Back to business after the election

Northwest Corner municipal elections were, for the most part, quiet this year, with many offices uncontested. In Cornwall and Falls Village, all  three incumbent selectmen were returned to office.

In Falls Village, in fact, not a single office was contested. Nonetheless, some voters turned out, expressing their apparent satisfaction with the status quo.

Two petitioning candidates got their names on the ballot.Mike Flint in Salisbury entered the race in time to have his name officially inscribed on the forms. Newcomer Nicole Blass in North Canaan was a last-minute entry; voters had to write her name in. Nonetheless, she earned a respectable 73 votes.

Incumbent First Selectman Curtis Rand, a Democrat, defeated Flint in Salisbury by a  decisive margin (904 to 215). The town’s two incumbent selectmen (Democrat Jim Dresser and Republican Bob Riva) were also returned to the board.

All vote totals, as well as election coverage and selectmen photos, are on the town pages.

Kent had four party-sponsored candidates for the board.Incumbent Democratic Selectman Bruce Adams beat the GOP’s Karen Casey for the top spot (694-369).

Casey came in last among the four candidates for selectman, behind Democrat Karren Garrity (584 votes) and Republican George Jacobsen (464), who join Adams.

In Sharon, Republican Bob Loucks got by long-term Democratic Selectman Tom Bartram in a close race for first selectman. The vote was 552 to 513.

Sharon is the only town in the state where a candidate may run for first selectman only, so Bartram, with 16 years’ experience on the board, is out completely. Democrat Meg Szalewicz joins veteran Republican Selectman John Mathews on the board.

The 11th-hour write-in campaign of independent Blass for the North Canaan Board of Selectmen made for a bit of a race in that town, but Blass failed to win a seat. Incumbents Doug Humes and Susan Clayton were returned to the board; newcomer Charlie Perotti will join them.

In Cornwall, Gordon Ridgway was cross-endorsed by the Democratic and Republican parties. He was re-elected first selectman in Cornwall along with incumbent Selectmen K.C. Baird and Richard Bramley.

Jill Gibbons is Salisbury’s new representative on the Region One Board of Education, defeating Paul Henrici for the seat vacated by Amanda Halle. The other seats up for grabs on the regional board were North Canaan and  Canaan/Falls Village, where Laura Freund and Gale Toensing, respectively, ran unopposed.

The top vote-getters in all of the six towns in the Region One school district were Sharon’s Tina Pitcher, who had 1,011 votes for town treasurer in Sharon, and Salisbury’s Carl Williams, whose 1,006 fans put him back on the Board of Finance for two more years. The former longtime board chairman had retired but is now stepping in to fill a two-year vacancy left by the late Zenas Block.