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Riverhead Town Board candidates square off at News-Review debate

Neil Krupnick
Neil Krupnick

How will the town be in a position financially to start paying off its looming CPF debt in coming years while building up its reserves? What will you do to improve the town’s financial standing?

Neil Krupnick: “The board should have gone to Albany and lobbied to refinance the CPF fund at a much more attractive rate. We’re paying way too much … The board had an opportunity to make a deal over at EPCAL for solar two years ago, which would have brought $18 million in income to this town and lowered our debt … Recently, the Parks Department and the Senior Department decided they are going to combine, and that idea will save the town $800,000.”

Tim Hubbard: “Part of the problem is we need to bring more revenue into the town. One way we can do that is beef up our code enforcement department, go out and hit illegal housing and illegal businesses. We can draw in some more revenue in that matter. We need to look at some more grants … Personally, I felt that the tax cap should have been pierced last year so we wouldn’t have as large of an increase this year.”

Laura Jens-Smith: “One of the other avenues we feel that would bring some revenue into the town is to do an accountability audit and see what our underperforming assets are in town. We have a highway department that’s located on Route 58 that may not need to be there. It may be more beneficial to the town to outsource our repairs and then to sell that property … It’s a really difficult position the town is in right now with this looming debt … I can’t stress enough the need that there was for this town board to go up to Albany and lobby to extend our CPF debt out … We need to become more efficient with the way we do business, and we need to strategize out for years to come, not just do our budget year by year.”

James Wooten: “There was no solar project two years ago at EPCAL, so I don’t even know where that comes from. Combining two departments is a saving of $100,000, not $800,000, but I guess if you throw it out there enough, it sticks … We did go to Albany. Not only did we go to Albany, but [Assemblyman] Fred Thiele assisted with that because you can’t extend a 30-year note on the CPF. You can’t extend it. Property law says the shelf life of real estate is 30 years. We went to change the law, and we did. We rewrote the law to say that any property that was bought with community preservation funds could be extended to a period of 50 years.”

Tim Hubbard: “There’s not enough acres up there [at EPCAL] to draw in $9 million a year, not to mention that PSEG and LIPA would also need to have a transfer station built up there … I ask people, please do your research and look at the facts.”

Has Route 58 been overdeveloped?

Tim Hubbard: “Route 58 has not been overdeveloped. With the tax money that’s coming in currently, we couldn’t replace that money. Our taxes now are high enough, but our taxes would really be high if we didn’t develop that land. On 11 parcels of land up on Route 58, we’re bringing in approximately $7 million a year in taxes … Where would we get that money from?”

Laura Jens-Smith: “It’s tax money in and tax money out … The town doesn’t do a cost-benefit analysis to the development that is happening on Route 58. While we may be bringing taxes in, how much are we putting out for our police department or fire department maintaining the infrastructure that supports those businesses there? It’s disingenuous to say it’s just bringing in tax dollars without any cost to the town at all … All development is not created equal. Smart development is what that town needs.”

Neil Krupnick: “We can’t change the past. Route 58 is Route 58. It is what it is. We made that deal, people thought that was going to be the end to all of our tax problems, and it didn’t turn out that way … We’re going to reach the saturation point. Everybody who drives down that road knows: when you pull onto it, you’re pulling into traffic.”

James Wooten: “Route 58 is not overdeveloped. Go back and read the master plan, and it calls for exactly what happened. You’re at the terminus of the Long Island Expressway, and that is really prime real estate for a commercial district. If you can’t find it in Riverhead, you can’t find it on the East End … My only flaw with Route 58 — and I pushed for this — I wish the county took time to do a better design on the road. I wish we had a meridian.”