Shelter Island Reporter Letters to the Editor: Sept. 12, 2024
PUZZLING
To the Editor:
New York State law requires that the Community Preservation Project Plan be adopted by the Town and subsequently revised by the Town Board every five years.
The existing Plan expired in 2019. The previous Town Board charged the Community Preservation Fund Advisory Board with updating this plan.
After two years of non-action, Council Member BJ Ianfolla, the Committee liaison, took it upon herself to update the plan and present it to the CPF Advisory Board. After doing so, the Advisory Board decided not to act on her presentation.
At the last Town Board meeting of the previous administration, a public hearing was held to present the revised Plan that BJ wrote. Members of the CPF Advisory Board said they now wanted to address some of these issues.
After that hearing, the majority of the Town Board voted to not act on the Plan, saying that it should be up to the incoming Town Board to act on it.
It’s now more than eight months since that meeting, so the Plan is now four years and eight months outdated, putting the Town in clear violation of the Community Preservation Act.
My question is why hasn’t CPF Chairman Gordon Gooding even put this on any meeting agenda for the CPF Advisory Board this year? I find this puzzling, as Mr. Gooding’s political ads for his primary campaign stated, “Less talk, more action.”
Maybe I’m looking in the weeds, but it seems to me there is a hidden agenda here.
GERRY SILLER, Former supervisor, Town of Shelter Island
HISTORY IN THE MAKING
To the Editor:
Thirty years ago, 73 members of the Comprehensive Plan Task Force and the Advisory Committee developed a Plan to control over-development, protect natural resources, and establish goals to sustain our community character.
They developed an implementation plan to “give direction to the varied actions taken by the Town and those within it bearing on growth and change: to make connections between individual actions and longer-term goals, and to provide coordination across topical areas.”
Nowhere in our operative (1994) Plan is there any mention of the development of any additional public water supply or wastewater treatment facilities on the Island. So why is the pending draft plan promoting the consideration of such infrastructure improvements for which the enormous financial burdens will fall on every taxpayer?
Our operative (1994) Plan (on page 35 item S6.) calls for a complete analysis of the sustainable capacity of the Island and of each of its major sub-areas, taking into consideration such things as impacts upon water resources and infrastructure capacity. In 30 years this has yet to be accomplished. Councilman Dickson is requesting this analysis be completed prior to any adoption of an updated Plan.
Why are the Town Supervisor and Deputy Supervisor pushing back on this 30-year-old goal?
PAM DEMAREST, Shelter Island
COWARDLY
To the Editor:
Freedom of speech, especially on one’s own property, is a foundational American value enshrined in our Constitution.
Recently, someone stole their neighbors’ lawn signs supporting their choice of a presidential candidate. This same person (or group) stole signs all over the Island.
This is un-American and cowardly.
No matter what party or candidate you are supporting this fall, behavior like this widens the divide. As neighbors, we are going to have different ideas and disagreements on politics. That’s O.K.!
Let’s just remember that we still need to see each other at IGA and, more important than what party you vote for, is our love of this great nation and the values that founded it.
With Liberty and Justice for All.
CAT BRIGHAM, SI DEMOCRATIC COMMITTEE, GARY BLADOS, SI Republican Committee
CONVERSELY
To the Editor:
Arguing that two wrongs in fact make right, a letter to the editor (“Election signage,” Sept. 5) asserted that one resident’s thumb-nosing the detente on pre-Labor Day political signs justified her retaliating in kind. Yup. And if my dog poops on your lawn you can bring your dog to poop on mine.
And, conversely, it’s O.K. to steal someone’s yard sign if you can get away with it. Or, alternatively, we could be adults and decide that getting in someone’s face is for kindergartens.
CHRISTOPHER HERMAN, Shelter Island
