No town clerk candidate emerges as Waterbury gets a select board race; Viens returns to the ballot unopposed

January 27, 2025  |  By Lisa Scagliotti

File photo by Gordon Miller

Waterbury’s March election is shaping up to be as much a story about who is not running as it is about those who are on the ballot.

All around Vermont, Monday at 5 p.m. was the filing deadline for candidates for local town and school offices to file for their names to appear on the March 3 Town Meeting Day election ballots. 

The most popular race shaping up for Waterbury is for the select board where three candidates will compete for two one-year positions and a single candidate – former board member Chris Viens – is unopposed for the three-year seat on the ballot. 

Interim Town Clerk Beth Jones shared the list of candidates who filed their petitions to participate in the upcoming election. 

Candidates Evan Karl Hoffman and Sandy Sabin, who both ran unsuccessfully in 2025 for the select board, are contenders for the two one-year select board seats, along with first-time candidate Martha Staskus, who currently chairs the town Planning Commission. Viens served on the board from 2012 until 2023, including as chair for several years.

The field opened up for this year’s election as all three of the select board members currently holding these offices opted not to run for re-election: Chair Alyssa Johnson and members Mike Bard and Victoria Taravella. Johnson has been on the board since 2022; Bard has served for seven years, and Taravella is ending her first one-year term. 

A key absence on the Waterbury ballot will be any candidate interested in the positions of town clerk and treasurer.

Jones began serving as interim town clerk in early January after Karen Petrovic stepped down from her positions as town clerk and treasurer. Petrovic has taken a new job with the state of Vermont. Her terms for the two elected offices each have one more year remaining. 

Bill Shepeluk, Waterbury’s former town manager who retired in 2022, is serving as interim treasurer. The town has also hired former Barre City Clerk Carol Dawes to work through early March to assist Jones with the Town Meeting Day election. 

Municipal Manager Tom Leitz noted that, although the clerk and treasurer are individually elected offices, many communities, including Waterbury, have the same individual hold both roles. Such was the case with Petrovic and her predecessors. 

Candidates can still run for any of the offices on the March ballot as write-ins, including the clerk and treasurer positions. They would need to communicate their interest to the community, given that the deadline to have names printed on the ballots has passed. A write-in candidate would need at least 30 votes to win election (and have the most votes if there was a contest). 

Any positions that remain open after the election would need to be filled by appointment. The select board would handle appointments for the town clerk and treasurer positions, with an appointee or appointees to serve until Town Meeting Day in March 2027.

Leitz said that as it’s presently structured, the town clerk position is a full-time job eligible for full staff benefits. It most recently paid a yearly salary of $69,659 as both roles, clerk and treasurer. 

Should there be two individuals serving separately as clerk and treasurer in the future, Leitz noted that the select board would need to address that arrangement and compensation. 

Also on Monday, two other candidates filed to run for office in Waterbury unopposed: Anna Black for a five-year term on the Library Commission and John Woodruff for a five-year seat on the Cemetery Commission. Both are already serving on those respective boards. 

Other Waterbury offices without any candidates after Monday’s filing deadline include one seat on the town Board of Listers for a three-year term and a seat on the Harwood Unified Union School District School Board for the remaining one year on an unexpired term. 

The school board opening comes as Waterbury member Dan Roscioli, who was appointed for one year in 2025, opted not to run for election. Pamela Eaton, another Waterbury representative to the Harwood board appointed last year, has filed to run for a full three-year term. 

As the largest town in the Harwood district, Waterbury has four members on the school board; the other five communities in the district each have two seats. Waterbury’s other school board members – Corey Hackett and Rob Dabrowski – are not up for election until 2027 and 2028, respectively.

The Waterbury openings are two of nine positions on the 14-member Harwood School Board on upcoming election ballots. Incumbents have filed to run unopposed in Duxbury and Waitsfield. Openings for seats representing Fayston, Moretown and Warren also did not attract any candidates yet. 

The school board would make appointments to fill any positions still open after the election. Appointees would serve until March 2027. Write-in candidates can still run for the March 3 election.