Charged with alleged conspiracy and falsification of civil service application
Dominic Spada, a former Huntington employee, is facing charges for allegedly falsifying his work experience on a Suffolk County Department of Civil Service application. File photo from the Town of Huntington
A Huntington resident, who until recently worked for the town and serves as a Village of Huntington Bay trustee, is facing charges for allegedly falsifying his work experience on a Suffolk County Department of Civil Service application and conspiring with another individual to corroborate the false claims.
On Feb. 10, county District Attorney Tim Sini (D) announced the indictment of Dominic Spada, 58, according to a press release from Sini’s office. The charges include offering a false instrument for filing in the first degree; making a punishable false written statement; falsifying business records in the second degree; and conspiracy in the fifth degree. All are class A misdemeanor crimes except for offering a false instrument, which is a class E felony.
Spada stepped down as the director of Maritime Services for the Town of Huntington Feb. 5, according to town Supervisor Chad Lupinacci (R), who accepted the resignation. The supervisor made it clear in an email statement that the charges have nothing to do with Spada’s position with the town.
“Based on Mr. Spada’s accomplishments during his short time in office, he may be the best director of Maritime Services the town has ever had, which is what makes this loss so significant,”
Lupinacci said.
“Mr. Spada’s stellar record includes making our waterways and shorelines safer than ever before for residents, beachgoers and boaters, taking the cost burden off the taxpayer in the process, returning federal and state tax dollars back to Huntington through grant-funded emergency response boats, and his complete in-house, under-budget renovations of our marinas and waterfront facilities that were neglected for 20 years. What Mr. Spada achieved for the town and all of our residents is unparalleled and we thank him for his service,” the supervisor added.
According to the DA’s office, in August 2018, Spada, who is also a Town of Islip harbormaster and the first assistant chief of the Halesite Fire Department, filed an application with the Department of Civil Service to take the open competitive examination for a bay constable position. Applicants must have a minimum of two years maritime experience to qualify, and Spada allegedly claimed on his application that he had worked for a Huntington-based maritime towing company, according to Sini’s office. Spada also allegedly claimed he worked for five years for the company, and he asked the owner of the company to corroborate his false application.
According to Spada’s profile page on the Village of Huntington Bay’s website, the village trustee has been a Huntington resident for 10 years. In 2007, he was recognized as the Halesite Fire Department Firefighter of the Year. He also was listed on the website as coaching youth lacrosse and football, and playing lacrosse in an over-40 league. He is married and has two children.
Spada was arraigned Feb. 10 and pleaded not guilty. He was released on his own recognizance and is due back in court March 16. If convicted of the top count, Spada can face four years in prison.
State Assemblyman Steve Englebright. Photo from Englebright's office
In 2020, state Assemblyman Steve Englebright (D-Setauket) maintained his seat in a race against Michael Ross, a local lawyer and former Suffolk County assistant district attorney. With nearly 30 years behind him as an assemblyman, Englebright is hitting the ground running in 2021.
COVID-19
While the assemblyman has a list of priorities for 2021, the COVID-19 vaccine rollout is at the forefront of his mind. He said in a phone interview that the state’s vaccination rollout protocols need to be addressed in regard to issues such as identifying more vaccination sites, making registering easier and allowing couples to sign up together.
He added more locations should be utilized such as chain and privately owned pharmacies, local school gyms and even National Guard facilities.
“It really is held up right now by a lack of imagination and proper use of technology that’s available,” Englebright said, adding that even having people answering the state hotline would be helpful.
He noted not having enough of the COVID-19 vaccines also exacerbates the problem.
“I think there’s always little bureaucratic things that discourage people, and the object of this exercise is to vaccinate as many people as possible and achieve herd immunity and return to normal at some level,” he said. “Especially, before these new variants come in from Brazil, South Africa and London.”
Infrastructure
Englebright has been keeping his eyes on Route 347 and the Long Island Rail Road.
While roadwork on Route 347 in the Smithtown area was completed a few years ago, Englebright would like to see the road improvements continue through Port Jefferson Station. The assemblyman is making sure the completion of the roadwork is a priority.
“This is important for the operation and quality of life for the Port Jefferson Station community,” Englebright said. “If I can move it up and accelerate the improvement, I’m going to try to do that.”
