Chautauqua County Family Court Judge candidates Sally Jaroszynski (D-Falconer) and Michael Sullivan (R-Fredonia)

JAMESTOWN – Two regional attorneys are pointing the finger at a Jamestown attorney for allegedly influencing the rating of a Chautauqua County Family Court judge candidate by the Independent Judicial Election Qualification Commission.

Frewburg Attorney Sherry Bjork and Buffalo attorney Margaret Murphey recently contacted the Jamestown Post-Journal with evidence she claimed proves Jamestown attorney Ken Lasker tainted Sally Jaroszynski’s campaign and worked to influence the commission’s not-qualified rating.

Jaroszynski is a Democrat from Falconer who is running against Fredonia Attorney Michael Sullivan for the Family Court Judge seat.

Murphey – who is speaking on behalf of Jaroszynski – and Bjork reportedly provided the Post-Journal with evidence that shows Lasker was working to keep Jaroszynski from winning the race. However, Lasker’s response is that he recused himself from the committee that handed out the ratings, and as a result he played no role in what the final ratings were.

Jaroszynski received a not-qualified rating from the commission while Sullivan recived a highly qualified rating. Just two years earlier both candidates received highly qualified ratings from the commission.

Jaroszynski currently serves as justice for the Ellicott Town Court. She also served as one of the two Ellicott Town Justices between 2011 and 2015, when former court clerk Jennifer Piazza was found to have taken more than $34,000 in cash.

An audit from the office of State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli, released in 2015, stated that both town justices “did not segregate the duties of the full-time Court clerk, who controlled all phases of the Court’s cash collection, recording and reporting process with minimal oversight. As a result, the full-time Court clerk was able to manipulate Court records and admitted to embezzling funds. Neither the Justices nor the Court clerks performed monthly accountabilities, and the Board did not consistently conduct, or retain anyone to conduct, the required annual audit of the Justices’ records.”

The current race for Family Court Judge comes after Judith Claire retired from the bench in June.

In 2014 Jaroszynski unsuccessfully ran for the newly created second family court judge seat, losing to judge Jeffrey Piazza in the 2014 November election. Sullivan also lost to Piazza that same year in the Republican primary.

Sally Jaroszynski

MAYVILLE – The Democratic Nominee for Chautauqua County Family Court Judge has received an unfavorable rating for a local judicial commission – despite the fact that she received a favorable rating just two years earlier.

The Jamestown Post-Journal is reporting today that the Independent Judicial Election Qualification Commission has given Family Court Judge candidate Sally Jaroszynski an unqualified rating.  In 2014, when Jaroszynski ran for a newly created family court seat, she received a qualified rating.

The ratings from the commission are only given upon request from a candidate. When given a rating, the commission has the option of rating a candidate as highly qualified, qualified or not qualified.

FAILED TO DETECT EMBEZZLEMENT BY FORMER COURT CLERK

Jaroszynski is a local attorney who’s practiced law in family court for 25 years and also currently serves as justice for the Ellicott Town Court. She also served as one of the two Ellicott Town Justices between 2011 and 2015, when former court clerk Jennifer Piazza was found to have taken more than $34,000 in cash.

An audit from the office of State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli, released in 2015, stated that both town justices “did not segregate the duties of the full-time Court clerk, who controlled all phases of the Court’s cash collection, recording and reporting process with minimal oversight. As a result, the full-time Court clerk was able to manipulate Court records and admitted to embezzling funds. Neither the Justices nor the Court clerks performed monthly accountabilities, and the Board did not consistently conduct, or retain anyone to conduct, the required annual audit of the Justices’ records.”

It’s not known if the audit from the state comptroller’s office played a role in the commission’s unqualified rating.

Jaroszynki is running against Fredonia area attorney Michael Sullivan and Sherry Bjork – who will square off in a Republican party primary next week.

The current race for Family Court Judge comes after Judith Claire retired from the bench in June.

In 2014 Jaroszynski unsuccessfully ran for the newly created second family court judge seat, losing to judge Jeffrey Piazza in the 2014 November election.

Image from www.facebook.com/andrewcuomo

ALBANY – Governor Andrew Cuomo will remain in office for four more years.

That after voters across New York went to the polls on Tuesday to vote for the top office in New York State – along with several other statewide, regional and local offices.

With nearly all election precincts reporting by the end of Election Day, Cuomo had collected about 54 percent of the statewide vote, with Republican challenger Rob Astorino of Westchester County picking up 41 percent and Green Party candidate Howie Hawkins coming in a distant third with just over 5 percent.

