Election Guide 2017

Election Guide 2017

Tracey Edwards

Mark Cuthbertson

Michael Raspantini

Chad Lupinacci

James Leonick

Emily Rogan

John Clark

Kevin Orelli

Ed Smyth

2017

ELECTION

Vote on Nov. 7

Election Guide 2017

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THE LONG-ISLANDER • OCTOBER 26, 2017 • A9

Huntington Highway Superintendent

John Clark

Kevin Orelli

(R,C,I)

(D,G,WF,WE,Ref)

Q: What experience do you have that makes you best equipped to serve as Huntington’s Superintendent of Highways?

Q: What experience do you have that makes you best equipped to serve as Huntington’s Superintendent of Highways?

A: “The highway department is a big job. Between operating budgets, money that it gets from the state in CHIPS [Consolidated Local Street and Highway Improvement Program] and also capital expenditure money, it has close to a $40 million annual budget… I worked for one of the largest privately held asset management companies in the U.S.; I was a managing director, chief administrative officer and the director of operations. I ran $50- and $60-million budgets, and I’ve had 600 people reporting to me… I also served for a nine-month period as Deputy Superintendent of Highways, so I know the job and day one when I take over I can hit the ground running.”

A: “I’ve been in the excavation and storm drainage business for essentially my whole life. I started plowing snow for the town as a teenager. I’ve done some large projects throughout Long Island… Many of the projects included subdivisions that involved building roads, installing storm drains, installing storm sewers and installing sanitary sewers; so I’ve actually done the work that the Highway Department does as a living. I’m a member of Local 138 of the Operating Engineers, and the members of our local have constructed nearly every major roadway on Long Island.”

Q: What do you feel are the three most important functions of the Highway Department?

A: “There’s 840 miles of roadway in Huntington that needs to be repaired and reconstructed. I think the number one thing has to be improving road surfaces. Right now we can only properly reconstruct about 22 miles a year of roadway. When you do the math on 840 miles of roadway, it tells you that it takes about 38 years to do all of the roadways… One of the other issues is clearing the roads during storms; we need to do a better job of clearing the roads of ice and snow… The other big thing is the trees that are maintained in the highway. There are probably 200,000 trees in the right of way, and those trees need to be pruned, and in many cases removed and the roots ground down because the sidewalks underneath are just buckling.”

Q: How would you describe the state of the roadway infrastructure in the Town of Huntington? If elected, how would you update and strengthen it?

A: “The better question is: what is the solution? When you look at the roadways and you look at the budget from a capital budget perspective there’s only about $2.2 million that goes into road rehabilitation and road reconstruction… That is a really substandard number. If you look at the combined capital and operating budget, it’s really only 5 or 6 percent of our budget that goes to road reconstruction. We need to reallocate more money from within the town to take care of what is a crumbling infrastructure.”

Q: If elected, how would you propose to update the Highway Department’s information systems and strengthen communication with residents, especially during emergencies?

A: “I was responsible for customer service in my former role, and I ran the customer service division. We need to use CRMs [Client Relationship Management systems]. The Town of Huntington has one, it’s called Qalert, and it’s a system that allows us to capture every type of resident request — whether that is a call in, they walk in the office or they go on the town website to enter the information. Qalert captures all of the resident requests, it allows us to date those, it allows us to prioritize those requests and it allows us to categorize those requests…You can use these CRM systems to allow you to work smarter on the customer requests, and get back to people as well. That’s what people want, an expectation of when they can see some type of results.”

Q: Water pollution is a significant environmental concern for the Town of Huntington. What can the Highway Department do to ensure that drainage systems also provide environmental safeguards for our harbors and bays?

A: “The Highway Department does put in drainage on the roadways, so especially on roadways that have a very high pitch to them where water runoff is significant the Highway Department needs to put in more drains in those areas so we capture the water before it gets down to the flat areas near the watershed… Two things I would do: I would increase the amount of resources to clean out our existing drains, and I would work to put in more drainage and better technology drainage.

Fabco makes a drain with an insert that catches a lot of the debris that causes the toxins to be released into the waterways.”

Q: What do you feel are the three most important functions of the Highway Department?

