Dirk Lammes backed by Murray GOP to be highway superintendent
MURRAY – The Murray Republican Committee has endorsed Dirk Lammes to be the town’s next highway superintendent.
Lammes currently owns Lammes Construction and works with municipalities with waterline repairs. His company also does snowplowing in the winters.
Ed Morgan, the Murray highway superintendent for 30 years, resigned on May 31.
That came too late in the normal endorsement and petition process, which is done in the spring.
Lammes will be on the November ballot as the Republican candidate for a one-year term. Next year there will be the normal election process for a full term. (Lammes also has been endorsed by the Conservative Party.)
The Murray Republican’s Committee to Fill Vacancies met on July 11 and interviewed three candidates. David Nenni, the Holley DPW superintendent, and Orleans County Sheriff’s Deputy Jim DeFilipps also were interested in the position.
Lammes, 52, has been doing emergency waterline repairs for municipalities since 2001, mainly in the Town of Irondequoit. He also has a contract in the Town of Henrietta.
He purchased his first backhoe when he was 18, doing construction work on his own, while working full-time with his father with construction work in Rochester.
If he is elected highway superintendent, Lammes said he would step back from his business which would be run by his nephew and son.
He has been plowing snow for more than three decades.
“It’s not like it’s new to me,” he said.
Lammes, a youth baseball coach the past 10 years, said he welcomes the chance to work closer to home.
“I like a challenge and the work is interesting to me,” he said. “I look forward to working with everybody. I’m not looking to reinvent the wheel. But if there are things we can improve on I will do it.”
The Highway Department is currently led by Deputy Highway Superintendent Louise Passarell with Dennis Mandigo, the senior highway employee, in charge of water.
