Woodstock town supervisor Bill McKenna is running for re-election heading a town-board slate with a seasoned veteran and an experienced manager and business leader. He faces primary opposition in overwhelmingly Democratic Woodstock this June for the first time as supervisor.
McKenna will be seeking his fourth elected term after he was appointed in 2017 to replace the late Jeremy Wilber. Former supervisor Jeff Moran challenged McKenna for the seat in 2019, but as a write-in candidate.
McKenna will run with Laura Ricci, who is seeking her third term on the town board, and with Anula Courtis, former chair of the human rights commission. He will be opposed by present council member Bennet Ratcliff.
McKenna stressed the importance of having someone at the helm who has a sense of town history and fiscal responsibility.
This past weekend, though, McKenna’s tasks included things people don’t notice, but keep essential services running. During the recent sub-zero cold snap, high winds cut power to the pump houses at the town water supply. Rather than call water and sewer superintendent Larry Allen in from the other side of the county, McKenna checked on the backup generator himself. He contacted a company to repair the power lines when Central Hudson told him they are the customer’s responsibility.
In the longer perspective, he said, he ushered the town through the pandemic and took advantage of revenue windfalls while being able to reduce services while people stayed at home. “But I think we need to be careful with that money we spend, and put it towards investing back in our community,” McKenna said.
One significant investment was the renovation of the town offices on Comeau Drive. Voters had approved borrowing $1 million while the town was preparing to use $1.9 million in capital-reserve funds to pay for the project. With majority town-board support, McKenna came up with a plan to use sales and mortgage tax surpluses, a $100,000 state grant through state senator Michelle Hinchey’s auspices, and a $250,000 grant for a reed-bed project at the wastewater treatment plant that hadn’t come to fruition.
“We’ll save $300,000 [in interest] by not borrowing a million,” he said. “To me, that makes a lot of sense.”
McKenna said he had pondered running for highway superintendent instead, but his friend, retired Kingston deputy fire chief Donald Allen, will run for that position. “So I thought, you know what, I’m gonna give it another shot at supervisor. There’s still a lot to get accomplished. I’m still not 58 yet, so I still have a lot of energy,” he said.
The town government has just started the renovation and updating of its fourth building in 20 years. “We’ve got a youth center that needs to be addressed. Either take that down altogether or renovate it in some fashion.”
He’s excited to see the zoning revision package come down the pike, McKenna said. “But there are going to need to be other changes made to implement some of the recommendations. For instance, one thing we might look at is tax incentives to encourage people to construct or have the right type of additional housing. We allow accessory apartments. That was a change that Jeremy [Wilber], Gordon [Wemp] and I made years ago, where we simplified that process.”
Anula Courtis, a first-generation American, is the daughter of Greek and Polish parents. She started a healthcare technology company whose primary focus is providing access to medication for vulnerable populations.
“I’m passionate about human rights,” she said. “It’s part of my DNA.”
Courtis co-founded the Woodstock Women’s March and served on the town police reform and reinvention committee, which made recommendations for police transparency.
“I care a lot about the direction the town is taking,” she said. “I really do believe that we’re at a critical point, and the decisions that we make are really important. I’d like to see civil discourse and politics. I think that we could leave arguing out there, wherever there is, but here in town, it has to be Woodstock. I think we have a responsibility to work together to address things that I view as human rights. This includes a housing crisis. I believe that, you know, access to clean water in the environment, really needs to be looked at, but looked at from a big perspective, from the laws to every single thing that we do.
“We need to find a way to disagree peacefully and agree and execute. And that is why I’m running, because I believe that that’s what I can do. I can facilitate those very difficult conversations, different points of view, find a way to meet in the middle, and then make sure that it gets done.”
Courtis said she wanted to find a middle ground between a growing number of entertainment businesses in town and people’s right to peace and quiet.
“We’re a tourist town. We’re wanting to encourage people to live here, work here, grow their families here, and they need to sleep at night. At the same time, we’ve got these venues, rightfully so, they’re here to entertain and provide food and drink bring money into the town,” she said.
Courtis said she can apply her corporate skills to working for the townspeople. “In the corporate world, growing a little company, you, you have to find a really good solution that’s easily implemented, and then just do it, and then do it again. And that’s how the ball keeps moving forward,” she said. “I’m willing to listen, I’m willing to change my mind. But I’m also willing to bring all parties to the table.”
Laura Ricci, a project manager, said she is running to continue the work she has done for the last two terms. “I feel like I’m in midstream,” she said. “In the first term, I was liaison to the comprehensive plan. I was a very active liaison, I went to almost every meeting. I helped take minutes as we did some firehouse meetings. I certainly was part of the review of the draft of the comprehensive plan, and was with it every step of the way. And I felt a lot of ownership with it.”
She said Bill McKenna knows the people of the town. “He did a lot of the staffing. He and I organized together where we thought things are to go in terms of committees, but he did a lot of this. He knows people and all of a sudden we had committees full of great people,” she said.
In terms of accomplishments, Ricci touted leading the review of the new telecommunications law that restricts placement of 5G and other cell tower equipment, the wellhead protection law nearly a decade in the making, and the zoning revision committee, which shepherded significant proposed changes through initial review.
“I would certainly be honored and privileged to be returned by the people of Woodstock to serve on the town board. And I would be honored and privileged to be able to serve with supervisor McKenna and Anula,” she said.
Ricci brings her 33 years as a project manager, her time as deputy supervisor, and her tenure on the planning board to the table. She sees the zoning changes, affordable housing and the scenic overlay law among the big items to tackle in the next term.
Tinker Street resurfacing is also important. “I’ve been in meetings with the DOT along with Bill [McKenna] on the Tinker Street paving. It’s an opportunity again, as liaison to the complete streets committee, which focuses on everything about the street: the driving the parking, the bicycles, the pedestrians. It’s an opportunity to improve a lot of that, as the whole paving gets done. Plus, there’s bridge work. So I am involved in that, and it’s going to flow into 2024.”
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