School Board Chooses Former Member to Fill Vacancy

The Riverhead School Board appointed Willie Hsiang, a former member of the board from 1983 to 1993, to fill the vacant position on the seven-member board at a special meeting Wednesday evening.

Hsiang, a Riverhead resident and current member on the board of Eastern Suffolk BOCES, will fill the position previously held by Angela DeVito, who from the board in June.

"We had a lot of great candidates, but it was really an excellent choice for us because he knows the workings of the board," board president Ann Cotten-Degrasse said. "The amount of information that's thrown at you is phenominal, so Willie, who's done budgets and worked on school boards before, will already be up to speed." 

Hsiang's appointment is effective immediately, and will run until the end of DeVito's elected term in 2012.

The board also released the names of the 13 applicants who expressed interest in the position. They were: Marie Buday, Harry Denys, Lee Hanwick, Willie Hsiang, Chuck Heilman, Susan Koukounas, Theresa Markel, James Rheaume, Patricia Sapienza-Brown, Glenn Schafer, Virginia Scudder, Richard Tavano, Daniel Waloski.