Shortly after the close of the polls on Tuesday, the Associated Press declared Cuomo the winner. During his victory speech, the governor focused on his campaign’s rhetoric – playing up his accomplishments of the last four years, which include legislation involving property tax assistance, new jobs and on-time budgets. The governor also promised those in attendance that he was just getting started and that New Yorkers “ain’t seen nothing yet.”

The governor said during the next four years he will focus on raising the minimum wage, improving public education, fighting the local property tax burden, passing the Women’s Equality Act and passing the DREAM Act.

Schneiderman, DiNapoli Win Re-Election

In addition to Cuomo’s victory, the two other state-wide office holder also picked up re election wins for their respective offices. Both Democratic Attorney General Eric Schneiderman and Comptroller Tom DiNapoli will serve four more years in Albany following wins on Election night.

Schneiderman defeated Republican opponent John Cahill 58-39 percent, while DiNapoli bested his Republican opponent Robert Antonacci, 61-36 percent. It was the first re-election for both Democrats.

Reed Cruises to Third Congressional Term

Congressman Tom Reed (R-Corning) with his family following news that he won re-election on Election Night, 2014. (photo from www.Twitter.com/TomReedCongress)

Congressman Tom Reed (R-Corning) will remain in office for at least two more years. The two-term Republican from Corning easily defeated his lone challenger – Martha Robertson (D-Dryden) from Dryden New York – by a margin of nearly 63 to 37 percent. The unofficial Election Night total from CNN had Reed picking up more than 105,000 votes across the 23^rd Congressional District, while Robertson was able to pick up just over 63,000.

Reed fared especially well in the western section of his district, which includes Chautauqua County. He picked up an estimated 40,600 votes in Chautauqua, Cattaraugus and Allegany Counties compared to the 20,000 that Robertson Received. The only county Robertson won was her home of Tompkins County – where she received over 14,000 votes compared to just 5,700 for Reed.

GOP Retakes State Senate

While Republicans were unable to win any of the three statewide offices, the GOP did find some success in the state’s upper legislative chamber.

It appears that Republicans will once again have sole control of the state Senate with candidates picking up enough wins to attain the required 32-vote majority.

Statewide, there were enough GOP victories rolling in around 11 p.m. on Election Night for Senate Republican leader Dean Skelos to declare in a statement that “New Yorkers have chosen balance and bipartisanship over an entire state government made up of Democrats from New York City, and placed their trust in Republicans to lead the Senate.”

Democrats later conceded that they weren’t going to win the majority.

It remained unclear whether members of the Independent Democratic Conference, led by Bronx Sen. Jeff Klein, would once again join forces with the Republicans, as they have for the past two years, or ally with their minority-conference Democratic colleagues.

Locally, Senator Cathy Young (R-Olean) picked up her fifth term in office after running unopposed.

In the State Assembly, the Demcrats picked up a seat and increase their majority with 99 of the 150 seats.

Goodell, Gerace and Piazza win County-Wide Races

Assemblyman Andy Goodell (R-Chautauqua) and Chautauqua County Sheriff Joseph Gerace (D-Jamestown) both won re-election, while Jeffrey Piazza was a four-way race to be the county’s new Family Court Judge.

In the Local elections here in Chautauqua County, it was a big night for the two candidates who hold county wide offices.

Assemblyman Andy Goodell, who’s 150^th district covers all of and only Chautauqua County, cruised to a third term in office after easily defeating democratic challenger Barrie Yochim. With all districts in the county reporting, Goodell picked up 75 percent of the vote.

Meanwhile, Chautauqua County Sheriff Joseph Gerace cruised to a sixth term in office, defeating Republican Challenger Russell Payne from Frewsburg by a margin of 63 to 37 percent.

In the race for the newly created second Chautauqua County Family Court Judge position, republican Jeffrey A. Piazza of Jamestown easily defeated his three opponents. Piazza picked up 59 percent of the votes throughout the county. In addition to running as a Republican, Piazza also ran on Conservative and Independence party lines.

Democrat Sally Jaroszynski, picked up 28.5 percent of the vote, Fredonia Republican Michael J. Sullivan, who ran on the Green Party line, picked up 6.6 percent of the vote while Working Families candidate James J. Spann, received 5.81 percent of the vote.

Rankin Defeats Kresge in District 12 Special Election

The Chautauqua County Legislature will have a new member serving on the panel. Republican Elisabeth Rankin won the special election for the District 12 seat which cover the north side of Jamestown, picking up nearly 52 percent of the votes. Rankin was challenging Democrat Beth Kresge – who was appointed to the seat earlier this year after it was vacated by Fred Larson, who had to step down after being appointed as the new Jamestown city court judge.

Rankin picked up an unofficial election night total of 746 votes, compared to Kresge’s 691.

