Recently Asked Questions (RAQs)

Our library is a school district public library. The associated school district is a central school district. The library does not hold or oversee our own elections. Library trustee elections, yearly levy, and any special ballot initiatives are held by the school district.

Our library trustee elections have become more active recently with a noticeable increase in resources being spent by candidates. Signs, mailings, political consultants, all have become common. With these changes have come more questions from the public about the elections and allowable candidate activities. Greater scrutiny of expense filings, questions about candidates’ signs, etc. have come our way.

If we received questions like these for non-district elections, I would send folks to the County Board of Elections for an authoritative answer. That is not a great resource for district elections like ours.

Is there an entity that has oversight of our elections? Is it the School District Chief Elections Inspector? Does NYSED have a role? Is it different for different types of school districts and associated school district public libraries? Are election rules for a school district public library potentially different than for the associated school district? Where can we direct questions from the public to receive solid answers?

We are a school district public library. We own our property. We recently obtained a construction grant and are eager to get our project moving! We have been told we don’t have to get a building permit from our town because we are a school district public library. Is that true? It would be great to not have to worry about a permit.

Our school district public library has offered early mail ballots for our 2024 and 2025 budget vote and trustee election. The school district is now telling us that the library is not obligated to offer early mail ballots and that only the school district is obligated to participate in early voting.

So, we have two questions:

1. Is this information correct? And, if so:
2. Since the library has used this in previous votes, do we need to continue using this additional form of voting by mail, or can we revert back to only using absentee ballots?

We are a school district public library. Can the school require the library to be part of its budget vote if the library desires to be separate from it?