Shelter Island Reporter Letters To the Editor: March 29, 2025
A REMARKABLE RESPONSE
To the Editor:
I’ve enjoyed staff writer Julie Lane’s retrospectives on the COVID pandemic on Shelter Island in 2020.
I hope a piece can discuss the Siller administration’s response. As the Town engineer at the time, I vividly recall the daily morning Zoom meetings with the supervisor and his response team members.
My first recollection of an emerging problem was a telephone call from a physician friend on the North Fork who, in an alarmed voice, told me something serious was emerging on the North Fork. A subsequent conversation I had with Supervisor Siller caused me to remark that whatever was happening was likely to define his legacy as a Town supervisor.
There is far too much about which to write in those early months, and being part of an impressive team attempting to deal with a public health problem having little definition.
Having been a part of many project teams in the past, this situation was unique, but under Supervisor Siller’s leadership our abilities emerged and coalesced into a viable response and approach to a catastrophic public health risk.
The single most important acknowledgment due the Siller Administration (and in my view an immutable legacy), is that public health data supports the fact that Shelter Island Town experienced the lowest COVID-19 incidence in Suffolk County.
Naysayers will cite factors such as geographic isolation, small population, reduced tourism, and restricted mobility. However, unless you sat in those Zoom meetings you did not see or know of the proactive measures discussed, evaluated, and enacted under Supervisor Siller’s leadership.
Every team needs a captain. And winning against the opposition often hinges on that captain’s strategy and leadership.
Shelter Island’s notably low per capita infection rate is the Siller Administration’s public health legacy.
JOHN CRONIN,Shelter Island
THANK YOU
To the Editor:
I enjoyed the great memories of John Feinstein as shared by Bob DeStefano (“Remembering John Feinstein,” March 20). It was wonderful learning about Mr. Feinstein, someone I did not know about before, and a great friendship.
Coincidentally, I was reading today’s newsletter from the Society of Automotive Engineers, which includes a daily quote from a famous person, featuring none other than John Feinstein: “Is it worth it? Does the end justify the means?”
Thank you Mr. Feinstein and Mr. DeStefano!
ROBERT PAPPAS, Shelter Island
ROOT OF JUSTICE
To the Editor:
Brava/Bravo to Jean Hollins Lawless and Paul Shepherd for speaking up and writing in so bravely and passionately as to the present predicament in our country (Letters, March 20) and to our so-talented cartoonist, Peter Waldner. Let me add myself to their tether … no less than a call to save what is the best in us (bad as our forefathers, foremothers, and let me add, all of us can be), as, beneath our fragile humanity so prone to human error, is a common goodness and a desire deep within our hearts and minds for not just money. What is freedom without justice and mercy?
Keep your minds, your hearts intact, fellow friends, whether you vote one party or the other. There is a way of doing things, an honor we owe to this pledge of messy freedom.
I did not vote for a dictatorship; my representatives in the legislature did not authorize Elon Musk to wreak havoc on our government. And how ironic that this entire thrust is advertised as the voice of one who said, “Be Not Afraid,” and as for “woke,” always advocated for being awake.
I believe our present evils are born of fear — this is a redeemable situation if we throw our arms around one another and come together as a diverse but proud and united republic.
Freedom is a privilege we signed up for here in the United States of America. I say Democrats, Republicans, Independents — pull your heads out of the mud and get with the picture, resist with all you can, and in the process try our best to “Love One Another,” remembering that tolerance is the root of justice.
ROZ DIMON, Shelter Island
FOOD RESCUE
To the Editor:
I have been a volunteer for Food Rescue USA for almost two years. I bring between 70 and 150 pounds of food to small food banks on the East End, as do many volunteers.
These small food banks are located in churches, libraries and a variety of places where people in need can pick up the food. Local businesses and farms donate all this food, yet we never have enough to fill the growing need of our residents.
Two weeks ago, $2.6 million in grant money was cut from the two largest food banks in our area. This is frightening, since the number of people who can’t afford food keeps increasing.
A hungry population is not a healthy population, and the ripple effect from being hungry is large. Cutting these services is not a solution to getting rid of waste in our government. I am certain people did not envision this horror when they voted, but everyone now needs to be vocal to Rep. Nick LaLota and other elected officials before this becomes an emergency we cannot control.
COOKIE SLADE, Cutchogue