A: “The most critical thing that the Highway Department does is snow plowing and snow removal. If an ambulance can’t get down the street or you can’t get to work, it could be life-threatening…Storm response and hurricane response are probably the next most important things. Our ability to respond to storms and trees falling down on wires, these are the things we need to be prepared for. I intend to coordinate with PSEG and try to get some training for our men on how to deal with downed trees in wires. The third thing that the Highway Department does is general pothole repairs, paving repairs, repaving our roads and keeping our roads in a safe and efficient state.”

Q: How would you describe the state of the roadway infrastructure in the Town of Huntington? If elected, how would you update and strengthen it?

A: “Depending on where you go, you have different responses from different people…

I can tell you the roads are probably typical of most places where we have 800 miles of road and it is difficult to keep them in repair. Generally speaking, the state of our roads in Huntington are fair-to-midline. One way I think we can strengthen it is by implementing more innovative paving techniques — we can do some reclamation of some existing roads. There are processes for doing cold in-place recycling of the roads. There is equipment out there that mills the road, mixes it with an emulsion and repaves the roads with the millings in one process… I would look at innovative ways to do the same work but in a more cost effective way.”

Q: If elected, how would you propose to update the Highway Department’s information systems and strengthen communication with residents, especially during emergencies?

A: “I’ve been told that they have actually done that already… The foremen have iPads with which they can receive information instantly about the situations that have to be responded to, and it’s tracked on their system… I’m going to look into if there is anything further that can be done... Whether the manpower is being allocated to do that is maybe another issue, but I think the town has the technology in place right now to respond quickly and efficiently to any residents that call. From what I understand, the call goes into one center and is rerouted to the garage responsible for that area. From there, the call is routed to the foreman who is in that particular neighborhood.”

Q: Water pollution is a significant environmental concern for the Town of Huntington. What can the Highway Department do to ensure that drainage systems also provide environmental safeguards for our harbors and bays?

A: “One of the things we can do is add additional catch basins to capture the water before it travels far enough to reach our harbors and bays. We want to capture as much water up stream before it gets into our waterways. We can also employ filtering systems for our catch basins that are piped directly into our harbors. There are many locations where we have culverts that go directly into the harbors, the Mill Pond in Centerport or many other locations; in those places we can add a filtering system that takes out hydrocarbons and other pollutants before they actually get in the water.”

Election Guide 2017

A10 • THE LONG-ISLANDER • OCTOBER 26, 2017

Tracey Edwards (D,G,WF,I,WE)

L o n g I s l a n de r N e w s . c o m

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What makes you different from the other candidates running for Huntington Town Supervisor?

What would you, as town supervisor, do to stimulate the local economy and encourage job growth in Huntington?

What is the town’s role in improving quality of life and public safety, especially in the areas most affected by crime?

“I really think that all of my experiences and background have prepared me for this point. I’m not a career politician, I’m a business person who was at Verizon for 37 years. I have an eye for customer service. I’ve been fortunate enough to have the best financial results in the state and the best customer service results in the country. I’ve managed a budget much larger than the town – $190 million versus $220 million; 703 full-time employees whereas I’ve managed 3,800. I’ve had large responsibility. I saved the company millions and millions of dollars just by innovation… I like to try different stuff. My business acumen is ready for it. I have also been chair of the planning board, was on the school board for 10 years and then have a civil rights, community service background that I get from my parents, both of them, in different ways. Plus, I’ve been there [on the town board] for three and a half years… I think if I put all those experiences together I’m ready to take this spot. I can go in there and make substantive changes right away. I don’t need a transition team.”

“What we’ve been able to do is really on the community development side and a tweak on economic development. I was proud to spearhead the Huntington Opportunity Resource Center. One of the things that we do is talk to the businesses about forecasting for jobs so we can partner with the St. Joseph’s and other community colleges to be job and skill ready for businesses two-to-five years out. So we’ve been doing it on an employment level. That is a benefit, economic development, but we can do it both ways. One of the things I’m concerned about is, if you look at the Quadrangle, it used to be occupied by much larger businesses, they would take floors of the entire building. They started to migrate from Manhattan after 9/11 and then again after Superstorm Sandy so the average square footage they are really renting now is around 5,000. I’m surprised they were able to survive this long, but I’m not sure that it’s sustainable. We definitely have to do more there.

