NORWICH – Running unopposed for his fourth term as Town of Norwich Supervisor, Dave Law says he’s looking ahead to negotiating the town’s fire service contract, bringing in new business and keeping the municipality’s general tax at zero.
All of the other candidates on the Town of Norwich ballot are also unopposed in this year’s election, but a few new names will greet voters at the booth.
Town Clerk Sharon Gohl-Muserallo will be stepping down, and in her place, candidate Martha L. Vidler is seeking the position. Both Law and Gohl-Muserallo said they endorse Vidler for the two-year term.
Also Norwich’s current Superintendent of Highways Michael Gibbon is not seeking reelection, and in his place Ronald G. Whaley is running with Law’s endorsement.
Veteran civil servants, council members Joanna Chiarino and Adam Evans, are also looking to retain their four-year terms on the board.
In addition, Assessor Mary C.E. Manley is seeking her position again, as is Tax Collector Barbara E. Annesi.
“Our goal has always been to never have any general tax and we’ve met our goal on that and reduced our highway tax to below a dollar per thousand for property taxes,” said Law.
In 2009, all town employees waived their annual raises with the exception of the full -time highway department. The town has 27 employees total, all of them part-time except for five positions at the highway department.
In 2010, Law will have to negotiate a new fire contract with the City of Norwich, something he had to do in his first term five years ago.
“Actually this will be my third time negotiating the contract. The first time I was as a volunteer captain on the other side of the table 12 years ago, when I worked on a committee with fire department,” he said.
Law said over all the town seems to be faring the economic crisis better than some of the other Chenango County municipalities, and he attributes this to having a strong business tax base and controlled spending practices.
“We’ve got to find where we can control the costs, it’s getting expensive and we need to take a hard look at everything,” he said.
He said a big part of the town’s continued success relies on promoting new business. Law said he and the board were working to ensure the Wood’s Corners plant, currently operator by Procter & Gamble, attracted new business clientele.
“We are always talking to our businesses making sure they’re strong. We want to get out and talk to people that’s the main thing, keep in touch with local business leaders and ordinary citizens,” he said.
“We’ve been pushing to have the Route 12 corridor expanded too; you need people in order to have business. We are also very fortunate that two new bridges are coming into town this year through federal stimulus and the DOT,” he said.
Although Law said he was glad the town had received additional aid in 2009 from the federal government to complete work on the two bridges, he’s skeptical of future contributions from the state.
“We have no idea how we stand with the state and right now we’re working on a budget hoping we get reimbursed. It’s guessing game,” he said.