Lehighton Area School Board unanimously appointed Lori Nothstein to the school board Monday evening. She fills the vacancy created as the result of the resignation of board director Thomas Zimmerman IV on March 24.

According to solicitor William Schwab, the school board had until April 23 to fill the vacancy.Following Zimmerman's resignation, the board voted to contact Nothstein to determine her interest in being appointed to the board for the remainder of Zimmerman's term.Nothstein ran for school board in 2013, but was defeated in the November general election by 146 votes."I'm in this to do what's right for the children, employees and taxpayers of Lehighton Area School District," said Nothstein."Mrs. Nothstein will be a great asset to the board not only by having another woman's perspective on what our students need, but also the approach of being fiscally responsible to our community," said director Rocky Ahner.After Nothstein was officially sworn into office, board President Gloria Bowman appointed her to serve on the Lehighton Area Memorial Library Board. In addition, director Larry Stern was appointed to the Building and Grounds Committee.In other business, the school board voted to authorize Schwab to take such actions as he believes necessary to obtain funds that are in a bank account with former Mahoning Township Tax Collector Richard Swarcheck which has the district's tax identification number associated with it at PNC Bank including litigation, if necessary."We've gotten no response from the former Mahoning Township tax collector until today," said Schwab. "This has been ongoing, but hopefully we don't need litigation."