All Three State Propositions Pass

State voters were supporting all three ballot propositions, according to unofficial returns on Tuesday night.

Voters overwhelmingly approved Proposition 1 – the amendment that would retool the state’s redistricting practice, the once-a-decade redrawing of the state’s political districts.

And Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s proposed Smart Schools Bond Act, Proposal 3, which would generate $2 billion to improve classroom technology and other elements of educational infrastructure, also saw approval, as did Proposal 2, the constitutional amendment that would eliminate the need for legislative bills to be printed and supplied to every lawmaker before being considered.

The Chautauqua County League of Women Voters is sponsoring its Meet the Candidates Forum Tuesday at the Robert H. Jackson Center. It’s one of two forums the organization is hosting for the community. A second forum is set for this Thursday night in the north county in the Fredonia Village Hall. Both forums begin at 7 p.m. and are free and open to the public.

According to organizers, several candidates will be on hand for Tuesday’s forum. They include:

• Candidates for State Assembly: Republican incumbent Andy Goodell and Democratic challenger Barrie Yochim;
• Candidates for Chautauqua County Sheriff: Democratic incumbent Joseph Gerace and Republican challenger Russell Payne;
• Candidates for the county legislature’s 12th district special election: Democratic incumbent Beth Kresge (appointed earlier this year) and Republican challenger Elisabeth Rankin;
• And the four candidates for Chautauqua County Family Court Judge: Sally A. Jaroszynski; Jeffrey A. Piazza; James J. Spann, Jr. and Michael J. Sullivan.

The two candidates for Congress – Republican incumbent Tom Reed and Democratic challenger Martha Robertson – will not be in attendance.

WRFA will be on hand to cover Tuesday’s forum and will broadcast the portions of forum during this week’s Community Matter’s program on Thursday at 6 p.m. Audio from the forum will also be available at our website www.WRFALP.com.

IN addition, WRFA will be hosting one-on-one interviews with both Congressman Tom Reed and challenger Martha Robertson – which will air next week during our Oct. 30 Community Matters Program.

County election officials say incumbent Democratic Legislature District 12 candidate Beth Kresge trailed challenging Republican Elisabeth Rankin in the Independence Party primary by just one vote on election night 19 to 18.  Three absentee ballots and one provisional affidavit ballot were opened with a count of 3 for Kresge and 1 vote for Rankin.  The final unofficial count for the primary election with the absentees and affidavit ballot added now stands at 21 votes for Kresge and 20 for Rankin.  Kresge now will be the Democratic, Independence and Working Families candidate and Rankin will be the Republican and Conservative candidate.

For the Green Party, Michael Sullivan expanded his one vote lead over and James Spann for Chautauqua County Family Court by picking up the sole Green Party absentee ballot received by the elections office in Mayville. Both candidates lost their major party primary bids.  However, the unofficial final Green party primary result now stands at Sullivan with 4 votes and Spann with 2 votes. As a result of the absentee ballot count, the November General election ballot for Family Court will find Jeffrey A. Piazza, Republican, Independence and Conservative; Sally A. Jaroszynski, Democratic; Sullivan, Green; and Spann, Working Families.

The four candidates for Chautauqua County Family Court Judge in the 2014 General Election will be (from left to right): Sally Jaroszynski (Democrat), Jeffrey Piazza (Republican, Conservative and Independence), James Spann Jr. (Working Families), and Michael Sullivan (Green Party).

JAMESTOWN – It appears that all four candidates for the recently created second Chautauqua County Family Court judge position will have their names on the ballot for the 2014 General Election.

Primary day 2014 saw contested races for six parties in the race for county court judge and each of the four candidates won at least one of the races.

In the Democratic Primary, Falconer’s Sally Jaroszynski defeated Westfield’s James J. Spann Jr. Jaroszynski had a strong showing, picking up over 60 percent of the vote.

In the Republican primary, Jamestown’s Jeffrey Piazza defeated Fredonia’s Michael Sullivan.  In that race, Piazza received 60 percent of the vote.

Piazza also won the Conservative and Independence Party lines. Meanwhile, Spann walked away from Primary Day with the Working Families Party endorsement while Sullivan will run on the Green Party line.

In the other local primary race, involving a special election for the Chautauqua County Legislature’s District 12 seat, Elisabeth Rankin won the Independence Party line vote in the narrowest of margins. Rankin picked up 19 votes while her opponent, current legislator Beth Kresge, picked up 18 votes. Rankin will also run on the Republican line while Kresge will serve have the Democratic and Working Familes endorsements.

Election day will take place on Nov. 4. For a complete list of all candidates appearing on Chautauqua County ballots for this year’s elections, visit voteChautauqua.com.