Another Pine Resident Announces Candidacy for Region 2 School Board Seat

Another Pine resident has announced he is running a write-in campaign for the Region 2 seat on the Pine-Richland School Board.

Peter Lyons has been actively campaigning for the seat that covers parts of Pine and Richland townships.

The seat has had a serendipitous life lately as the sitting school board member, , resigned in late March. Then the only person who had filed the necessary petitions to get her name on the ballot, announced she was withdrawing from the race.

was appointed by the school board to fill the unexpired term for Stedeford's seat through the end of the year. She announced that she was running a write-in campaign for the seat.

Now Lyons is reaching out to voters in Region 2. In Pine, that covers voting districts 2, 3 and 6. For Richland, the region includes voting districts 1, 2, 7 and 8.

"After work and on weekends, I have been knocking on doors and speaking with voters throughout Pine-Richland about our school district," Lyons said in an email.  

"Nearly all voters share concerns about the financial issues facing the district, both in the short and long run," he continued. "The level of knowledge and concern that I've seen from voters is impressive."

Lyons, who is married and has a 5-year-old son, earned his Bachelor of Arts from Tufts University. He is a chartered financial analyst and a portfolio manager for BNY Mellon.

With 20 years of experience in corporate and government finance, Lyons said his priorities as a director will include fiscally conservative tax and expense policies.

"My motivation is one of concern for my own son's education as well as a desire to better my community.  I do not undertake this effort lightly, and would not do so if I had the least reservation about fully committing myself to the cause," Lyons said in an email.

"We are very lucky here in Pine-Richland that there seems to be relatively unanimity on many questions of academic curriculum and quality.  However, the board still plays a very special role in setting financial priorities and goals," Lyons wrote.

"Clearly, my background is particularly biased toward a financial perspective.  However, I believe it is in this area that most voters have concerns."

In his list of priorities, Lyons stressed traditional and fundamental academic excellence; raising the goals and benchmarks for measuring academic success; and a focus on proven, results-driven methods and programs.