Englebright is also a proponent of full electrification of the LIRR Port Jefferson line, and in 2019 was part of a press conference speaking out against the railroad purchasing more diesel engines.
He said electrification will be a “game changer,” raising the values of homes, attracting more people to use the railroad and creating less pollution.
“We’re working with late-19th century, early-20th century models for rail, and the time has long passed — we need to upgrade them,” he said.
PSEG Long Island
Englebright said a closer look is being taken at PSEGLI. Many have been disappointed with the utility company, he said. Recently, many of its top executives were pulled off of Long Island issues and sent to Puerto Rico to try to acquire big contracts for rebuilding the Caribbean island’s hurricane-ravaged electrical infrastructure.
Englebright said the Long Island Power Authority board is moving toward full municipalization of the utility company, something he has been pushing for since 1983 when he was a Suffolk County legislator.
“I’m still of the opinion that moving to full municipal ownership would give more accountability and more stability in terms of our ratepayers obligations,” he said.
Recycling
Englebright along with state Sen. Todd Kaminsky (D-Long Beach) is co-sponsoring legislation regarding recycling and creation of waste related to packaging which will extend producers’ responsibility. The goal is to boost recycling, curb waste and save tax dollars. Englebright said the responsibility of recycling packaging and paper products will shift from local governments to corporations.
Locally, it could mean that the Town of Brookhaven could extend the life of its landfill, which is slated to close in 2024 and was negatively affected when China stopped taking America’s plastic waste in 2018. The request to reduce landfill waste is one that comes from towns all over the state, according to the assemblyman.
“One-third of the waste going into the landfill is for packaging,” Englebright said. “So, if we can help extend the life, the useful life of our landfill, it will save our taxpayers millions.”
The assemblyman added that “we’ll just be more responsible if we put the responsibility for packaging onto the manufacturers.”
“If we create an incentive for the manufacturers to reduce the amount of waste and standardize the type of plastics that they use to use recyclable plastics, such as polyethylene instead of polyvinyl chloride, the work of the town becomes much, much less stressful,” he said.
Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act
Englebright said implementing New York State’s Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act, which was passed in 2019, is a priority. The act sets to legally binding emissions reductions’ standards with the goal of eliminating dependence on fossil fuels by 2050. The act sets a goal to reduce emissions by 85% below 1990 levels by 2050. An interim target is at a 40 percent reduction by 2030. The remaining percentage of emissions will be offset by actions such as planting trees, which removes carbon dioxide out of the air, to reach net zero emissions.
An original sponsor of the legislation, Englebright is encouraged by President Joe Biden’s (D) commitment to do the same and U.S. Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) also being a proponent. Englebright is further encouraged by Biden moving toward incentivizing electric automobiles which was followed by General Motors announcing it’s going to phase out internal combustion engines by 2035 and move into the electric vehicle arena.
“All of that is within the framework of what we went through at the state legislative level,” Englebright said. “We had a debate basically for four years before Todd Kaminsky became the chair in the Senate and was able to move the bill.”
Restore Mother Nature Bond Act
The state’s $3 billion Restore Mother Nature Bond Act was announced in the state budget in 2020 but was pulled from the November ballots due to the pandemic’s impact on New York’s finances. Englebright said it’s important to get back to implementing the legislation which will fund critical environmental restoration projects in the state — including restoring fish and wildlife habitats, preserving open spaces and enhancing recreational opportunities and prepare New York for the impact of climate change and more.
The bond act would help advance the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act.
News of the COVID-19 vaccine was met with immense excitement and demand after the pandemic ravaged for almost a year with no apparent light at the end of the tunnel.
Excitement stifled among New Yorkers, many say, as the distribution of the vaccine supply in New York state has been filled with supply issues, appointment cancellations and an online portal that is difficult to navigate.
Distribution began with health care workers in December (Phase 1a) and on Jan. 11 (Phase 1b) expanded to other frontline workers such as teachers and police officers, along with anyone ages 65 and older.
This seems to have been when the demand surged out of control. Long Islanders have been trying to access the portal to make an appointment only to find available appointments to be both miles and months away, leaving residents to consistently call the New York State hotline, hoping for a cancelation and appointment to open up — a process especially challenging for elderly residents. As of Feb. 8, the state has received 2,808,825 vaccinations and administered 2,228,567. On Long Island, 82% of the vaccine doses distributed have been used. There are about 7 million eligible residents throughout the state.
