Be sure to vote in by-election

KEEN VOLUNTEER: Kay Gray at the Friends of the Park Arbour Day planting session in Soldiers Memorial Park Greytown last year. PHOTO/FILE

A by-election for Greytown voters is to take place after community board member Kay Gray stepped down for health reasons.

Mrs Gray had been on the Greytown board for the last six years and is well-known for her work around the town and her role as a midwife.

She has been involved in several groups like the Civil Defence Response Team, the Tree Advisory Group, Friends of O'Connors Bush, Stella Bull Park and Sarah's Garden groups.

She has also been a co-ordinator at the Greytown information centre and had been on the community board when it received a national heritage award for restoring the Greytown Town Hall.

Mrs Gray received 657 votes in the local body elections held in October and was one of four elected board members. Mrs Gray's husband Mike was a South Wairarapa District councillor for many years, until this year's elections when he was not re-elected.

Her father Fred Yule was mayor of Greytown Borough Council. Greytown people are being urged to take action now to enrol to vote or check that their enrolment details are correct in the wake of Mrs Gray's resignation.

The by-election will be held next year on February 11.

"The by-election for Greytown takes place in just 12 weeks' time," said Philip Parkes, registrar of electors for the Wairarapa electorate.

"All eligible people will need to enrol or update their enrolment details by 16 December 2013 to vote in the by-election," he said.

Nominations for the role are currently being called for, said Mr Parkes. He said almost 2600 people would be able to cast their vote by post in February to choose the next Greytown community board member.

"Only those people who are correctly enrolled will receive voting papers in the mail and be able to have a say in the election."

Go to www.elections.org.nz to check your details or enrol to vote. You can also get enrolment forms by calling 0800 36 76 56, Freetexting your name and address to 3676, or from any PostShop.