Elizabeth Yockel is seeking the Democratic party’s nomination for Ontario County Clerk.
The Richmond resident says her personal experience led her to want to run for the position, namely when she was in the process of starting her own business in the 2010s. Yockel told Finger Lakes News Radio, when filing for her DBA, she had to take time off of her work day to drive to the clerk’s office in Canandaigua to file the paperwork, something she says in an inconvenience to those who want to start businesses in the more rural parts of the county.
If elected, she hopes to modernize the office to make it more accessible to residents, saying “I’m here because I want to embrace innovation; I want to bring ourselves into the 21st century, to be prepared for the future instead of just kind of keeping it where it’s been for a long time.”
One of her plans would be the creation of mobile offices that can pop up throughout the county at public places, such as libraries, so residents would be able have certain services performed without the need to drive to Canandaigua.
A second plan would be the offering of more services online. According to Yockel, not only would this make filing documents easier, but also create a digital record.
She is running against Heidi Barend-Guerrie with a primary scheduled for June 27th.