On Feb. 15, those with certain comorbidities and underlying conditions will be eligible to sign up for appointments.
“The entirety of our week seven allocation was delivered to providers yesterday and already New York has administered 90% of its first doses while prioritizing fairness and equity,” Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) said in a statement. “Week after week we exhaust our vaccine supply and are basically left waiting for the next week’s delivery. This is not unique to New York. It’s happening in states across the nation because the previous administration grossly mismanaged and politicized the vaccine distribution process from the beginning by not ordering enough vaccines from manufacturers. With new leadership in Washington, the light at the end of the tunnel is in sight but we must manage our expectations. Production of the vaccine alone will take six to nine months. In the meantime, we will continue to distribute the supply we do get quickly and fairly as we have from the start.”
To try to find out the best way to go forward, TBR News Media spoke with a bipartisan group of local elected officials to ask what we can hope for in the future, where they think the biggest problems are in the distribution chain and whether or not they have received the vaccine.
File photo by Kevin Redding
Congressman Lee Zeldin (R-NY1)
“We need to make it easier, not harder, for New Yorkers to get the coronavirus vaccine who want it,” Zeldin said in a statement. “New York’s rollout has been an unmitigated disaster: Unused coronavirus vaccines sitting in freezers for weeks, doses ending up in the trash, local health departments overwhelmed with vaccine demand, thousands of appointments canceled, New Yorkers showing up to appointments only to be turned away and more. While these drug companies need to continue ramping up the production and distribution of vaccines, the state needs to ramp up its strategy, rules and communications.”
“While I believe vaccine distribution should be prioritized to those who need it most — the elderly, frontline workers and more — as soon as the doctors say it’s my turn, I won’t hesitate to get it.”
When asked about the state health department lacking vaccine supply from the federal government he said, “Drug companies need to continue ramping up production and distribution, but when these vaccines get to states around the country, they need to be put into people’s arms effectively and efficiently, not thrown in the trash.”
File photo of Jane Bonner
Brookhaven Town Councilwoman Jane Bonner (R-Rocky Point)
Bonner said that the issue with the distribution is at the federal level. “President Biden [D] said throughout the entire campaign that he had a plan [for vaccine rollout] and clearly he doesn’t,” she said. “Never make campaign promises that you can’t keep.”
Bonner has been working with her elderly constituents to try and guide them to the New York State website, or to the hotline.
“Seniors have lost so much throughout this pandemic,” she said. “They really need to be able to socialize and go out again. We need to work together for our seniors, and to get the schools and businesses open.”
Bonner has not yet received the vaccine, as she wants elderly people to receive it before she does.
File photo by Kevin Redding
County Legislator Sarah Anker (D-Mount Sinai)
Anker has sent letters to Cuomo, as well as U.S. Sens. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) seeking answers for the failures in the vaccine rollout.
In a letter to the governor dated Jan. 11, Anker conveyed the frustrations of senior citizens and essential workers trying to get appointments immediately after the Phase 1b distribution, only to find out they were already booked
“As the Suffolk County chairwoman of both the health and seniors committees, I am writing to acknowledge my frustration and concerns regarding the disbursement of the COVID-19 vaccine in the county,” she wrote. “With my district having one of the largest senior populations in Suffolk County, I offer the suggestion of providing accessible locations, including community on-site availability, to our senior communities who are more at risk of COVID-19. While I appreciate the many Suffolk County staff members doing their best to facilitate the vaccination process and the patience and cooperation of the residents eagerly awaiting their turn in getting inoculated, I ask that a more cohesive process be implemented as soon as possible as we move forward in dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic.”
Anker wrote to Cuomo again Feb. 3. “Since the county is not able to provide vaccinations to our senior citizens under New York State executive order 202.91, it would be helpful to have a comprehensive list that outlines all locations, including pharmacies and other vaccination sites,” she said. “Without this information, we as elected officials cannot provide our constituents, in particular our senior citizens who may not have the ability to register online, with accurate information and guidance about how and where to receive the COVID-19 vaccine.”
