Candidates Night Planned At Parsippany Hills High School

PARSIPPANY, NJ — Residents of Parsippany will have another chance to meet the candidates for the upcoming Board of Education election.

The Par-Troy Council of PTA's is hosting its annual “Candidates Night,” which is planned for Tuesday night at 6:30 p.m. The event will be held at Parsippany Hills High School, which is located at 20 Rita Drive, Morris Plains.

Anyone who is not able to attend in person can watch the live stream of the forum here.

Though all are welcome, only Parsippany residents will be allowed to question the Board of Education candidates regarding their views on the school district.

This year, 12 people filed petitions seeking election to the Parsippany-Troy Hills Township Board of Education, according to the Morris County Clerk's office.

Three three-year seats are up for grabs.

The candidates who filed for these seats are:

• Matthew DeVitto
• Kendra Von Achen
• Balakrishna "Bala" Samaga
• Nilesh Bagdai
• Falgun Bakhtarwala
• Cassandra Cogan
• Wendy Wright
• Nicole Dellafave
• Lily Benavides
• Deitria Smith-Snead
• Timothy P. Berrios
• Andrew Choffo

Two incumbents, DeVitto and Von Achen, are looking to retain their seats on the board. Another incumbent, Debra Orme, is not running for re-election.

Eleven of the twelve candidates already faced off last week at a virtual debate co-hosted by the League of Women Voters.

During that forum, there was no audience participation allowed, but all questions posed to the candidates were generated by members of the public and screened by the League to eliminate duplicates and personal attacks.

The debate was live-streamed on YouTube and has been posted to the League of Women Voters of the Morristown Area, YouTube page. To view the entire debate, click here.