Fillmore gets new clerk, two new council members

Wednesday, November 6, 2019

FILLMORE — The Fillmore Town Council saw an effective overhaul Tuesday evening as current Council President Bill Ashcraft and councilwoman Robin Duncan were voted out.

Jerry Huff and Meredith Trusty will take both of their seats in turn, while current councilman C.J. Huller will retain his seat on the council.

Trusty accrued the most votes with 41. Jerry Huff earned 39 votes with Huller receiving 38 of them, leaving Ashcraft and Duncan with 27 and 34 votes respectively.

In the race for the clerk-treasurer position, Jayna Haldeman was defeated by challenger Tonya Gruenholz with 35 votes to the incumbent’s 30.

After learning she had won this race, Gruenholz told the Banner Graphic that she had some new things to learn, but looked forward to addressing local issues like law enforcement and cleaning up the town.

However, she felt that more cooperation was needed on the council.

“I don’t think that has been done much in the past,” she said. “We’re definitely going to have to work as a team. We’re not going to get anything done if we’re butting heads all the time.”

Irrespective of this take on maintaining positive relationships between members of the town council, Gruenholz was excited to be elected as clerk-treasurer.

“I’m very happy; absolutely happy,” she said.

In talking about his goals for the future being on the Fillmore Town Council, Huff believed that recent negativity and lack of communication has kept Fillmore from improving.

“There’s so many things that need to be fixed here,” he said. “Fillmore keeps staying an ugly place, and that’s really why I ran - to help fix that.

“I have a business here, and I think that the people here do trust me,” he added.

Huff said he was “both happy and sad at the same time” with Duncan not being retained on the council. He shared that they both had worked on ideas to help Fillmore move forward.

Nonetheless, he was optimistic about the impact he could have in the future as a councilman.

“Maybe I can make a difference,” he said.

About 19 percent of eligible Fillmore voters cast ballots in the local elections.