11/09/2022
Four newcomers elected to Ocean City school board, ousting incumbents
Upper Township returns two incumbents and their running mate
By DAVID NAHAN
Sentinel Staff
Four newcomers were elected to the Ocean City Board of Education Tuesday and two incumbents and their running mate were chosen by voters in the Upper Township school board race, according to unofficial results.
In Ocean City, Catherine Panico, Kevin Barnes and Liz Nicoletti won three-year terms and Robin Shaffer won the one-year unexpired term.
Incumbent school board President Dr. Patrick Kane and fellow board members Dr. Charles Roche and Greg Whelan did not win new terms. Ryan Leonard, who was appointed to the board on August, lost his bid for the one-year term.
In Upper Township, long-serving members Michele Barbieri and Kristie Chisholm were re-elected. Their running mate, Christine Lentz, won the other three-year term.
Incumbent William Sooy lost his bid for re-election in the large field of candidates.
Barbieri earned 2,219 votes, Lentz received 2,208 and Chisholm got 2,109.
Daniel Kilgallon was close behind with 2,016 followed by Kiernan Black with 1,909. Alexander Grassi had 1,629 and Sooy had 1,033.
In Ocean City, Panico received the most votes with 2,259 followed by running mate Nicoletti with 2,082. Barnes won the third three-year term with 2,062 votes.
Kane received 2,027, Roche had 1,824 and Whelan 1,664.
For the one-year term, Shaffer, who campaigned with Panico and Nicoletti, won with 2,079 votes.
Leonard received 1,398 and the third candidate, former board member Dale Braun, got 636 votes.
Panico, Nicoletti and Shaffer all lost their bids running for school board last year, as did Leonard and Braun.
Unlike Braun and Leonard, however, the trio have been outspoken over the past year at school board meetings. They raised issues during public comment, most of it spent assailing the new state Board of Education Health and Physical Education standards school boards across New Jersey had to adopt.
Panico, Shaffer and Nicoletti, along with others, repeatedly urged the board to reject the standards, complaining they included language and content about s*x education, s*xuality and gender identity inappropriate for students, especially in the lower grades.
The board narrowly adopted the standards in August in a 6-5 vote, after educators explained the district was able to tailor the curriculum around the standards to fit the community.
The educators said Ocean City’s curriculum removed the controversial content and in matters of s*x education, s*xuality, gender and gender identity, if students wanted to go beyond the parameters of the curriculum, teachers would tell them to go home and ask their parents.
The voting results in this story are from the capemaycountyvotes.com website run by the county clerk’s office.
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