Yasses moving in and moving on following Village of Oakfield election

Jeremy Yasses spent the night in his new home on North Pearl Street in the Village of Oakfield last night.

That would be unremarkable, except that there has been a small controversy in Oakfield over the residency of the recently elected trustee.

NYS law requires village trustees to be residents of the village they represent.

According to Yasses, it wasn't an issue during the election, but after he beat out an incumbent for the position, at least one person raised the issue at Monday's village board meeting.

"I think everybody on the board expected him to move to the village," Mayor Richard Pastecki said. "I think some were saying they didn't know how the GOP could run somebody who wasn't a village resident, but we all knew he was moving."

Yasses has completely renovated a large Victorian farmhouse on North Pearl Street. The 2,520-square-foot home was built in 1880 and Yasses gutted it and totally redid the interior of the main house as well as made extensive repairs and changes to the barn on the property.

Escrow just closed on his former residence and his family is moving this week.

Yasses has been involved in village politics for some time. He's also a landlord there.

Pastecki said the question of Yasses's residency is pretty much a dead issue, unless some other village resident wants to fight it on their own dime.

"The board is not under any obligation to do anything about it," Pastecki said. "The law is so vague ... What I discovered (in researching it) is that anybody can bring a suit to contest an election, but that doesn't guarantee the election will be found invalid. ... we probably do not want to spend taxpayer money on it because there’s no clear outcome. "

It's not even a topic Yasses really wanted to talk about because he doesn't think the issue is really about him, just a little small-town political wrangling, and he's ready to get to work.

"I want it to be a smooth transition and to come in and do good things for the people of the village," Yasses said.

He's proud to have taken part in a village election where differing views were represented and that brought more people to the polls than usual.

"I think it's phenomenal," Yasses said. "That's the way America was built -- democracy, different views and opinions, and that's how it should be."

Yasses will be sworn in on Monday.