Letters to the Editor
No respect
To the Editor:
There is no possible way I can even attempt to dignify Meredith Page’s letter to the Reporter (“Damage done,” June 12). I have been a member of St. Mary’s Church for 30 years and I do not recall ever coming across any “bad apples” — most disrespectful.
GEORGIANA KETCHAM
Shelter Island
Needed: Bold action
To the Editor:
I am dismayed to read that the town is considering building a substation near the Havens House. My first concern is about the actual need for the substation. It was reported that in November 2012 one of two cables from the North Fork failed, but that the second one and a third from the South Fork had adequate power to supply the Island. This substation project seems excessive in light of this information and with a $12 million price tag, very costly to ratepayers.
East Hampton Town has now made the commitment to have 100 percent of the town’s electricity needs met with renewable energy sources by 2020. It seems to me that if we want to address the concerns of power outages due to mega-storms linked to climate change, we need to get down to fundamental changes and find clean ways to address our energy requirements. That and serious conservation of energy usage will leave an Island and planet to future generations that is habitable.
East Hampton has made the change. Greenport School makes all of its electricity from the sun. Many individual homeowners and businesses have made the transition, and I am proud to say I am one of them. Having made more power than I use with the panels on my roof, over 5,000 kilowatts have gone out on the grid for others to use from clean renewable energy from the sun.
I hope the community and leaders of Shelter Island can take the same bold action as the Town of East Hampton and join in the commitment and installation of clean energy solutions to our present problems.
PENNY KERR
Shelter Island
Remembering last time
To the Editor:
I remember the Town Board work sessions concerning the proposed sale of my property behind O’s gas station to LIPA in or around July 23, 2008. The community was completely against the idea of the sale and what LIPA had envisioned. After the meeting, many people came up to tell me how livid they were. I couldn’t believe the hostility! I was getting phone calls, and Jack Murrin came to my house to make an offer on the back property that bordered his expansive lot. I couldn’t blame them, after thinking about the impact something like this would have on their health and well-being, let alone property values.
Quite honestly, I wasn’t prepared to be “the person” who made the substation possible. In the following days I did find another buyer and asked my lawyer to find a way to back out of the deal, which he accomplished.
Now, the town is doing the same exact thing but to many more people, as can be seen on the Google Earth pictures I enclosed [in a letter to the town] with little regard for the neighboring property owners. Re-read the articles that were written in the Reporter. I recall at one point the town attorney was asked by the board to look into a code change to make it nearly impossible for this to ever happen. An electric substation belongs in an industrial zone, not in the center of town.
I wonder if the health concerns of the town’s people are worth the income generated by renting/selling the property? One has to wonder why this same Town Board now accepts the idea when just a few years ago, and 1/16th of a mile down the road, it was so unacceptable.
A few more thoughts: Have we completely forgotten about the second transmission line promised to Shelter Island? There was a meeting with the utility company that no one seemed to know of and therefore was lightly attended, so Supervisor Dougherty commented that public opposition was essentially non-existent. Not true! You have done a great job of keeping this quiet.
Something of this magnitude should come up for a vote. Don’t mistake poor attendance for lack of opposition. This is the reason you were voted into office. Ask yourselves this simple question — would you want this in your backyard? To me it’s a simple decision.
This Town Board seems to be selling us out!
MARK LABROZZI
Shelter Island
A vote for Lee
To the Editor:
With the Republican congressional primary fast approaching on Tuesday, June 24, 2014, it is unfortunate that the negative attacks have obscured the fact that we have the opportunity to elect a man possessed of a sort of honor and dignity rarely seen in Washington today. Lee Zeldin has the potential to be not just a great legislator, but a statesman of a sort that we have not seen since Congress’s approval rating dropped below 15 percent. But since the good things that candidates do tends to get lost in the fray, let me give you some reasons to vote for Lee Zeldin.
After graduating from Albany Law School, Lee spent four years on active duty with the U.S. Army including as a military intelligence officer, federal prosecutor and military magistrate. In the summer of 2006, while assigned to the Army’s elite 82nd Airborne Division, Lee deployed to Iraq in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. In 2007, Lee returned home to his family and resumed his law practice. He remains in the Army Reserves, where he serves with the rank of major.
Lee was elected to the State Senate in 2010 and in his first two terms has:
• Successfully fought to repeal the MTA payroll tax;
• Led the fight to eliminate the salt water fishing license fee;
• Successfully blocked the legislation to create Obamacare exchanges in New York (they were later created by an executive order from the governor);
• Sponsored a bill to repeal the SAFE Act;
• Sponsored a bill to stop Common Core;
• Wrote the law to protect veterans’ families from being harassed at their loved ones’ burials;
• Voted against every tax increase that was proposed;
• Sponsored legislation to enact the nation’s strongest property tax cap; and
• Created the PFC Joseph Dwyer Program to help returning veterans cope with PTSD and traumatic brain injury.
Unfortunately, Lee Zeldin has faced one of the most disingenuous campaigns in recent memory. His opponent has created a number of strawman arguments, assuming that if he repeated them loudly enough and long enough people would begin to believe them. The real insult is not to Lee Zeldin, but to the intelligence of the voters. Don’t let this cynical brand of politics work. Get out and vote for Lee Zeldin on June 24.
ROBERT DeSTEFANO JR.
Chairman, Shelter Island Republican Committee
Dangerous
To the Editor:
Your photo captioned “Canine Car Service” (Island Opinions, June 12) brings up an important issue. Now that warm weather is here, no dog should be left in a car with the window partially down as shown in your photo. Cars heat up incredibly fast and it doesn’t take long for an animal (or child) to get heatstroke or die.
MELANIE CORONETZ
Shelter Island