And we also have to care for the businesses down in the village to find out what’s going on there.”

“I do think we should have a dedicated public safety force – we have it, but we don’t have it in conjunction with the police department… On park rangers, I want them to be the eyes and ears of the police department; we have intelligence to give to them. I think we could do better from a code enforcement standpoint if we’re working with the civic associations and community leaders to identify problem areas… Currently we do investigation by complaints. I want [state] resources to put into public safety and investigations because I think we could be more proactive versus reactive.”

“Both my experience being on the school board for nine years and having dealt with budgets of at least $120 million, 6,000 students and 800 employees; or whether it’s been at the state level for almost six years helping to create budgets of $150 billion and dealing with policies that affect thousands upon thousands of employees throughout New York State. I think bringing those two experiences would be a great asset to the town. In addition, using my outside knowledge to bring common sense reform to town hall is what’s needed right now and what the residents of Huntington want.”

“We want to make sure we retain existing jobs here, and we also want to bring more jobs to the area. We are going to appoint a jobs and business tsar to help serve as liaison to the business community; that is going to be one of the first things we are going to do… We are going to control taxes and cut fees. We are not going to pierce the tax cap like the town board did last year, and we are going to streamline the permitting process to make sure that businesses don’t get turned away from the area, but are welcomed to the area so we are actually a partner with the businesses and not a barrier to them.”

“The town has to work along with all of the levels of government to make sure that they coordinate the efforts of their public safety department, but they have to work along more with the Suffolk County Police Department, the state police and all federal police. They have to help coordinate the efforts with their public safety officers so they can see hotspots in the area, and help coordinate that information with the local police department. If they know there are hotspots for heroin or hot spots for gang activity, they need to make sure they coordinate this information with the police department… We need to beef up our public safety units, and also our code enforcement bureaus; so if we see people abusing their permits or liquor license they need to report this to the official that are in charge of this so they can investigate and decide whether or not they deserve these types of licenses.”

“I am a 100 percent independent candidate, which means I am not politically affiliated and can be the only one to work 100 percent for the people all of the time outside of party loyalties…

I am also the only entrepreneur. Both of my opponents do not have entrepreneurial experience, and people say that the entrepreneur has the hardest job there is because you are generating all of your own income. You really do need to be creative, and that experience alone sets me apart from my opponents.”

“I would take a look at the fee requirements that the town presently puts on businesses, both small businesses and large businesses, and find out why we have such a difficult process for business owners to be able to operate. The first thing I would do is streamline that process and make sure business owners have an easier time operating their businesses. We are going to be offering business incentives to come into Huntington, that’s more for the large corporations… It’s really going to be dependent upon what taxes they can save… To stimulate the local economy we really have to work directly with local business owners and entrepreneurs.”

“The town really needs to listen to support the civic groups and the individuals that come together to fight these problems that we have in crime ridden areas. We need to be better engaged with our local police. We need to be able to develop a task force at the town level to combat gang issues and drug issues… Right now I don’t see the town playing an active role; I think that partnering with private companies and building more housing is not addressing the problem. In order for us to address the problem we must work directly with the civics, and we must develop a task force partnering with Suffolk police, as well as bringing in specialized police officers who specialize in gang control and drug trafficking.”

Chad Lupinacci (R,C,Ref)

Michael Raspantini (End Corruption in Huntington)

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THE LONG-ISLANDER • OCTOBER 26, 2017 • A11

Huntington Supervisor

What is the biggest issue that must be addressed to ensure Huntington is successful over the next 20 years? How would you address it?

“There really isn’t one issue. It’s such a big town. The overall issues are public safety, water quality and taxes, but after those core things it depends where you live. That’s why I’m the one for this job. I know what the issues are depending on where you live. I’m having meet and greets all around town and it’s interesting to find out what people are most concerned about.”

Efforts to build a Huntington village parking garage are in their third iteration. Do you believe a parking garage is necessary? Or are there other solutions to ease parking that have not yet been implemented? If so, like what?

