there is money out there in government to fix our problems--we just need to know where to go to get it. It should be apparent to our county commissioners and state senator that the folks trying to do the right thing here at city hall aren't career politicians with a vast network of people to go to for specific fixes. They're just ordinary citizens. Nobody expects us to be spoon-fed the money or to have the leg-work done for us; just steer us in the right direction. If you can't at least put us in touch with the particular agencies or persons that can help us, what are we paying you for?
Does anyone else ever drive through Columbiana, Salem or Lisbon and wonder why our town doesn't look as nice? Maybe if our elected officials "on high" saw to it that we received a whole piece of the pie instead of just the crumbs, we might regain some semblance of a business district again. Wal-mart stole away a significant portion of "mom & pop" businesses here, but other towns still manage to provide specialty shops that Wal-mart doesn't cater to.
I find it sad that East Liverpool got grant money to tear down 66 dilapidated properties this past year, while Wellsville ended up with about 8. We have at least 10 more that need to go. And I don't wish to see a town of empty lots, but if no one is going to maintain or fix these properties up, those of us who do care what the village looks like and do our part to maintain our property shouldn't have to look at these eyesores year after year. No small business owner in their right mind is going to think about starting a new business here if the town doesn't look decent. And it just might send the message to the drug dealers who seem to be flocking here that their kind isn't welcome here either. I wonder how the number of properties allocated to each city was arrived at. It couldn't have been by population, as East Liverpool surely doesn't have 8 times as many residents as us.
Are our tax dollars really being spent to their best possible advantage when the county commissioners spent $117,000 of a $330,000 county-wide grant on remodeling the courthouse bathrooms? And now they're planning on spending even more to pave a parking lot there. We sure could've used some of that money to fix the floodwall pumping stations here, clean out the village "bear traps" or paving a road or two instead. What is worse yet, is the fact that we have a county commissioner that lives here in town. Aren't our needs evident enough?
Hopefully, the new folks set to run the town can bring these issues up to the people who just seem to pass us by.
From what I have seen the citizens have "pitched" in countless hours of help over the last several years. May those who haven't feel inspired to do so now. And I am amazed at how many people don't see the importance of even voting.
The revitalization committee has had wonderful ideas and they get shot down every time primarily due to narrow-minded people who, GOD FORBID, would even attempt to look outside the box.
The last comment above was apparently send by "an anonymous" Revitalization Committee member!
We beleive everyone should quit whinning and make renewed efforts to try working together.
nib
We MUST control the drug problem in OUR TOWN/VILLAGE PRIOR to worrying bout doing much more.. There are many youth in this town that have caught on that NOTHING MUCH will happen to them and there friends when it comes to doing the things they do EACH NIGHT on our village streets. Actually, they brag about it.
I don't know if that last post went through, so I'll try again.
Thank You, Wellsville!
I look forward to serving you.
I have already had calls and conversations with friends and associates in regard to opportunities such as; the route 30 project, Plank and Chesapeake Energy.
Yes, we can get back to those pictures on the flood wall.
We can make Wellsville a place where people can settle down and raise a family.
Very Truly Yours
JRM
actually no I'm not a RC member; I'm not even a resident of your town...just an interested observer *no, not a relative of anyone on the committee, either*
John - Please enlighten us on the Route 30 project. Are you referring to expanding it to four lanes?
nib
This is in response to the posting from anonymous on November 10th asking for specifics:
I pay over a thousand dollars a year in city tax and just about the same amount in annual property tax. I take pride in my home and try to keep it looking nice not just for my own satisfaction but also to help the town look like a nice place to live.
I could use a new sidewalk behind my house, which is a public sidewalk, and one on which school kids travel back and forth to the Junior High. I'd be happy to pay half towards a new one, as it would also help make my property look better. Many folks in similar situations might argue that because it's a public sidewalk, the city should pick up the whole tab and not just half. But I'm a realist, and would be happy just to be met halfway. Unfortunately, the village has no money left to pick up the other half of the tab.
I can remember reading in The Review not all that long ago, about a councilperson taking some flak over questioning a payment for jet-rodding the village sewers. An estimate given before the start of the job was $9,000, yet the village was finally billed for around $36,000, and a couple of councilpersons were wondering why a stink was being raised over the issue. #1--This village is not made out of money. #2- If I, as a consumer was going to have work done on my house and received a beginning estimate where the actual cost was going to end up running over, let alone four times the original amount, someone better get an okay before the extra work is performed, or not be shocked when they don't get paid.
Instead of giving the lone councilperson grief for raising questions about the matter, I'm wondering why the others weren't asking the same questions? Maybe if they had, there might've been enough money left in the kitty for my new sidewalk.
Nib, while I understand your not wanting your blogsite to be a forum for only bashing the previous administration, the new administration needs to be made aware of past examples of where we as a village came up short, or they risk making the same mistakes.
The drug problem in this town is out of control! Its'not hard to see who the dealers are,and the best time to bust them .It just takes a little time and effort by the P.D. They don't have it when you spend all day up on the highway going after big time criminals ,the traffic violators!
Sarge - thanks for the well thought out comments. You made some very good points.
We sincerely hope that if & when we get the big check from Chesapeake that our Council members will be responsible business people. That seems like a lot of money but when it comes to paving, replacing sewer systems, play ground equipment, etc., that amount will be whittled away in no time.
$1.9 million will not transform our village into some place wonderful. That amount is only a fraction of what would be needed to accomplish that. If used wisely it will provide for a good start, spending a little at a time.
With the river, our highway and rail systems Wellsville has a lot of potential to offer manufacturing businesses. Maybe our village officials can work with the Chamber & Revitalization Committee to do some serious marketing of that potential.
We're encouraged that some of the defeatist attitudes will be turned around to progressive thinking and positive action.
nib
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