Council: We're Not Moving Elections to November

You won't see any Ridgewood council candidate's name on the same ballot line as President Obama's this November.

On Wednesday night, the council discussed the , where it could save money but also run the risk of clouding its village troubles with the national ones. Unanimously, the five council members said moving elections and disrupting the sanctity of the local voting lot would be a bad move for Ridgewood.

"I think it's time to fish or cut bait," Mayor Keith Killion said before opening the floor to Councilman Stephen Wellinghorst.

Wellinghorst is perhaps best positioned to assess the situation. The councilman was elected into office in a special election in November to take the seat of the late Anne Zusy, and, like Mayor Killion and Councilman Paul Aronsohn, would see his term extended six months if elections were pushed back. The second-highest vote-getter in November of 2010, in a year Republicans swept all levels of government.

"I think the small amount of money we would save would change the character of the town in a way I really don't want to see," Wellinghorst said Wednesday. "If we change what we do now from May to November, it's going to become a partisan town and we're going to have Democrats and Republicans fighting with each other and it's going to be a lot uglier than it can already be sometimes."

Like others, Killion agreed the cost savings didn't trump independence from the slash-and-burn national politics other towns can often get sucked into. "As appealing as it is to save some money...it's really not worth it. This may change later on if the board of ed[ucation] jumps into it," he said, a point Deputy Mayor Riche also noted. 

"If all of the elections were moved to November, at some point it makes sense."

There have been no discussions by the school board to move its elections of late and if the village were to have jumped on the move-it-to-November bandwagon, it would be locked into the fall elections for ten years. 

"You almost get to be an independent when you're running in Ridgewood," Councilwoman Bernadette Walsh said in support of maintaining the status quo.

"Whatever your individual beliefs are, when you're running for a council seat you're truly just running for Ridgewood. You're not being partisan at all. I think that benefit allows everyone on the council to bend their own rules a bit and work better together."