Polling places changes, trick-or-treating

In a rare show of bipartisanship, both Republicans and Democrats in the Pennsylvania House are calling for the Republican state Rep. Aaron Bernstine to resign immediately. This comes after videos from the representative’s now-deleted Snapchat account showed him encouraging his five-year-old son to smoke a lit cigar. Other videos from the same account documented Bernstine using sexually explicit language around his son and other young children. Bernstine has apologized for his behavior, but did not make any promises to resign.

More than 9,000 residents in Wayne County have requested mail-in ballots ahead of this year’s General Election. But for those who still plan to vote in person, the finalized list of polling locations is now available on the county’s website. Residents in Damascus 2, Dyberry Township and Mount Pleasant will be voting in different locations than usual. The new locations can be found at waynecountypa.gov.

And in a 5-1 vote, the Honesdale Borough council has decided to allow trick-or-treating this Halloween on October 31 from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. The mayor and the councilors have urged residents to follow CDC guidelines for the holiday, which advise that traditional trick-or-treating or trunk-or-treating are considered high risk for spreading the COVID-19 virus. Hawley Borough has also decided to allow trick-or-treating on the 31st, from 4-7 p.m.

DA race heats up, state counters clusters

Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the NYS Department of Health are continuing to monitor hotspot clusters of COVID-19, which includes zip codes in Orange County. The positivity rate among these hotspots is almost 6 percent, compared to the rest of the state's rate of around 1 percent. The governor has called on local governments to enforce COVID-19 restrictions, promising to close all business activity if needed.

Two bills sponsored by Sullivan County state representatives were signed into law this past week. The first prevents farmers negatively affected by COVID-19 from losing their agricultural property tax assessments due to reduced sales. The second bill provides marketing assistance to promote New York farm products--like shellfish and wine. Sen. Jen Metzger and Rep. Aileen Gunther were sponsors of both bills.

With less than a month to go before the election, the race for Sullivan County district attorney is heating up as the candidates traded barbs about each other’s track records last week. Former Sullivan County judge and Republican nominee, Frank LaBuda, said his opponent, Acting District Attorney Meagan Galligan was responsible for a decreasing number of indictments and an increasing backlog. Something he promised to change. ADA Galligan, in turn, said  that while on the bench, her opponent had a “record number of cases awaiting trial in his court for more than six months."