WILTON – Two candidates – state Rep. Thomas Saviello and professor Michael Burke – are vying for a seat on the Board of Selectmen.

Saviello, 59, is an independent who will be termed out of the Legislature next year. He has served on the Board of Selectmen twice before.

Burke, 56, is a Democrat who teaches English at Colby College in Waterville.

Saviello says he has not made a decision about his next step, politically.

“I enjoy serving the community I live in,” he said. “My goal is simply to make the town better. This is my way to continue to serve the people of Wilton regardless of my future decision.”

Burke, who moved to Wilton in 1987, remembers the “unusually blessed place, in many ways,” that Wilton was at that time. The problems that have plagued Wilton since are something he wants to keep working on.

“I’m not smarter or wiser than anyone else, but I do want to keep hammering at what I see as the problems of Wilton: a downtown that doesn’t work, the lack of jobs for residents, the environment and the reasons there is so much poverty in town,” Burke said.

He said he believes new ideas and new people are needed to help run a town or any entity.

“The people who have been on the board are all, as far as I know, smart, dedicated folks, but public and elected officials can’t and shouldn’t be the same folks all the time … new people have to be willing to help out, and be given a chance to,” he said.

Burke was the director of the Honors Program at the University of Maine at Farmington for 10 years. He’s the president of a statewide union for faculty in the University of Maine System and a writer who anticipates his third book will be out next spring.

Saviello moved to Maine in 1972 to pursue a master’s degree in agronomy at the University of Maine. He stayed and earned a doctorate in forest resources in 1978.

He became the manager of environment for International Paper in 1991 and continues to work for the mill, now Verso, but anticipates retiring next year, he said.

He also teaches, as an adjunct professor, at the University of Maine at Farmington.

“If elected, I do believe I can bring my experience and contacts at the state and federal level to help the town,” Saviello said. “I have no agenda as a selectman. My goal is simply to make the town better.”

In other election matters, SAD 9 school board director Angie LeClair is running unopposed for re-election, Town Clerk Linda Jellison said.

She said voters will decide on a replacement for the Board of Selectmen seat vacated by Norm Gould prior to the June 15 town meeting.