“We need the spaces, no question, but I think we need to be strategic… Out west they have these roof gardens so that it [a parking garage] aesthetically doesn’t just look like brick and mortar. I think we could really do a nice job in the village on putting in a parking garage. On height, I think it depends [on location]. If we’re going to do it on Gerard then it has to be two. If we were going [to Elm Street], because of the slope, then it could be three. What you don’t want to do is make it so high that you can’t see businesses. You can’t block them out. We have to be very careful because we don’t want anybody to lose businesses because people don’t know they’re there… If we do a lower parking garage, but we get 100 cars out of the village by getting merchants to start a some sort of rewards program for employees [who park offsite], then that would make up for the height of the garage.”

“Public safety is huge; we need to make sure we have a law enforcement official who is in charge of our department of public safety, and we need to make sure that we help with the heroin crisis, and also get rid of the gang activity. The safer we make our communities, the more jobs and businesses that will bring to the area. We want to make sure that we maintain existing jobs, and of course bring new jobs to the area… people are going to want to live close to work, and I think that is where we’ll really see the development flow: when you have jobs in the community, when you having housing options in the community and you have walkable vibrant downtown areas, then the community interacts and thrives together.”

“You definitely need a parking structure to help ease parking, that’s for sure.

The second thing you can use is modern technology, like creating a ‘Park Huntington’ app that people who have smart phones can download and see which parking spaces are open during peak time. The third thing is we want to make sure we expand off street parking for the larger businesses for their employees in the downtown areas… I think we could really expand on those opportunities to help free up spaces.”

“We are a beautiful community; we have so many different areas in Huntington, diverse neighborhoods. We are only as strong as our weakest link, and right now the weakest link that we have in our community is the Huntington Station community. The biggest issue that we face is the issue with crime, with gangs, drugs and the opioid epidemic that’s affecting our youth. Beyond that, the youth is really where we need to focus because the youth need to be able to afford to live and work here…We have to treat all of the concerns as the number one biggest concern because there are others that are equally as important… If Huntington Station is not doing well, riddled with crime, riddled with gangs, people having a problem walking the streets and feeling safe that’s a very large concern.”

“I certainly believe that we need to look at a parking structure, and consider putting one into the village because that seems to be our only hope at this juncture to alleviate the parking problem that we have in town. I don’t believe the present government has been successful in putting up their trolley effort to get town employees and business people to park up at the train station parking lot and be bussed down to the village; that was a failure. We already tried that, and at this juncture we do require a structure.”

As the town’s chief fiscal officer, what are your plans for drafting future budgets to keep Huntington financially stable?

“We do have to consolidate, but we can’t do it in the building department. I want to create different ‘swim lanes,’ residential, commercial and transformational, to make permitting fast. But you can’t do that by cutting people [staffers]. I don’t necessarily want to, from a budget perspective, focus on cutting. I want to focus on how we bring more revenue into it. There are a lot of untapped grants that are out there.”

Huntington Supervisor Candidates At A Glance Editor’s note: Each candidate was asked these same five questions on local issues and talking points. Each candidate was then asked to give a general, one-word stance on each issue without opportunity for further elaboration.

Here are t heir responses:

Are you for or against term limits in any form?

Tracey Edwards: For Chad Lupinacci: For Michael Raspantini: For

“We don’t want to pierce the tax cap like the town board did last year, because that affected their tax rates by going up substantially, but also by the residents losing a refund check for the town portion of their taxes. We need to look at all efficiencies and shared services, along with the county government and our school districts. In addition to that, we need to make sure that we look at all positions appointed by the town supervisor to see where we can eliminate the waste there… Also looking at bringing in new sources of revenue… Instead of increasing fees or increasing taxes, look at corporate sponsorships on certain things, not outsourcing, but actually advertising rights where we could bring in new streams of money.”

“The first thing that is crucial is trimming the fat on the governmental level.

We need to take a look at all of the appointed deputy positions, and find out how we can, number one, eliminate some of these positions, and, two, consolidate some of these positions with other directorial positions in these various departments… We need to look at that first to find out are these individuals necessary, and can we first trim down on staffing to see if we can close that $2 million revolving budget deficit…I do believe that in my first year I will be able to close that deficit just by looking at the budget now and the staffing expenditures… I will be approaching the budget from a zero base budgeting standpoint, which means we will be starting out just on what is required and building around that.”

