Upper Saddle River school board candidates face rare contested election in the fall
Although Upper Saddle River's regional high school candidates will go unchallenged, two elementary school board trustees will face challengers in a rare contested Board of Education race this November.
According to petitions received by Monday's county submission deadline, three of five Upper Saddle River representatives on the 10-member Northern Highlands Regional High School board will run unopposed for new terms: President Christine Ferrarie and trustees Lisa Halperin and James Mulvey.
However, incumbents Jennifer Johnston and David Verducci will face two other residents seeking two open seats on the separate seven-member elementary school board: Mark W. Mehegan and Ellen G. Simon.
Mehegan did not immediately respond to requests for biographical information, and little about him is posted online.
Simon is listed as secretary of the Upper Saddle River Education Foundation Executive Board. Her various online postings describe her as an "attorney and compliance professional" with a law degree from Harvard, a master's in philosophy from Oxford University, and a degree from Brown University.
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Her 900-word candidate essay on Substack − the first of "several essays" in the "coming months"− outlines the philosophy encompassed in her slogan "Excellence, Integrity, Respect."
"Let us begin a productive, positive discussion about how to move our district forward in the post-COVID era," she concludes.
Last year four candidates ran unopposed for school board seats: Sheila Yallowitz for Northern Highlands; Mary Ann Gray, Stephen Leo Quagliani and Susan Gandara for the elementary board.
Upper Saddle River shares the regional high school district with Allendale, which has four members on the board. Ho-Ho-Kus and Saddle River send their students on a send/receive basis. Only Ho-Ho-Kus has a seat on the board because its students represent more than 10% of the student population.
This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Upper Saddle River NJ school board election sees new candidates
