Four candidates vie for Highland Town Board

Chris Dickey

Dickey has been living in Highland for 25 years part time, but has been spending more time in the area over the past four or five years since his daughter went to college.

“I’ve been watching how the town has been responding to some of the changes in the economic environment… I’ve really enjoyed watching the town come together around some things that I think will make people’s lives better,” said Dickey. He was approached to run, and he accepted because he wanted to be a part of that effort.

Dickey considers health care as one of his top priorities, particularly trying to close the health services gap experienced by people in rural communities. He’s one of the founding figures of the Highland Health Initiative, a project aiming to bring a health clinic back to Highland.

He’s also invested in preserving the community’s natural resources. He has a doctorate in environmental health sciences, and has been closely watching the conversations about development along the Delaware River.

“I have something to add to the conversation about how we can improve development, because we need it; we need money to come into a community without compromising this really, really beautiful, precious resource that we’ve got in the river,” he said.

Gabor Dezso

Dezso has lived in Highland for 10 years, and was inspired to run for town board in part due to the influence he’s felt from an overabundance of rules and regulations. 

“If you read through the codes and zoning and the rules and regulations, it’s not about the idea of the country of the free,” Dezso said. 

Dezso had to go to court for a year due to a neighbor’s complaints about him keeping chickens on his property without having enough land per the town’s code, something he says was instrumental for him deciding to run. He sees that kind of regulation as overzealous: “Are [these regulations] for the people or against the people? We really don’t need farming?”

Dezso would support bringing the constables back to Highland to create more work for local people. However, he said, the town would have to question the finances of the decision versus the finances of continuing to work with the sheriff’s department, and what happened to the equipment left behind when the department disbanded. “We should not spend a million dollars to re-establish the constabulary” since the town already had the necessary equipment, he said. 

Dezso supports the Camp FIMFO development, seeing it as a positive that the developers want to upgrade the camp’s septic systems, and not seeing their plans as an environmental issue. 

Joseph Krist

Krist has 38 years of experience with lending and investing in municipal finance, involved with governments of all sizes, he said. 

“Given current issues with the town’s financial statements, people told me that they thought I could help, and so I said, ‘Sure. We know what you think, let’s see what the rest of the town thinks,’” he said. 

Krist said he would keep up the momentum the town has already built with putting policies and procedures in place, and with reinforcing the right way for things to be done. 

Krist also has a focus on development in Highland. With the town working to rethink its comprehensive plan, he says it’s important that the town gets it right, but that it’s also important to complete the process sooner rather than later. 

It’s become clear, he said, that there are multiple opinions in the town on things like short-term rentals. He sees short-term rentals as a major factor impacting housing in Highland, making it harder for families to move into the community. 

The more people move into Highland, the better the tax base will be and the stronger its community institutions like the volunteer fire and ambulance departments, he said. “I think housing needs to be more available and affordable, and I think there’s things we can do in terms of how we approach our regulations and land use that can address that.”

Frank Monteleone

Monteleone wanted to run for town board because he wanted to be an integral part of the comprehensive planning process. He has a background in land development and code enforcement, and currently serves as the vice chair of Highland’s planning board. 

“If I’m elected onto the board, I will be a good shoulder for [the other members] to talk to and myself to have conversations with,” he said. “I know what a good building department should look like; I know what a good zoning board should look like; I know what a good planning board should look like.”

Monteleone sees the biggest threat to Highland at present to be Mel Carney as a candidate for town supervisor. According to Montelone, Carney and other members of her faction “publically advertise that the Town of Highland is a dumpster fire,” and that advertisement affects people’s opinions of the town in a way that harms its businesses. 

It should be highlighted “the importance of electing the right supervisor, because her path is one of just anger and revenge, and that’s not what we need,” said Monteleone.

Monteleone supports bringing the constables back to Highland. He says that he’s in Eldred every weekend, and he sees the difference between when the town previously had constables and now when it does not. “I feel strongly about putting them back,” he said.