Three seats up for grabs in the next Riverhead school board election

If you’re interested in volunteering to work on the Riverhead Board of Education, now’s the time to step up.

There will be three seats up for election in May. The unpaid position is for a three-year term, but one of the two seats to be filled in the May 15 election is for one year, to fill the unexpired term of a board member who resigned last year.

Candidates for school board have until the close of business at 5 p.m. on Monday, April 16 to file their nominating petitions with the district clerk.

The district offers blank petitions for candidates’ use and convenience. They may be picked up during business hours at the district office. Use of the forms is not required. For more information, see the school board association’s website.

To get their name on the May 15 ballot, a prospective candidate must obtain the signatures of a minimum of 50 qualified voters in the Riverhead Central School District (2 percent of the 2,493 voters in the May 2017 school district election.)

The three seats up for election this year are currently filled by Susan Koukounas, Byron Perez and Ron Fisher. None has yet publicly stated whether they will seek election.

Koukounas, of Aquebogue, was first elected to the school board in 2012 and re-elected in 2015.

Both Perez and Fisher were appointed last August to fill a pair of vacancies created when board members Amelia Lantz and Ann Cotten-DeGrasse resigned in tandem last June, protesting what they said were violations of school law procedures and lack of communication with then-district superintendent Nancy Carney. Carney said their accusations were “misinformation.” Lantz’s term of office ran through June 2019 and Cotten-DeGrasse’s term was up this year.

The remaining board members decided to fill the vacancies by appointment rather than special election; but the term of the appointment would be just until the May 2018 election. After soliciting resumes and interviewing prospective candidates, the board chose Perez, of Wading River, a Riverhead Town police officer, and Fisher, of Flanders, a business owner.

A school board candidate must be a U.S. citizen, at least 18 years old, a qualified voter in the school district and able to read and write. They must be a resident of the school district continuously for one year before the election.

At the time when the board member takes office, they cannot be employed by the board on which they serve or live in the same household with a family member who is also a member of the same school board.

According to the New York State School Boards Association, board members have the following responsibilities:

• Create a shared vision for the future of education
• Set the direction of the school district to achieve the highest student performance
• Provide rigorous accountability for student achievement results
• Develop a budget and present it to the community, aligning district resources to improve achievement
• Support a healthy school district culture for work and learning
• Create strategic partnerships with the community stakeholders
• Build the district’s progress through continuous improvement
• Adopt and maintain current policies
• Hire and evaluate the superintendent
• Ratify collective bargaining agreements
• Maintain strong ethical standards