Rotterdam Town Supervisor John Polimeni has held onto his seat, defeating challenger Clark Collins by a little more than 300 votes in a race that exposed a bitter split inside the local Republican Party months before voters ever cast a ballot. Polimeni ran on the Conservative line without other backing, while Collins campaigned on a Republican-backed independent line.
According to an unofficial count reported by the Daily Gazette, Polimeni took 4,113 votes to Collins's 3,795 on Election Day. Collins is the husband of former town supervisor Mollie Collins, a detail that underscored how personal the race had become for both camps, as reported by the Times Union.
A Party That Turned on Its Own Supervisor
The roots of the fracture trace back to April, when the Rotterdam Republican Committee first endorsed Polimeni, then withdrew that support and backed Collins instead. The Times Union's reporting on the fallout described a party in open rebellion against its own decision.
About 20 Rotterdam Republican committee members protested the switch by exiting the party, according to the same account. GOP officials said at the time that Polimeni had refused to help their candidates and failed to return calls, which they said prompted the party to pull its line from him.
Dueling Accounts of Why the Party Walked Away
Schenectady County GOP chair Joy laid out a more detailed version of that rationale, saying the party's reasons included Polimeni's failure to attend candidate events, respond to calls and texts, and carry petitions for Republican legislative candidates. Polimeni disputed parts of that account, saying he responded to all but two calls and had intended to have someone else carry Conservative Party petitions on his behalf.
The dispute escalated further when Polimeni accused local GOP leaders of seeking capital projects pursued by the previous administration in exchange for an endorsement, a claim reported by the Times Union. Joy denied that characterization outright, saying, “At no time was any endorsement contingent upon any project or political consideration.”
Tax Hike Proposal Shrinks After Pushback
Running alongside the political feud was a fight over town finances. Polimeni had proposed a 34% tax rate increase, which he attributed to the previous Collins administration's failure to budget for high-dollar contractual expenses. Collins, for his part, blamed Polimeni for the tax increase proposal as the campaign wound down.
That original 34% figure was eventually reduced to 18% after deliberations with the Town Board, according to the Times Union's reporting. The downward revision came amid mounting scrutiny of the town's books from a state audit released in September.
State Audit Flags Missing Financial Filings
A review from the New York State Comptroller found that the town's comptroller had not prepared and filed Rotterdam's 2024 annual financial report with the state comptroller as required under New York State General Municipal Law Section 30. The Times Union separately reported that nearly $1 million in receipts had not been entered into the town's computer system, and that Polimeni sent a letter to both the state attorney general's office and the state comptroller's office.
The Schenectady County Conservative Committee offered a terse reaction to Polimeni's win, writing simply, “Rotterdam has spoken.” Polimeni did not respond to multiple calls for comment on his victory, per the Times Union's reporting. Earlier in his term, Polimeni had discussed the launch of a mobile food pantry on Sept. 16 at the Center for Advanced Technology, a project that predated the turbulence of this fall's campaign.
