NORWICH – After 19 years and a half years of serving Chenango County, District Attorney Joseph McBride is scheduled to become a New York State Supreme Court justice, with First Assistant District Attorney Michael Ferrarese set to take the reigns.

After receiving the last of the absentee ballots Monday night, McBride is now officially scheduled to become a New York State Supreme Court Justice on January 1.

"I'm ready to move on to the next step in my career, and I look forward to serving the community – making sure the community's needs in supreme court get handled in a fair and efficient way," said McBride. "I'm going to be assigned to Tompkins County and Chenango County, but I won't officially start until January."

He said it's important that Chenango County keep the supreme court seat, and have someone to fill it from the area. He added that when that time comes, by law the first assistant district attorney becomes acting district attorney for the remainder of the term.

"In professional lives there comes a time to hand the baton to somebody else, and its my pleasure to hand the baton to Mr. Ferrarese," said McBride.

He said Ferrarese has a long history of working with the district attorney's office, an excellent work ethic, a good sense of justice, and he believes the office is going to be fine with Ferrarese in charge regardless of the obstacles.