Putnam County agricultural board elects chair, recommends two appointees and moves to pursue farmland-plan grant

Christine McLaughlin was elected chair of the Putnam County Agricultural District Board at a special meeting where members also completed a secret-ballot recommendation for two vacant seats, authorized staff to pursue grant funding to update the county agricultural and farmland protection plan, and agreed to improve storage and transparency of the board’s records and bylaws.

The board discussed vacancies for two seats — a farmer representative and an agribusiness representative — reviewed five applicants and used paper ballots to rank nominees. After members counted ballots, the board decided to forward a recommendation to the County Legislature for Joni Lanza as the agribusiness representative and Betsy Ryder as the farmer representative. Board members noted variations in the transcripted tallies during the count; the tally read during the meeting included 8 votes for Lanza, 8 for Ryder and 2 for another candidate (Hanovich), and members agreed to send a…