Are you for or against putting all town contracts online and publically available by 2020?

Tracey Edwards: For Chad Lupinacci: For Michael Raspantini: For

Are you for or against a Huntington village parking garage taller than two stories?

Tracey Edwards: For Chad Lupinacci: For Michael Raspantini: For

Are you for or against a short-term moratorium on all building in Huntington village?

Tracey Edwards: Against Chad Lupinacci: Against Michael Raspantini: For

Are you for or against amending ZBA guidelines to not allow any new structures taller than 25 feet in Huntington village?

Tracey Edwards: Against Chad Lupinacci: For Michael Raspantini: For

Election Guide 2017

A12 • THE LONG-ISLANDER • OCTOBER 26, 2017

Mark Cuthbertson (D,G,WF,I,WE) [Incumbent]

James Leonick (R,C,Ref)

Emily Rogan (D,G,WF,WE)

Ed Smyth (R,C,I,Ref)

L o n g I s l a n de r N e w s . c o m

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What makes you differ as a candidate from your opponents?

What would you, as a member of town council, do to stimulate the local economy and encourage job growth in town?

What is the town’s role in improving quality of life and public safety, especially in the areas most affected by crime?

“For better or worse, I have a lot of experience in this job. I have a lot of institutional knowledge, starting as a planning board member, then as assistant town attorney and evolving into a town board member. I’ve sat through hundreds of public hearings and made difficult, controversial decision over the years. I think what does make me different in that respect is I’m not afraid to make the tough decisions.

When you first get into office there is the inclination to say, ‘I don’t want to make anyone angry.’ That instinct gets in the way of doing some big picture things.”

“When we find a company that wants to do business here we roll out the red carpet. We did that with Canon. They were going to move to New Jersey, but Huntington was the last stop… and we put forward an intensive effort to attract them. We do that by working with the chamber of commerce and doing outreach to businesses in the Melville Employment Center. One of the ways we encourage job growth is to have mixed-use buildings in the downtowns and hamlet areas, where people are living, potentially working there and visiting the stores.”

“It’s significant, but secondary. The primary mover is our police and we assist them because there are certain codes under our jurisdiction that can supplement their efforts when it comes to public safety. We often will team with police for search warrants when there are building code violations. They’ll get liquor law complaints and we’ll go in with the fire marshals to supplement that by looking at the occupancy limits.

We work hand in glove. I think a new facet of this are our park rangers, many of whom are retired police officers, who are licensed to carry firearms, close the parks and patrol – they’re really the eyes and ears of the town.”

“One of the biggest things we can do is help redevelop the 110 Corridor – to bring businesses back there, fill the office space and bring good-paying jobs to the area that will help to keep young people in the area and revitalize it. That will help the town as a whole.

If we don’t give a shot in the arm to that area, we’re going to lose money from the tax base if business and property owners default on buildings that are vacant. If we keep them busy, fill them up and expand them a bit, we’ll increase the tax base and bring more money in.”

“It’s tremendous. The quality of life, including issues of crime and drug, are among the top issues that I hear residents talk about. The town and the town board have an obligation to do whatever they can to address those things through cooperation with state and local policing authorities by utilizing to our fullest extent our code enforcement personnel, creating civic support through neighborhood watch groups and having community involvement to create a dialogue about what needs to be addressed.”

“I have a broad background that encompasses professional life, and both community and public service. I think that gives me a wealth that is not matched by the other candidates. I have a background of 20+ years as a self-employed business owner, almost 30 years as an attorney and I’ve been a New York State arbitrator for tax grievances, an adjunct college professor, co-op board president and I have six or eight volunteer and nonprofit organizations, including Boy Scouts, Rotary and Chamber of Commerce... that I’ve been involved in. I think that shows I’m not just one sided. I have a lot of life experience as well as community experience.”

“First of all, I’m the only woman running.

Also, apart from Mark, who is an incumbent, I’m the only one with governance experience as I’ve been elected four times to a school board.

I have experience running meetings because I was board president for four years, helping a community navigate divisive and contentious issues, and understanding Robert’s Rules of Order and the open meetings laws. I’ve also been engaged in town hall issues in terms of being a community member. I can’t speak for my opponents, but I’ve been going to town board meetings for years.”

