Breaking down the Riverhead school vote

The Riverhead Central School District’s budget proposal passed 1,520 to 1,252 on Tuesday.

Though the voter turnout was about the same as last year’s vote, the results were much closer than in 2012, when the budget passed by nearly 700 votes.

Voters cast their ballots at four polling locations across the Riverhead area: Aquebogue Elementary School, Phillips Avenue Elementary School, Riley Avenue Elementary School and Riverhead High School.

Of the four voting locations, only a majority of Phillips Avenue voters cast ballots against the budget. Most absentee voters also voted no.

The biggest margin of victory for the budget proposal was at Aquebogue Elementary School, where about 63 percent of voters favored the budget.

There were two related propositions on the ballot. One was a proposal to establish a capital reserve fund to help build a new school bus maintenance facility. The other involved a plan to buy property in Riverside to help establish the facility.

While the first proposal was accepted, the proposition to buy the Riverside properties was defeated.

Phillips Avenue voters rejected both propositions by wide margins, while the land-buy proposal only found support at the Riley Avenue polls, where it came ahead by a single vote.

Newcomer to the board Chris Dorr took home most of the votes in two of the four polling places, raking in 423 votes in Aquebogue and 209 votes at Phillips Avenue. He came in second at the high school polling place by six votes, and only came in last at Riley Avenue.

Board member Amelia Lantz won re-election, while incumbent Jeff Falisi was voted out of office.

For a full breakdown of the vote results by polling place, see below: