The registered voters from the Village of Mineola will vote on Tuesday, March 18 to fill three seats on the Mineola Village Board of Trustees.

There are three candidates running for two of the seats. Linda Fairgrieve and Paul Cusato of the Hometown Party are running for re-election for their seats, which are both two-year terms. Challenger Paul Pereira of the New Line Party is also running. The two candidates of the three who receive the most votes on March 18 will fill the two trustee positions.

Tom Kennedy of the New Line Party is running for the other seat on the board, which is a one-year term. He is running unopposed. The seat is a one-year term because there is one year left on the seat that belonged to John DaVanzo, who retired from the board. Kennedy was appointed to fill that seat.

The New Line Party, which currently holds a 3-2 majority on the board, with Mayor Jack M. Martins, Deputy Mayor Larry Werther and Kennedy is guaranteed to maintain its majority over the Hometown Party, which has Fairgrieve and Cusato since Martins and Werther are not up for re-election and Kennedy is running unopposed. The New Line Party, though, is trying to gain another seat on the board with the election of Pereira.

Although the Hometown Party is guaranteed to retain at least one seat, Fairgrieve and Cusato feel it's critical that they both be re-elected in order, they say, to maintain an effective two-party system.

"I think we need checks and balances. I'm afraid if it's a 4 to 1 board, either Linda or I will never have a chance to have a motion seconded," said Cusato, a longtime member of the Mineola Fire Department, who is running for his third term in office as a trustee.

Pereira, who is a history teacher at Mineola High School and coached the Mustangs boys soccer team to the Long Island title in 2005, gives his opponents credit for taking on the job of trustee of the village, but respectfully disagrees with their assessment that the village board needs a two-party system to effectively govern.

"There aren't two teams up there. It's one team and you want to put your best players on that team regardless of what their party affiliation happens to be. The sense that I'm getting is that people want things done, that they're happy with the direction the village is headed in and they want people up there who will contribute to that, who will be active participants of the process and not just observers," Pereira said.

Pereira said the village watchdogs are the village residents who, due to initiatives by the New Line Party, are able to attend open board work sessions and see meetings on television.

Fairgrieve, who was elected in 2000, is the senior member of the board, and Cusato have filled two seats on the board as members of the Hometown Party and are making finances a part of their campaign.

Fairgrieve and Cusato are making a bold promise to the residents of the village not vote for the 2008-2009 village budget if the budget raises village taxes. "We have to hold the line on taxes," said Fairgrieve. "I think with everything going on, we can't have a tax increase."

It may be a hard promise to keep since costs such as employee salaries and benefits, services and fuel continue to escalate. But Fairgrieve believes that it can be done. "These economic challenges that we have now we haven't had before," she said. "I think we all need to work together now and in the future to confront these economic challenges and keep Mineola an affordable place to live."

Kennedy believes that promising no tax increase is only a political ploy. He points out that there are some costs like tipping fees and costs for fuel that can't be controlled. In addition, he said that a large portion of the budget goes to debt service because of borrowing done by the prior administration.

"Obviously, the goal for all of us is not to increase taxes. We would all love to make that promise and keep it," Kennedy said. "We haven't scratched the service of the budget. It's way to early. We'd like to keep it to zero or as low as possible. That's our goal as it always is."

After both campaigning successfully against the formation of a village police force culminating with a referendum in December 2006, Fairgrieve and Cusato proposed a plan that included a neighborhood watch program, which is currently being organized under the auspices of Mineola Auxiliary Police Chief Mike Spae.

Cusato said going forward he would like to see the neighborhood watch up and running and the rehabilitation of the athletic field adjacent to the community pool. Fairgrieve said she would like to protect the village from overdevelopment and pointed to voting to eliminate a curb cut on Royal Avenue for a proposed CVS project as an example.

Cusato and Fairgrieve also would like to see better communication between the mayor and the trustees. "One of the things I also would hope in the next two years is that there could be more of a collaborative effort," she said.

"We do work well together but there are times when we disagree," said Cusato, adding then he and Fairgrieve are then labeled as obstructionists. "We should be given the opportunity to express our views."

However, members of the New Line Party argue that the two Hometown Party trustees have not involved themselves in the process of good government and have instead tried to obstruct the progress the village has made. "If I am elected, I hope to be able to in two years or four years or certainly after eight years, have a record to speak of, be able to say this is what I've accomplished. I feel the opposition doesn't have that."

Pereira is proud to be running on the New Line Party since, he believes, the party has a record of accomplishing things like putting the village on solid financial footing after years of borrowing and looking for ways to expand the tax base. "They produced. They promised and they delivered and because of that, I want to be part of that," he said. "This party five years ago took the challenge and offered a vision and they began to deliver on that vision and I have every reason to believe they will continue to," he said.

The board has been unanimous on some important issues over the past year. For example, the board voted unanimously to reassess properties in order to institute a more accurate for of assessment. The board also voted unanimously to approve the Winston condominium project.