Anker also stated in the letter the Suffolk County Disabilities Advisory Board advised her that accommodations were not being made for disabled people at state-run vaccination sites. For instance, the New York State COVID-19 vaccine form, which patients are required to fill out before receiving the vaccine, does not have a braille version nor is it compatible with screen reading software for the blind. Anker also reached out to Schumer and Gillibrand on Feb. 3. expressing concern with the limited federal supply of the vaccine being distributed to the county.
“Currently, the vaccinations that are available are a mere fraction of what our constituents need, and the current climate is getting more desperate. Increasing vaccinations are not only the best way to combat the pandemic, but paramount to keeping our large population of seniors and others healthy,” the letter read.
“I say I’m like a dog with a bone,” Anker said. “I will not let this go until I’m assured that this process is fixed. I don’t want to wait a week. I don’t want to wait a month. I know that we may not have the vaccines right now, I understand that,but while we’re waiting fix the process.”
She said she has been working with local pharmacies to try and get them a supply of vaccines, as well as local senior communities to figure out their vaccination plans.
Anker has not yet received the vaccine but said that she “probably will” once she is eligible.
Leg. Nick Caracappa
County Legislator Nick Caracappa (R-Selden)
“I believe I share the same view as many residents of Suffolk County in that the initial rollout of the vaccine was a disaster, with the short supply and limited venues of distribution,” he said in a statement. “Recently, this office has aligned with other county, town and state officials in demanding that the governor stops ignoring the needs of Suffolk County. Additionally, I’d love to see the New York State health commissioner and local government agencies collaborate to expedite supply and distribution of the COVID-19 vaccine to our frontline workers, essential workers and vulnerable senior citizens.”
“The time is now to get our residents a sufficient supply of the vaccine to combat this deadly virus once and for all,” he added. “I encourage all those who are eligible for the vaccine to sign up as quickly as possible. Although I haven’t received the vaccine to date, I intend on doing so once I qualify in accordance with New York State guidance.”
When asked to expand on what he meant by the governor “ignoring the needs of Suffolk County,” as well as how specifically the state health department and local governments could collaborate, he said, “The governor should have sent more doses to Suffolk County and more specifically to Brookhaven Town. County and town agencies have the venues available to provide ample locations to receive these much-needed vaccinations and easing the overcrowding we are experiencing at the limited locations currently available. We should work collectively with the state, county and town to arrange for these vaccines to be expedited and administered to those who need them. We all knew this vaccine was coming but the preparation to distribute was completely mishandled.”
Steve Englebright
State Assemblyman Steve Englebright (D-Setauket)
“New York’s vaccination rollout and its online system for determining eligibility and booking appointments has resulted in a great deal of anger and frustration for residents anxious to get vaccines for their parents or themselves,” Englebright said in a statement. “We need to have a simple, more user-friendly system for signing up online forvaccines.A universal preregistration system where eligibility can be approved, and appointments allotted as doses arrive would save us all a lot of time and angst.”
Although he has yet to be vaccinated, he knows the importance of getting it to Long Island seniors.
“It makes little sense for residents of retirement communities to make appointments and travel separately to mass vaccination centers when medical teams can bring vaccines to them. For seniors who have their homes in the community and, soon, residents with comorbidities, there should be pop-up vaccine centers run by hospitals or the County Department of Health at local libraries and senior citizen centers. Elected officials on the state, county and town levels could help get the word out to their local communities.”
Photo from Kara Hahn
County Legislator Kara Hahn (D-Setauket)
Hahn shared constituents frustrations regarding the New York State online registration system and expressed regret that she is limited in what she can do to reform it as a county legislator. She called the process of seniors trying again and again to get an appointment without success as “dehumanizing.”
“I feel their pain,” she said.
Hahn has been working with the county to establish distribution locations within the community for when supply is more abundant.
She has not received the vaccine, as she is not yet eligible but said she will when she is.
Town of Smithtown Supervisor Ed Wehrheim. Photo from Nicole Garguilo
Smithtown Town Supervisor Ed Wehrheim (R)
Wehrheim said that he signed a letter to the governor Jan. 14, in coordination with the Suffolk County Supervisors Association asking that essential town workers be vaccinated. He said that a lot of town workers were exposed to COVID-19 in recent weeks and he was concerned, but if they were still quarantined when the storm hit, town workers would still be quarantined.
