Denehy defeats Camacho

Kevin Denehy defeated three-month incumbent Angel Camacho for a slot on the Elmont school board Tuesday night. Denehy won the seat once held by Frank Ragona by a slim 82-vote margin.

The official tally was 882 votes to 800 votes.

Denehy said that he was "pleasantly surprised" by the result, in a vote that turned out to be a bit of a nail-biter.

"They started listing the different schools and everything one school at a time, so my numbers were going up and going down a little bit," Denehy said. "Overall I was very happy about it."

The numbers from Elmont's seven polling places showed that the contest was definitely a back-and-forth race, with Camacho carrying Clara H. Carlson School and Dutch Broadway, along with a one vote advantage among absentee ballots.

In the end, however, Denehy managed to keep enough daylight between himself and the incumbent.

He said that he's already been in contact with other board members about what his role will be over the next few months, and is hoping to get his hands dirty early by helping streamline a few programs across the district.

"It all depends on what I'm allowed to do, what's expected and what I can do to try to help," he said. "I'd like to see if there's things that I can help consolidate to try and help make things more efficient."