Few candidates with school board deadline nearing

Candidates for school board seats open at area school districts have until 5 p.m. Thursday, July 30 to file nomination papers with board secretaries.

As of Thursday, only two candidates had filed papers for the 14 seats open in Plymouth County school districts.

In the Le Mars Community School District, Brenda Phelan has filed papers for her seat representing District 4.

Also up for election are the District 1 seat held by Leon Scott and District 2 seat held by Cris Collins.

Candidates for the LCS board seats must obtain 50 signatures on the nomination papers.

In the Kingsley-Pierson School District, Scott Bohle has filed papers for re-election to his District 3 seat. The other open seat is District 1 held by Shari Seuntjens.

Akron-Westfield Community School District voters will elect members to four seats on the board.

They are District 1, held by Kevin DeRocher, District 2 held by Phil Parks, District 3, held by Josh Martinsen and District 5, held by Janet Willer.

Willer was appointed to the District 5 seat, and is up for election to fill the remaining two years of the term.

In the Hinton School District, two at-large seats, held by Rob Held and Steve Eddy, are up for election.

Voters in the Remsen-Union School District will elect members for seats representing District 1, 3 and 5.

Current members are District 1, Travis Tentinger, District 3, Rich VanDam and District 5, Mark Wurth.

Nomination papers are available from board secretaries, at the superintendent's office and the Plymouth County auditor's office.

The board secretary must file the nomination papers at the auditor's office by 5 p.m. Friday, July 31.

The last day for candidates to withdraw by filing a written request with the board secretary is 5 p.m Tuesday, Aug. 4.

Election for school board members will be Tuesday, Sept. 8.

Effective with the September 2009 election, school board members will be elected to four-year terms. This is a result of a law passed in 2008 by the Iowa Legislature which changes school board member' terms of office from three to four years with elections in September of odd-numbered years. The law also limits special elections to four dates per year.

This means 2010 is the first year in which there will be no September school board election but there may be school special elections.