“I would want to try to get together with some of the folks who are already open for business here and find out from them what’s working, what’s not working and why… One of the issues not particular to Huntington, but to local economies everywhere is that small businesses are up against big box stores and online businesses, so it’s harder for them to be able to stay in business. So the very first thing I’d want to do is ask folks to come together in an informal setting and just share with me some of the things that work for them and some that don’t. We can come up with an action plan… and open that relationship with local merchants.”

“I get results. I’m somebody that if given a problem, resources and time I make problems go away. I’ve been doing that for 20 years as a lawyer. I did it as a staff sergeant in the Marine Corps Reserve. It’s just what I do.”

“I would get the town out of the way of business. I would also encourage business to resettle in Huntington whenever possible. And I would proactively reach out to them. If it’s a corporate business, move to the Huntington 110 Corridor. If it’s retail, take a store in Huntington. But, as an elected official, I would go to them. And when they say, ‘Why?,’ I would say, ‘Because when you’re in Huntington and you have a problem, you call me first and I’ll make the problem go away.’ If there’s a crime problem near your business, obviously if it’s not an emergency, call me and I’ll call the police department. That kind of proactive governing is something business owners clamor for… Just roll out the red carpet for big and small business, and show them why… If elected I will proactively go out to the business community around the metropolitan area and do what I can to persuade them to move their business to Huntington.”

“The town has to play a role in terms of working with the Suffolk County Police Department. One of the things I’ve learned about the district of the school board I sit on is that it covers some of the areas that have been impacted more heavily by crime over the years. Some of the things we’ve been able to do, and what I would do as a town board member, is facilitate relationship building and partnerships with the agencies responsible for law enforcement. What I would love to be able to talk to law enforcement about is getting back to having beat cops; it has worked really well. SCPD has done a great job to reach out to our communities and improve relationships… The other thing I’d want to do is get back to helping folks set up neighborhood watch groups. Some areas have them and they’ve been effective. I think getting community members across the town involved and engaged in their local neighborhoods is a great way to help support that effort as well.”

“I think the town’s role is essential. One of the key roles of government at any level is public safety, specifically, whether it’s through increased public safety patrols, coordination with the 2nd Precinct and/or bay constables on the water. We need more outreach for anti-gang and anti-drug initiatives. These things need to be down even further than the high and middle levels, but into the grade school levels.”

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THE LONG-ISLANDER • OCTOBER 26, 2017 • A13

Huntington Town Council What is the biggest issue that must be addressed to ensure Huntington is successful over the next 20 years? How would you address it?

Efforts to build a Huntington village parking garage are in their third iteration. Do you believe a parking garage is necessary? Or are there other solutions to ease parking that have not yet been implemented? If so, like what?

“It’s having housing that meets the needs of two important groups: seniors and young people. I don’t think the current suburban cul-desac layout fits the needs well enough of those two groups.... There are people in that [older] age group who just live in too much house and people who are younger and just don’t want that sort of house. So, to keep us going long term, we’ve got to meet their needs. There is a sweet spot of smaller homes that I don’t think anybody in suburbia has explored.”

“We’re at the point where we probably need a parking garage.

I’m a little reluctant to say that because if 10 or 15 years from now we have driverless cars, we’re not going to need a parking garage.

If I have a driverless car and it takes me to Jonathan’s, my car doesn’t have to park downtown, it could go to an outlying area…

But that’s a little futuristic. The other methods that we haven’t exhausted fully are we’ve acquired property and built parking lots…We’ve also had a prominent national company conduct a parking study and try to maximize parking with signage and other things. I’m not going to say we’ve exhausted all other efforts, but we have certainly tried and it looks like we’re heading to the need to build a parking garage. The problem with it is obviously the cost and the way the governor’s tax cap works.”

Town Council Candidates At A Glance Editor’s note: Each candidate was asked these same five questions on local issues and talking points. Each candidate was then asked to give a general, one-word stance on each issue without opportunity for further elaboration.

Here are their responses:

Are you for or against term limits in any form?