“The majority of our employees still are not included in any vaccine schedule as of today, endangering our abilities to provide essential services like senior meal delivery, animal shelter staffing, duties of the town clerk and the functions of our building departments,” the letter read. “Should these workers be included in a phase in the near future … allow us to help the process by setting up vaccination sites in each of our towns and by including municipal workers in the next phase of vaccine rollout to ensure that our essential services are not disrupted.”
Wehrheim said that he had not yet heard back from the governor. He also has not personally received the vaccine.
Smithtown Town spokeswoman, Nicole Garguilo, said the town has received approval from the county to use Nesconset and Branch Brook elementary schools as vaccine distribution sites as supply becomes more widely available. “If the county doesn’t get the number of vaccines from the state that they require, they’re not going to greenlight any other vaccine distribution sites,” she said.
Another roadblock is the fact the site needs to be staffed with certified vaccinators, a process that takes four-to-six weeks. While the site must be supervised by a nurse practitioner, physician’s assistant or a licensed physician, pharmacists, midwives, EMTs, medical students, podiatrists, dentists, dental hygienists and students in medical studies programs can get certified to give the vaccine, pursuant to New York State guidelines.
Garguilo said the town is working on partnering with a private pharmacy or hospital in order to streamline the vaccine process. The town’s priority would be to get vaccinations for teachers, as well as seniors in assisted living communities who live on a fixed income and are generally not technically savvy.
“That would make the biggest impact in the shortest amount of time,” she said. You would give the schools everything they need to get back to in-person learning and you would help the people who have those who are in that high-riskcategory that have suffered the most through this pandemic,” she said. Ideally, they would have “targeted vaccine weeks” in which they would focus on vaccinating the schools, and the senior population, one at a time.
Mario Mattera. File photo
State Sen. Mario Mattera (R-St. James)
Mattera said the “whole” problem with the vaccine distribution is a lack of federal supply being delivered to the state. “Every CVS, every Walgreens, every pharmacy, just like with the flu shot, could go and get the supplies and give it, our residents could go right around the corner from their home to go and make this easy … the problem is the federal government releasing as many [vaccines] as they can.”
When asked what he thinks the realistic timeline for the vaccine to be widely available is, Mattera said, “I really wish I could answer that. If I had the crystal ball, I guess I would be a hero. I just really feel the more companies that the FDA approves … there’s going to be more that’s going to be distributed out there.”
He is specifically optimistic for the Johnston & Johnson vaccine, which will be administered in a single dose. He also said that he has not personally received the vaccine, as he “wants everyone else to go” first. He emphasized the importance of following social distancing measures and wearing a mask to continue to curb the spread of the virus.
File photo
County Legislator Rob Trotta (R-Fort Salonga)
Trotta said the state should have granted eligibility to a smaller population, such as those 85 years old and over, studied the backlog, and then opened it up to other groups such as teachers.Cuomo “created the panic,” he said. Trotta added the state was “giving people the hope that they’re going to get [the vaccine], and in doing so “clogged the system up.”
“Anybody with common sense would never do that,” he said.
Trotta has not yet received the vaccine because he is not yet eligible, but he was able to secure his parents an appointment at Jones Beach after spending hours on the computer attempting to secure one.
“Everyone was very nice,” he said. “The National Guard’s running it. It went very smoothly, and it could have all been like that if they would have just opened it up slower.”
Steve Stern. Photo from Stern’s office
State Assemblyman Steve Stern (D-Dix Hills)
“The COVID-19 vaccine is a light at the end of the tunnel and our best hope for recovery from the pandemic for our health standpoint and for our economic recovery,” Stern said in a statement. “I share the frustration that my neighbors feel about the scarcity of vaccines, difficulty securing appointments and a hard-to-navigate system. New York has been receiving 250,000 vaccines a week for the entire state, which has 19 million residents, seven million of whom are eligible under current CDC guidelines. This is clearly inadequate and totally unacceptable. Our new administration in Washington is actively working to procure and produce more vaccines, vials, syringes and to develop logistical support to enable the states to vaccinate at least 150 million Americans by the end of March. Our office has been working with our partners in state government to ensure that we receive our fair share of vaccines and that residents are kept informed about how they are vaccinated when they are eligible. I have not received the COVID vaccine and like my neighbors, will wait until it is my turn. It is in all of our interests to have as many of our neighbors vaccinated as soon as possible to bring an end to the pandemic.”
