Off Main Street: The offbeat side of the news
Give him a hand
If there were an award for the most accidentally clever and successful political campaign of the year, the winner would be Clark Borngraber, hands down. Or in his case, hands clean.
Borngraber, who this week won election to the Brant Town Board, was looking for some token that he could hand out to voters as he campaigned.
His wife suggested hand sanitizer. He initially was put off by the cost until his daughter found a deal: three bottles for 50 cents at Dollar Tree. He bought about 800, removed the labels, added his name and campaign slogan and went to work.
One voter Borngraber approached asked what he was handing out.
“I said, ‘It’s hand cleaner; help me clean up the town.’ He looked at me and started laughing,” he said.
That throwaway line became the theme of his campaign and the talk of the town.
“It just kind of caught on. Wherever I thought someone had a little bit of humor in their body, I said, ‘Help me clean up the town,’ and they thought it was wonderful,” he said.
He’s not sure what he’ll do to top that in four years if he decides to run again. Then again, by then he’ll be 77, and as a friend pointed out to him: “At your age, if you order three-minute eggs, you’re worried if they’re going to get here before you go.”
Bills fan in Jets den
As a lifelong Bills fan working in the Bronx, Todd Gorlewski, 34, takes abuse from co-workers who root for the New York Jets.
He got some revenge when the Bills beat the Jets on Oct. 18.
A hospital chief financial officer, the West Seneca native was the only Bills fan in a fancy luxury box in the Jets’ stadium.
For much of the game, Gorlewski kept quiet while the other business people in the box put down the Bills at every chance.
Then, late in the third quarter, the Bills’ Lee Evans scored a key touchdown, and Gorlewski couldn’t shut up any longer.
He screamed, “Yeah!” and pumped his fist.
“You’re a Bills fan?” his incredulous box mates asked him.
“Yes I am, all my life,” Gorlewski said. “Born and bred in Western New York.”
He said he never had more fun walking out of a stadium.
Aurora’s feminine side
Aurora Councilman James F. Collins, who was re-elected in this week’s election, knows the gender scales will soon tip for the Town Board:Women will outnumber men on the five-member board in a 3-to-2 split, believed to be the first time that has happened in the town’s history.
The election of the town’s first female supervisor, Jolene M. Jeffe—plus the election of Susan Friess as a new councilwoman— means Collins and Councilman Jeffrey Harris are in the “minority.” The other board member is Councilwoman Kelly Wahl.
Collins suggested it might be a good idea if he shows up at the new board’s first meeting in January bearing gifts.
With his tongue firmly in his cheek, Collins quipped: “I think I should bring flowers and chocolate.”
Polish and proud
Her friends call her Tina Bove. But the West Seneca Town Board member’s full name is Christina Wleklinski Bove. That’s what she wanted on the ballot in her Erie County Legislature race this year.
Problem is, the Board of Elections told her the ballot would not have room for all those letters and told her she had to cut some of them out.
Cutting out her given name was out of the question, which is why voters this week cast ballots for “Chris Wleklinski Bove.”
“I am very proud of my Polish heritage,” she said. “My mother and father are both gone. Part of who I am is Wleklinski.”
Look for her in Old County Hall in January. She’ll be the legislator with the extra long nameplate.
Written by Bruce Andriatch with contributions from Dan Herbeck, Karen Robinson and Mary B. Pasciak.
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