Shelter Island Reporter Letters to the Editor: June 27, 2025

SUPERVISOR RESPONDS

To the Editor:

I would like to thank Gordon Gooding for his advertisement in the June 12 issue of the Reporter. It gives me the opportunity to point out his misstatements and demonstrate why I am the better candidate for Town Supervisor. 

Gordon states that the Town received a $1.5 million Federal grant. It is actually a $1,250,000 grant. If you are going to quote numbers, it’s best not to make a quarter million dollar mistake. 

Also, the past administration never let the grant expire; the chaos at the Federal level had the grant canceled and restored twice. 

Gordon states that he will ensure that this year’s budget will come in on time. The Town has never had a budget not come in on time. Statutorily, it is not possible. Someone who has been running for office for the past two years should understand how the budget calendar works and what the deadlines are.

Just because Gordon says something, does not make it true. Check the facts before you believe his misstatements and question if they are intentional or he is just misinformed.

AMBER BRACH-WILLIAMS, Supervisor, Town of Shelter Island

IN THE RUNNING

To the Editor:

My name is Liz Hanley, and I’m running for Town Board this fall. 

A perspective is missing from our Town government: working families, especially those with children in our school. The issues that are critical for us touch everyone in our community, starting with affordable housing. This week, my heart is breaking for the families affected by the coming cuts to the Pre-K program, but the repercussions of issues like these affect us all. 

We need to not only address these issues as they arise, but also get ahead of them. We all need our neighbors who run the ferries, who own and work in our favorite restaurants, and who show up when we call 911. A vibrant year-round community ensures that all of us have the services we depend upon. That’s important for all of us. 

Is this a complicated problem? Yes, it touches housing, small businesses, and the school. But it doesn’t have to be expensive to solve. Not if we start now. I have a proven record of addressing housing issues with no-cost solutions for our town, whether finding $3.5 million in outside funding for ADUs or putting together a team that figured out how to build 10 affordable rental units with no town money. I’m an accountant. I’ve been solving complex financial problems my entire adult life. We can do this. Let’s build this together!

Ideas? Questions? Stop by Pizza and Politics on July 16 from 5 to 7 p.m. at Slice and connect with Shelby (our most excellent town clerk candidate) and me. 

Find me on Instagram and Facebook @voteforlizhanley. 

Happy Summer!

ELIZABETH HANLEY, Shelter Island

AN OPEN LETTER TO REP. NICK LALOTA

To the Editor:
Dear Congressman LaLota,

When President Trump campaigned about his immigration policies, he claimed to be targeting violent criminals. Instead, many of the people who have been seized by ICE have no criminal records, and appear to be hard-working, taxpaying residents of their communities. Most recently, a Southern California gardener, a father to U.S. military veterans, was pinned down and punched over the weekend, according to NBC News.

The man in question, a gardener in Santa Ana, Calif., was pinned down and violently detained Saturday by federal immigration agents. His son, who served in the U.S. Marine Corps, expressed anger, sadness and a sense of betrayal.

A video clip outside a Santa Ana IHOP on Ritchey Street and Edinger Avenue shows Narciso Barranco being punched repeatedly in the head last Saturday.

Could you use your influence to prevent masked, often unidentified agents from pouncing on workers, handcuffing them behind their backs, denying them due process, and taking them away, often, from their children? These are the actions of a dictatorship, not of our cherished democracy, with its rules of habeas corpus, a presumption of innocence, and a fair and public trial by one’s peers.

REV. BEN BORTIN, North Fork Unitarian Universalist Fellowship, Jamesport