File photo
County Legislator Susan Berland (D-Dix Hills)
“Suffolk County is ready with the infrastructure and personnel necessary to help vaccinate the public,” she said in statement. “The problem we’re facing now is that we don’t have enough vaccines. Recognizing that demand is clearly outpacing supply, I will continue to advocate for increased supply from the state and federal governments so we can reach our goal of vaccinating 75% of our eligible residents as soon as possible.”
Berland said she is “neither eligible for, nor has she received, the vaccine.”
File photo by Alex Petroski
State Sen. Jim Gaughran (D-Northport)
“What we’ve seen so far has been problematic,” Gaughran said. “The biggest issue is twofold: One is the lack of supply coming out from Washington, and what I think made it even worse was that the state was told it was going to get a supply that it never got; and two, the rollout itself, including at the state level, has been problematic.”
He acknowledged that there have been issues with the state website crashing, and appointments being made when there was a lack of supply.
“It’s been a mess, but I believe it’s going to get significantly better,” he said “I think you’re going to see an addition to the large state-run sites, large county-run sites. Eventually it will be distributed even more on a community-by-community basis.” He is hopeful that the senior population can be vaccinated within “the next month or so.”
Gaughran added he has pushed for additional community pop-up distribution sites, as well as a plan to vaccinate seniors that are “shuttered in their homes.” He also acknowledged seniors are having difficulty navigating the vaccine website and there needs to be a solution to make it more accessible. He said that he worries that once the vaccine becomes more widely available, people are going to be making cancelations to try and get an earlier appointment which could create a “bureaucratic nightmare,” and feels as though there needs to be a system in place to prevent that from happening.
The state senator said that he has not yet received the vaccine, as he is not a member of any occupational group that is eligible, nor is he over 65.
“I’m waiting for millions of other people to get the vaccine before it’s my turn,” he said. “But once it is, I’m going to sign up.”
File photo
County Legislator William “Doc” Spencer (D-Centerport)
Spencer said that his office has been getting calls from seniors, who are having trouble getting on the phone, or going on the computer to make an appointment.
“For seniors that may be less tech savvy, to go online and make the appointment is not so easy for them,” he said. “My wife was able to do it for her parents, but she had to do it, they would never have been able to do it. Sometimes the website is down, sometimes the hotline is down, so I think that that’s probably one of the biggest things is expanding that infrastructure once you’re actually doing the vaccines. I think this is almost as much as an IT job as it is a health department job.”
Spencer stressed the importance of making sure the vaccine is going into underserved areas, not only in the United States but around the world.
“I believe there’s a lot of nationalism that’s going on right now. People are like, ‘We’ve got to get enough vaccines for people in our country,’ and I can understand that, but there’s definitely been some reports that if we don’t vaccinate in a lot of our third-world countries, it will becomenot only a humanitarian crisis, but it’s an economic crisis too.”
Spencer is focused on ensuring that vaccines get to communities of color hard hit by the pandemic.
“If we don’t get enough vaccinations in areas where there are Hispanic and African American populations, where they may be in close quarters there’s less opportunity for social distancing, we’re not going to be able to control the virus as effectively,” he said. He added that he is advocating to place vaccine sites in communities like Brentwood, Huntington Station, Central Islip and Gordon Heights that are walkable.
Spencer has not yet received the vaccine but will do so once he has “the opportunity.”
After serving on the Riverhead Town Board for 11 years, it’s time for something new.
Assemblywoman Jodi Giglio (R-Riverhead) started her term this month, by replacing now-state Sen. Anthony Palumbo (R-New Suffolk) in his former Assembly district. When state Sen. Ken LaValle (R-Port Jefferson) chose not to run again for the Senate in Albany, Palumbo took his seat after battling it out against Democrat Laura Ahearn.
The Long Island delegation is featuring seven new faces out of 16 Republican representatives — four new State Assembly members and three new senators — and Giglio, a woman with more than a decade-long political history on the East End, is thrilled to take on a new challenge.
