TRSL Board makes interim appointment, receives election results

October 5, 2018

Baton Rouge - At its October meeting, the TRSL Board of Trustees made an interim appointment to the District 1 seat and received voting results for the colleges and universities election.

DISTRICT 1:
The board appointed Neshelle S. Nogess, M.B.A. of Lutcher to serve the remainder of the unexpired term of former District 1 trustee Britt Colon who resigned from the board in July. Nogess will serve as an interim trustee until December 31, 2018.

In January, she will take the oath of office for her new four-year term as District 1 representative. She was elected without opposition to the seat upon the withdrawal of John McCloskey from the race.

Nogess, a former District 1 trustee (2016-2017), is the Director of the Sales and Use Tax Department with the St. James Parish School Board. District 1 includes actively working TRSL members in the parishes of Ascension, Jefferson, Plaquemines, St. Bernard, St. Charles, St. James, and St. John.

COLLEGES & UNIVERSITIES:
In the election for the higher education seat on the Board, no candidate received more than 50% of the vote. A run-off election will be held with the top two candidates who received the most votes in the primary.

Moving forward in the run-off election will be Thomas F. Stafford, Ph.D. (Louisiana Tech University) with 16.97% of the vote and Cyrille Frey (LSU Health Science Center-New Orleans) with 14.68% of the vote.

Voting information for the run-off election will be mailed to eligible voters on October 19, and the deadline to vote is 4:30 p.m., Monday, November 19.

Run-off results will be announced at the TRSL board meeting in December. The person receiving the most votes will represent TRSL members employed in higher education for a four-year term beginning January 2019.

DISTRICT 7 UPDATE:
In other election news, Suzette Stelly Riddle of Abbeville was elected without opposition to the District 7 seat. Riddle is a classroom teacher/librarian at Indian Bayou Elementary School in Vermilion Parish.

She will take the oath of office in January and begin serving her four-year term. District 7 includes actively working TRSL members in the parishes of Acadia, Calcasieu, Cameron, Iberia, Lafayette, St. Mary, and Vermilion.