"This was the first time we didn't have any candidates. We had two open seats and no candidates," said Lewiston Porter School Superintendent Paul Casseri on WBEN.
Casseri has been at Lewiston Porter for 21 years as a high school principal and now superintendent, and has never seen this happen.
"When the community began to realize that there were no candidates, we began to see significant interest. I'm aware of five or six individuals who mounted write-in campaigns on social media."
Voters ended up writing in over 100 names Tuesday. Many only received one vote.
Casseri said there were plenty of silly names as well.
"The President of the United States got a few votes, Donald Duck and a few other cartoon characters were written in. Every name was tabulated and we are able to say that we do have at least four names that received significant votes."
Winners cannot be announced yet because the individuals need to be asked if they are willing to take the seat.
Does it concern Casseri that no one was willing to step up ?
"It is concerning. But people's lives are much busier today and it is a commitment. Plus, there is no stipend unlike the Buffalo Board of Education."
And he added, "there's a lot of negativity out there especially on social media and it can get pretty ugly."
The annual Lew Port budget, at over $58 million dollars, was approved Tuesday by a vote of 653-334.
"We had two open seats and no candidates"
"We had two open seats and no candidates"