“It’s very exciting being in Albany,” she said. “I’m honored by the fact that the voters elected me to represent them, I am working hard every day, learning the system and trying to represent them to the best of my ability.”
Apart from being a former Riverhead board member, Giglio owns her own construction management company. Now she’s ready to tackle whatever 2021 will bring.
“It’s very important in this political and economic climate that we all come together and do what’s best for not only the people of New York state, but for the country,” she said. “I always try to listen to what other people have to say whether I agree with them or disagree with them.
The new assemblywoman said that she will “never be condescending, even if I have a different viewpoint.” Her goal is to find solutions to the problems New York state is currently facing.
Property taxes
Giglio said one of the bills she is currently working on is to waive penalties and interest for late payments of property taxes for homeowners impacted by the pandemic and those on a fixed income.
“By adding penalties and interest every single month that they don’t pay is a strain on the people that are trying to pay their taxes,” she said.
The assemblywoman wants to waive penalties in 60 days from Dec. 31. If a person cannot pay in those two months, there would be no penalties or interest from 60 days to the 90 days, making it a smaller percentage.
Waste management
“We need to figure out our garbage situation with recyclables because we live on an island and clean water and clean air is very important to us,” Giglio said.
With the Brookhaven Landfill expected to close in 2024, the assemblywoman wonders how will waste be removed from the Island.
“What’s the plan? How are we going to get garbage off of Long Island?” she asked. “The costs of getting garbage off of Long Island is really going to have a tremendous tax impact on the residents.”
COVID-19 vaccines
Giglio is hoping to combat the vaccine distribution issues Long Islanders are facing. By rolling out a coherent vaccine plan, she said, then COVID recovery can begin.
“You have to get people vaccinated where they feel comfortable going out and they feel secure,” she said. “That will recreate the businesses opening up, opening up the catering halls, opening up everything at full capacity.”
Giglio said she is unhappy that New York has been at “such a disadvantage compared to other states.”
“I think we should be getting the vaccinations sooner than later,” she said. “It should have been a collaborative effort, whereas the Legislature decided who was the most vulnerable and when the vaccines came in who would be the people to be vaccinated first. It’s based on us as elected officials hearing from our constituents as to who the most vulnerable are.”
Snow blanketed the ground as a winter storm hit the North Shore Dec. 16 into 17. Photo by Kyle Barr
Due to the impending snowstorm, Town of Brookhaven Supervisor Ed Romaine (R) issued a State of Emergency in the town effective 10 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 31 until 10 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 2.
Vehicles that are parked in the street should be moved to driveways or they could be subject to towing at the owner’s expense. Any abandoned vehicles obstructing access for snowplows and emergency vehicles may also be removed by the town. Residents are urged to stay off the roads unless there is an emergency or if it is absolutely essential to travel. The County of Suffolk has also declared a State of Emergency. The current weather forecast indicates the likelihood of significant snowfall, across Brookhaven starting Sunday and into Monday).
Monday garbage pick-up is also canceled.
Residents should call 451-TOWN to report snow related issues. Call 911 for police, fire and ambulance emergencies only. To report a power outage or downed wires, call PSEG at 800-490-0075 or go to www.psegliny.com to file a report online.
A rendering of proposed bus lanes on Nicolls Road. Rendering by Greenman-Pedersen, Inc.
Suffolk County is moving forward with a rapid-transit bus system along Nicolls Road, even though the initiative is still in its early stages.
On Jan. 27, the Suffolk County Council on Environmental Quality, known as CEQ, will hold a virtual meeting to determine the need for a State Environmental Quality Review for the bus system. Residents interested in submitting their thoughts on the SEQRA review will be able to email them to CEQ (details at end). The opportunity will be the first of many for the public to comment on the system in the near future, according to Suffolk County Legislator Kara Hahn (D-Setauket), who is also a CEQ councilmember.
The proposal to create Suffolk’s first north-south multimodal transportation corridor was introduced by County Executive Steve Bellone (D) in 2015. The proposed corridor will feature dedicated lanes for rapid transit buses traveling along Nicolls Road between Stony Brook and Patchogue, as well as high occupancy vehicle lanes in some sections, with the goal of relieving traffic congestion.
