Thank you, Sheila

To the editor: Election Day has come and gone, and for the most part we know the final results from last Tuesday. Sadly, a dedicated public servant was not successful in gaining another term in office. I wanted to take this moment as a longtime Town of Woodbury resident to personally thank Sheila Conroy for her years of dedicated service to our town, especially over the past four years as our town supervisor. Sheila worked actively on behalf of our town on many fronts. However, what I found the most impressive about Sheila was that she put the interests of our town ahead of her own political interests. Recently, there was a vote before the Town Board on a controversial development. Realizing the enormous benefits of allowing this development to proceed, Sheila scheduled a board vote on various legalities involving the development before election day. Any political campaign strategist (including yours truly) probably would have told her to wait. However, she didn’t. She was honest and sincere with the voters of Woodbury as to where she stood. That took guts! In my nearly 13 years in the political realm I have met few elected officials who will sacrifice their careers for the benefit of their constituents. Sheila is certainly a rare commodity in the political world. Although Sheila lost, I believe Woodbury won because of her and the majority of the board’s determination to put the town first. As a result, the town gained 113 acres of open space at no cost to the taxpayer, $10 million in water, sewer and infrastructure repairs, more than $1 million in additional parkland fees and much more. This development will also not be the burden that those who spread nothing but fear and misinformation during the campaign wanted you to fear it would be. To Mr. Burke, congratulations, sir, on being elected Woodbury’s first Democrat supervisor in more than 20 years. You certainly worked hard for your victory and you are to be commended for it. However, I believe you will learn quite quickly that it is easy to sit in opposition and speak out against the present administration. It is a lot harder to sit up in the seat of power and make the tough decisions everyday that need to be made and then be berated, yelled at and attacked for making them. If you don’t believe me, ask Sheila. Jim Booth Highland Mills