Those of us who had recently announced our intentions of running for positions on the Delaware Town Board on the Rural Heritage Party line have been informed that some of the petitions we submitted to the Sullivan County Board of Elections were challenged by a resident of Callicoon. Due to a technicality in the State Election Law, the board of elections has sustained the valid objections of someone who scrutinized our petitions, detected an error and challenged our petitions.

The basis of the objection was the omission on our petitions of the number of signatures that we were submitting. We acknowledge our mistake, and the right of this person to challenge our petition.

As a result of this challenge, our names will not appear on the ballot in November on the Rural Heritage line. However, we will still be on the ballot as the Democratic Party’s candidates.

We are not professional politicians. We are a small but growing grassroots group of dedicated but fallible citizens. We hope to learn from our mistakes; perhaps the most important lesson we have learned from this incident is that there are some people who clearly would prefer to challenge us on technicalities, rather than on meaningful issues.

We hope that you share our goal for a prosperous future for Sullivan County and the Town of Delaware based on maintaining and sustaining our rural heritage.

Steve Lundgren, candidate for Town of Delaware Supervisor

Dick Ried, candidate for Town of Delaware Board (to fill two-year vacancy)

Marc Dubrovsky, candidate for Town of Delaware Board

John Murphy, candidate for Town of Delaware Board