Nye County school board gets 2 new members

The Nye County School District Board of Trustees will have two new additions starting in 2019.

Pahrump residents Sean Hastings and Mark Owens each won a seat during the 2018 general election in early November in the nonpartisan race. Hastings won the Area 5 seat in Pahrump and Owens won the Area 3 seat on Nov. 6.

“I am very grateful for everyone that supported and voted for me during this general-election period,” Hastings said in an email. “What an exciting time. I am thrilled for this new opportunity and challenge laid before me.”

Owens also gave a statement to his voters following his win.

“I’m excited about the win and appreciate the confidence that the voters had in me and I look forward to serving the community as a school board member,” said Owens in an email.

Owens defeated Donald Rust with more than 67 percent of the vote and got 1,331 votes in the Area 3 race. Hastings got more than 68 percent of the vote and got 1,913 votes against his opponent Tawna Yazzie’s 864 votes.

The two candidates spoke about some of their ideas for the school board.

Owens said he would like to “work with the Nye County Sheriff’s Office to enhance security at the schools to protect the students,” he said in an email.

Owens is also hoping to work with the Nye County School District on improving the district’s student state and national academic rankings and enhancing the Career Technical Education (CTE) program throughout the district’s entirety.

Hastings, who said he is new to politics, said knows “there are many challenges facing our school district, such as school safety, student testing performance, and parent/teacher communication, just to name a few. I believe it will take strong leadership skills to listen, understand, assess and guide our school district towards becoming better. We can always do better I don’t like status quo and never will.”

Hastings said during his term he promises “to strive to do what I can to help guide our students, parents, and school faculty and staff toward becoming better. I will always listen to the concerns, new ideas and challenges that come my way, carefully weigh out all sides and do my best to educate myself and our board members before making any sort of final decision.”

Hastings is a 13-year resident of Pahrump and several of his children are in or have graduated from Nye County’s public school system. He is a general manager of Affiliated Physical Therapy in Pahrump and also travels to Las Vegas, where he manages two other locations for the company.

Owens has lived in Pahrump for 27 years and is retiring after four decades of work as a senior engineering associate for a national lab at the Nevada National Security Site.

Other races were decided for school board as well.

During the primaries, Nye County Manager Tim Sutton ran unopposed in Area 7 for a seat he currently holds. Roger Morones also ran unopposed in Area 1. Both candidates were put on the ballot during the 2018 primaries as a formality and declared elected at that time.

Contact reporter Jeffrey Meehan at jmeehan@pvtimes.com. On Twitter: @pvtimes