POAs Holding Annual Resident Electors' Meetings Tuesday

Garden City's four property owners' associations are gearing up for their respective electors' meeting, held annually in January. Each association will make their nominations official Tuesday night for village and school board trustee positions.

• The Central Property Owners' Association (CPOA) annual resident electors' meeting is scheduled to begin at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday at the St. Paul's Senior Center located at 108 Rockaway Avenue. The CPOA Nominating Committee selected Richard V. Silver for the position of village trustee for the 2013-2015 term after being advised by mayor Don Brudie that he would not seek re-election for this position.

• The Garden City Estates Property Owners' Association (Estates POA) annual resident electors' meeting is scheduled to begin at 8 p.m. Tuesday at Stratford School. The Nominating Committee of Garden City Estates will present John DeMaro for village trustee candidate and Laura Hastings for school board trustee candidate. Oxford Boulevard resident Greg Blair is challenging DeMaro's nomination, forcing a run-off election Jan. 29 (time and place still to be determined).
  

• The Eastern Property Owners' Association (EPOA) annual resident electors' meeting is scheduled to begin at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday in the Stewart School auditorium. The elected members of the Garden City East Nominating Committee have unanimously nominated Dennis Donnelly, current trustee, to the village's board of trustees for a new two-year term. Francine Ryan, a 27-year resident of Garden City East, is challenging Donnelly's nomination, forcing a run-off election Jan. 29 at Stewart School (time still to be determined).
  

• The Western Property Owners' Association (WPOA) annual residents' electors general meeting is scheduled to begin at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday at Homestead School. Upon accepting John Watras’s resignation from his current position as trustee and his request to be considered for the office of mayor, the Nominating Committee unanimously selected Watras for mayor, a two-year term beginning in April. The committee also selected Robert Bolebruch for the remaining one year of the village trustee seat vacated by Watras. In addition, Barbara Trapasso was selected to serve a fourth term as school board trustee, beginning in July 2013.

Under Garden City's Community Agreement, which was adopted back in 1919, "the four property owners' associations are the conduits which supply the slate of candidates. At all times each section of the village has two of its residents on the board of trustees, assuring equal representation."

Any 15 or more residents can challenge the person(s) nominated by submitting a petition for an alternate candidate. The residents need not be POA members but they must be residents of that particular section of the village.

Challenges force run-off elections, which are to be held this year in January in the sections of the village where the challenges took place. The names of the winners will officially appear on the ballot for the village election in March.