Tomorrow, June 27th, is a primary election, which means that you are voting within your party of register to choose which candidate will continue on to the regular election in November. But don’t take my word for it. According to AJ Magnan, Democratic Commissioner of Elections in Ontario County, “A primary election only occurs when there are more party candidates for office than there are offices to be elected. The winner of a primary election appears on that party's ballot line in the General Election.”
The Board of Elections has posted sample ballots. Check yours out here.
Polls will be open from 6am - 9pm. You can find your polling place, courtesy of the Board of Elections, here (you will have to enter your address).
The county-level offices that are up for election and their primary-ing candidates are as follows. Links to campaign websites/social media pages, if available, are provided:
County Clerk:
Liz Yockel (D)
County Coroner (two seats available):
Michael D. John (R, incumbent)
James J. Devaney (R, incumbent)
Thomas A. Cheney (R)
Note that, since there are no Republicans in the county clerk primary and no Democrats in the primary for coroner, most voters will only have one race on their ballots. In the general election in November, though, there will be candidates from both parties in both of these races, according to Magnan.
The City of Geneva will also be electing a mayor, a councilor at large, and city councilors for Wards 4 and 5. (There are no Republicans in the Geneva primaries, so Republican voters in Geneva will only have the coroner race on their ballots.) Steve Buchiere over at the Finger Lakes Times put together a nice article listing each Geneva candidate’s experience and background (in case anyone reading this lives in Geneva).
Mayor of Geneva:
Jan E. Regan (D)
Stephen A. Valentino (D, incumbent)
Councilor At Large for Geneva:
John W. Brennan (D)
Anthony D. Noone (D, incumbent)
Ahmad Whitfield (D)
City of Geneva Ward 4 Councilor:
RJ Rapoza (D)
City of Geneva Ward 5 Councilor:
Wil Wolf (D)
James G. Petropoulos (D)
The Town of Gorham will also be electing a new Supervisor. There are no Democrats in this primary, so voters registered as Democrats in Gorham will only be voting for their choice of county clerk in the primary. (You see how this works.)
Supervisor for Gorham:
Brian G. Lazarus (R)
Dale C. Stell (R)
Mike Hibbard wrote a nice article with more information about the November election, if you’re interested. In addition to party petitions (which may lead to primaries if the field of candidates is crowded), candidates may also be nominated for office through “‘independent body petitions’ and town caucus meetings,” according to Magnan. “The final list of candidates for the November election will not be known until after July 27th (the last day to file a caucus nomination).” (Thank you for the information, Mr. Magnan!)
Finally, I am going to suggest some related reading for anyone looking for a little context about these elections. Read about a recent county discussion about issues with coroners here; information pertaining to the county clerk can be found here; and, lastly, here’s an interesting article I found about why John Pruett, currently serving as a Supervisor for the City of Geneva, resigned from the Geneva City Council in 2021.
By the way: I want to provide a little context to the piece I wrote highlighting Tom Cheney. A friend of mine told me I should speak to him, and the timing lined up nicely, as the Board of Supervisors had at the time been discussing problems with coroners not doing their job. I am registered as a Democrat (although I consider myself an independent), so although I did feature Cheney in that piece, I did not sign his petition. Quite the opposite — I signed the petition for his Democratic adversaries, Nancy Augustine and Laura Swarthout, who had a three-person petition together with county clerk contender Liz Yockel. I signed that petition because I wanted as many people as possible to be on the ballot, being a fan of meaningful competition in elections.