MONTICELLO, NY — After 15-year county clerk Dan Brigg announced he would not run for reelection, two candidates have thrown their names in for consideration on the November 5 ballot.
Deputy county clerk Russell Reeves (R) and David Sager (D), a former county legislator, will vie for the position.

Reeves, who has been deputy clerk for 18 months, is a local business owner in Liberty—he and his wife own the Antique Palace Emporium ,and he and his son own Reeves Excavation. Along with being a chiropractor and legislator, Sager has served as county coroner and was manager of the Village of Monticello.

Both men are running on platforms dedicated to efficiency. Sager’s campaign page on Facebook promotes his years of experience as a Jeffersonville volunteer fireman and as a member of various nonprofits, including the Red Cross and the Soil and Water Conservation District. He plans to make the clerk’s office the “most efficient, customer-service friendly and technologically advanced agency in county government,” according to an event page for a meet-and-greet hosted by his campaign. Reeves, who has been a Town of Liberty councilman and supervisor, highlights his previous achievements in the deputy clerk position on his campaign website, including petitioning for the state to establish a test site in Sullivan County for notary licenses.

The Sullivan County Clerk’s Office is responsible for operating the county’s Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) operation, as well as recording deeds, issuing pistol permits, passports and other records. Additionally, the office earns revenue from transactions, such as renewing a car registration. If a county resident renews at the county DMV in the Monticello government center, the county keeps 12.7 percent of the fee. If a resident renews the registration online, the county keeps a far smaller amount of the total.

Not surprisingly, both men want to increase the number of transactions that take place in the clerk’s office. To do that, both candidates say wait times at the DMV must be reduced.

“People are not going to wait hours in line at the DMV,” Sager said. “In summer time—and at other times depending on the day—the wait times are way too long, and people are going to go other places.”
Reeves said he sees the help desk as a potential for solving the issue.

“I’m looking to expand the help desk to reduce DMV wait times in the office,” he said. “The help desk we have now is in place and doing very well.”

Sager, who released his platform in July, has accused Reeves of pulling several of his goals from that platform. Sager said that in Reeves’ year and a half in office, he’s never addressed wait times.

“Despite what David Sager says, you just can’t go out and hire unlimited DMV clerks to reduce wait times,” Reeves responded. “There is a budget process and the legislature has to approve any new positions. David was a legislator, he knows that. For the 2019 budget, the legislature gave us one extra person in DMV. For the 2020 budget, we are not getting any new positions.”

Regarding other ways to improve service, Sager said he would create a fast lane in the DMV for minor transactions, and would expand the mobile DMV operations. He would also make as many of the forms as possible available online. “There are ways to streamline the operation,” he said of the office.
Reeves said, “I also want to expand the use of the mobile DMV van, that goes around to the towns, I’m looking forward to utilizing [the] grants that are available to continue to digitize county records.”

Both men also say that they want the county clerk’s office, which has run at a deficit for years, to become a cash-positive operation. Reeves said his goal was to save the taxpayers by bringing in more revenue.