Letter to the Editor Barber for Senate

Dear Editor,

For the first time since I was born in the early nineties, Schoharie County will be represented by a new State Senator because longtime representative Jim Seward is retiring at the end of this year. After a lifetime of service to us – not only in Schoharie County, but across the entire 51st Senate District – Mr. Seward has earned a well deserved retirement, and I wish him nothing but health.

This retirement, however, means that voters have an awfully important choice to make on Election Day to decide who our next State Senator will be, and to me, the choice is fairly simple.

Jim Barber’s roots run deep in Schoharie County, literally. Born and raised down the road in Fulton, Jim is the fifth generation of farmers who have cultivated a living from the fertile soil of our blessed Valley. He has not only carried over the legacy of his family’s farm for another generation, but he has provided a source of honest labor and employment for residents over many years.

When Jim has not been busy working on the farm or raising a beautiful family, he has been fighting for our agricultural interests on the state level as the Special Assistant in the New York State Department of Agriculture and Markets and on the federal level as the New York State Executive Director of the USDA Farmer Service Agency.

Since announcing his Senate candidacy last year, Jim has impressed me greatly with his depth of knowledge and his truly bipartisan spirit. A graduate of Cornell, he hit the books and proposed a six-point tax policy to shift the burden of crippling property taxes off of Upstate New York’s residents, while ensuring that he will be a voice for us in Albany.

A lifelong farmer and businessman, Jim understands that we need to simplify the regulatory state that New York has become, while ensuring the environment – our most precious asset in the Schoharie Valley and beyond – is protected for generations to come, and that our Second Amendment rights are preserved now.

One of the truly admirable qualities of Jim’s character is that he always shows up for us:

- Whether it be as our local farmer who needs to prepare the farm stand, he showed up.

- Whether it be as our local school board member at Middleburgh Central, he showed up.

- Whether it be as our local agricultural voice in Albany or Washington, he showed up.

- Whether it be as our local candidate for New York State Senator, he showed up.

The same, unfortunately, cannot be said of his opponent, Peter Oberacker.

When it was time for Peter and Jim to debate before the League of Women Voters, Peter claims he didn’t show up because the nonpartisan League is anti-Second Amendment, which makes me wonder how he’ll ever find the courage to step foot in Albany then. We don’t have to worry about that problem with Jim, because not only does he show up, but he does so while standing for our values.

Please, on this upcoming Election Day, head to the polls and cast your ballot for Jim Barber to represent us in Albany.

Timothy Knight,

Middleburgh Village Trustee