The Republican ticket: Ken Panza, Lorin Rose, Jackie Earley, Frank Engel, Peter Cross, Mike Reynolds. (Photo by Dion Ogust)
The Woodstock Republican Committee at its September 15 caucus injected new life into the local electoral season by choosing independent candidate Lorin Rose for town supervisor over Jeremy Wilber, the freshly minted Democratic nominee, and endorsing the Town Board candidacies of Peter Cross and Ken Panza, who will face incumbent councilman Jay Wenk in a three-way race for two seats in the fall election.
Rose, who had already secured a place on the general election’s ballot as the nominee of the Common Sense Party, which he created, handily defeated Wilber by a vote of 45 to 21 in the supervisor contest. The outcome was similarly decisive in the Town Board race, as Cross, with 38 votes, and Panza, with 33, easily outpaced Wenk, with 18, and Homer Foster, with 17.
Voters at the caucus routinely nominated two Republican incumbents, town clerk Jackie Earley and highway superintendent Mike Reynolds, and one Democratic incumbent, town justice Frank Engel, for reelection. Each of the three current office holders has already received the Democratic nomination and is running unopposed in the November 8 general election. William West, chairman of the Woodstock Republican Committee, presided at the caucus.