“Water issues, whether we’re talking about septic waste, drinking water or the waterfront, I think that all the issues involving water and the impact upon water by development is the single biggest issue. If we work together and come up with a comprehensive plan to address these issues for the entire town, it will help the town to be productive and successful in various areas over the next 20 years. We have a lot of waterfront communities. Many of those homes and businesses are not connected to sewers; they have cesspools. I think they should be connected to sewers. We should expand sewering along the waterfront areas. We need to improve the stormwater runoff that goes into the harbors and bays by reducing the flow, filtering it and by keeping water from infiltrating the sewer system. We also need to come up with a viable plan to reduce the amount of nitrogen that’s put into the ground and ends up in stormwater runoff.”

“I do think a parking garage is necessary, however I don’t think it’s the only solution. As quickly as we can get a garage up, it’s going to fill up. The development projects already slated and that have been approved will increase traffic and the need for parking.

The growth of village will continue to put demands on parking so I think we need something else besides a parking garage. I don’t think we want to fill the village with multiple parking garages, but it would be great if we could locate an area on the perimeter of the village where we could have shuttle service back and forth – something tasteful, similar to the trolleys for wineries on the North Fork that bring people back and forth during the high traffic times.”

“It’s really easy to focus on some of the issues that have to be addressed, but generally people like being here and we’re fiscally in really good shape… The biggest thing is finding the balance between sustaining and protecting land use, but at same time, not stifling economic growth and development where appropriate… We also need to think about things like where younger people are going to live. A lot of millennials don’t want to own a home and a car. The idea of the American dream is different than it was a long time ago. We can’t go backwards, we need to go forward and the way to do that is to have good conversations with everybody, not leaving any particular groups behind.”

“I do think we need a parking garage, but that’s not the only solution. We can come up with some other ideas of how to alleviate both parking and traffic issues. In California they use [smartphone] apps… through which you can see where parking is open, prepay for it and use a credit card or cash. We need to look a little outside the box for other opportunities… We should look into having some employees park offsite and use a shuttle service to take them to work and back to where their cars are so that there is more parking for local folks. I’d also love to look into designating some 15-minute spots for folks who need to run quick to grab a pizza or medicine and go home. Those are all ideas that can help, but I don’t think we can dismiss garage... We just have to be creative with how we approach it. The parking garage doesn’t have to be nasty looking brick and mortar, or a steel beam structure. We can look at something that is aesthetically pleasing… and goes along with the rest of the look and feel of the town.”

“Taxes. The tax issue in Huntington is a perennial problem. We have to get town spending under control. We have to make the town government more efficient. Overall, the structural governance of the town is due for an overhaul. For example, transportation and traffic safety seem like they might be a good fit in the highway department…

I recognize the fact that the vast majority of the town’s budget at this point is non-discretionary. There is very little of the spending the town board has discretion on, but the small portion that is discretionary is something we’ll take a hard look at and try to reduce.”

“I believe a parking garage is necessary. The exact placement or design certainly remains to be seen. As far as paying for it, the estimates I’ve heard are anywhere between $16 million-$20 million. There are various ways it can and should be paid for, one of which would be a public-private partnership where a parking company comes in, builds and operates it. The downside to that is you now have paid parking, but the upside is the town doesn’t have to shell out $20 million to buy a garage. The other option is to have the developers that are coming into the town on these projects that have already been greenlighted, instead of affordable housing component, put in a parking component — make them put in a contribution to a parking fund. Secondly, I wouldn’t sell off the town’s existing parking spaces, which the current town board did.”

Mark Cuthbertson: For James Leonick: For Emily Rogan: For Ed Smyth: For

Are you for or against putting all town contracts online and publically available by 2020?

Mark Cuthbertson: For James Leonick: For Emily Rogan: For Ed Smyth: For

Are you for or against a Huntington village parking garage taller than two stories?

Mark Cuthbertson: For James Leonick: Against Emily Rogan: For Ed Smyth: For

Are you for or against a short-term moratorium on all building in Huntington village?

Mark Cuthbertson: Against James Leonick: Against Emily Rogan: Against Ed Smyth: Against

Are you for or against amending ZBA guidelines to not allow any new structures taller than 25 feet in Huntington village?

Mark Cuthbertson: Against James Leonick: Against Emily Rogan: Against Ed Smyth: Against