Town of Erie Board of Trustees Vacancy

In a Regular Meeting of the Town of Erie Board of Trustees on Tuesday, May 10, Trustee Christiaan van Woudenberg announced his resignation from the Board. The resignation takes place immediately leaving an open vacancy on the seven-person board.

Trustee van Woudenberg has been serving the Town in the role of Trustee since 2018 and was deeply involved in supporting issues like the vision for Town Center, supporting the Sustainability Master Plan, increasing regulation on oil and gas drilling through updates to the Town code, and many more. He valued working together collaboratively with the other Board members and the Town staff and worked hard to listen to residents’ concerns in the community.

With this new vacancy, the Board of Trustees has two legal avenues for moving forward:

1. Hold a Special Election to elect a new Trustee.
   
   OR
   
   
2. Appoint a new member using any process agreed upon by the Board.

The last instance of this was in the fall of 2021 with the vacancy left by former Trustee Bill Gippe. At that time, the seated Board determined that an application and interview process, followed by a vote by Ranked Choice Voting was the best course of action. The Board concluded this approach was appropriate because the vacancy occurred more than 18 months after the last election, but just a few months before the next election. The Board determined that appointing an interim Trustee for those few months was appropriate knowing an official election was close at hand for the residents to share their opinion through a vote.

Mayor Justin Brooks stated, “Our gratitude for Trustee Van Woudenberg’s service to the Town of Erie cannot be overstated. To fill this vacancy, I intend to propose the Board consider appointing Dan Hoback for Trustee at our next Board meeting on May 17. This will enable the Board to maintain focus on conducting the business of the Town as efficiently and effectively as possible. The last municipal election was just certified in the last month and Mr. Hoback received the next highest votes on the ballot, which was rather close. I believe this is a clear indication of the will of our community for who they want to serve on the Board.”

The next meeting of the Board of Trustees will be held on Tuesday, May 17. The final agenda for this meeting will be posted on Friday, May 13. The meeting can be viewed on Comcast Channel 8 or can be watched in real-time online. As always, all Board of Trustees meetings and information are posted to the Town Calendar.