Freeholder of The Year Goes To...

Union, NJ -- Union County Freeholder Vernell Wright was recently named 'Freeholder of the Year' by the New Jersey Association of Counties (NJAC) at their annual convention in Atlantic City.

Wright has been a resident of the Vauxhall section of Union Township for more than 50 years. She is in the first year of her second term on the Freeholder Board.

She had previously lived in South Carolina. After moving to Union she began her career as a Title I Teacher at Jefferson School in 1966.

Over the next 36 years she served in various positions in the Union Public Schools System. In 2005 she began serving as an adjunct faculty supervisor at Kean University until joining the Freeholder Board in 2012.

In her first term on the Freeholder Board (2012-2014), Freeholder Wright served as Chairman of the Policy and Administration Code Committee, as well as a member of the Homeland Security Committee, the Open Space, Recreation and Historic Preservation Committee, and the Policy and Administrative Code Committee.

She also served as liaison to several advisory boards including the Advisory Council on Aging, the Senior Citizen & Disabled Resident Transportation Advisory Board, the Commission on the Status of Women, the Youth Services Commission, the Commission on the Status of Women, and the Local Advisory Council on Alcoholism and Drug Abuse, among others.

(Photo provided: Freeholder Vice Chairman Sergio Granados, Freeholder Bette Jane Kowalski, Freeholder and NJAC Board of Director Member Vernell Wright, Freeholder Chairman Bruce Bergen and NJAC Executive Director John G. Donnadio)