Buses would operate in HOV lanes on the inside of the road and along specialized bus lanes along the outside portions of the road. The buses will go from the Stony Brook train station all the way down Nicolls Road to Patchogue, and smaller routes would be incorporated to travel to the Ronkonkoma train station and MacArthur Airport.
“There are a lot of important improvements to a corridor that is a key north-south corridor in Suffolk County,” Hahn said.
The county legislator said it’s a tremendously large project which includes a more-than 5,000-page document for CEQ members to review. While she said it seemed as if the county had hoped the council would come to a decision about the SEQRA review in the December CEQ meeting, the members asked for more time to review the documents, saying it would take multiple sessions. They will also decide which will come first, a SEQRA review or a National Environmental Policy Act review, as the county has received federal funds for the project.
“We’re spending a significant amount of time going over each piece of it,” Hahn said.
Different topics CEQ members have and will review include groundwater effects if any, proposed pedestrian bridges, noise walls in specific spots, vegetation, air quality, bus shelters, home values, traffic estimates, coordination of bus routes, environmental analysis and more.
At the December meeting, CEQ members also made recommendations that data be added to the 5,000-plus page document.
“We are by no means ready to make a determination, and we are really early in the stages of the review,” she said, adding CEQ doesn’t expect to make a decision about the SEQRA review until February.
There are different phases of the project, and regarding the Three Village area, work won’t begin north of the expressway until 2024. Hahn said before any work begins there would be multiple outreaches to various civic groups and chambers in affected areas.
Proposed changes along Nicolls Road include intersection improvements at Hawkins, Hammond and Mark Tree roads, as well as Pond Path. Proposals include eliminating the left-hand turning lanes at the intersections and shortening the time of the red lights on Nicolls Road at those intersections for safety purposes and to help with traffic flow.
Residents who are interested in submitting statements regarding the council’s SEQRA review decision of the project can do so before the Zoom meeting on Wednesday, Jan. 27, at 9:30 a.m. The council invites residents to send in statements for the public portion by emailing them to [email protected].
Sen. Jim Gaughran was sworn into his second term by his friend, state Supreme Court Justice David Gugerty, outside of his old high school, Half Hollow Hills. Photo from Gaughran’s office
State Sen. Jim Gaughran (D-Northport) sees 2021 playing out in two parts.
With the carryover from all the public health and economic difficulties of 2021, the first few months will require continued crisis management.
The state will work to “figure out how to get vaccines [for COVID-19] to everybody, how to get schools fully open with kids going … and get businesses back open,” Gaughran said in a wide-ranging interview.
The pace at which the Empire State moves past the crisis depends in large part on the vaccine, which Gaughran described as “key.” He predicted that could occur sometime between February and April.
Up to now, the state senator said the process of getting the vaccine has been frustrating, with the website crashing. Gaughran’s office has fielded numerous calls from constituents. Some people in their 90s have called for help navigating the website, while grandchildren have also reached out on behalf of their older relatives, hoping to get an appointment for those who are among the most vulnerable to the virus.
Gaughran hopes that the vaccine supply chain will improve in the next few weeks.
The state senator believes that President Joe Biden (D) will “open up the floodgates” for the state to receive more vaccinations.
Gaughran anticipates that the process of receiving vaccinations will likely track the same course as viral testing. Initially, people struggled to get tested, often waiting for a test and then days or even a week for a result.
The state and the country have figured out how to improve testing, allowing “anybody to get a test,” he said. “I am hoping the same thing happens with the vaccine.”
The second phase of the year, which could occur around April, will involve the rebuilding of the economy, with opportunities for Long Island and New York to benefit from new directives out of the federal government including for green, alternative energy.
“We’re going to have major money for green energy jobs,” Gaughran said, with infrastructure upgrades, sewage treatment and other projects starting or expanding in 2021. “There’ll be a much stronger will coming out of Washington. We have to pump up the economy.”
New York is well positioned to capitalize on some of these economic and job opportunities, Gaughran said. That could be especially important as the government looks to support projects with considerable advanced planning.
“Whenever these grant programs are available, the states that are most prepared with shovel-ready projects and concrete plans to move forward will get the most money,” Gaughran said.
Gaughran said Long Island can build a green-energy workforce that is educated and supported by area institutions including his alma mater Stony Brook University, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory and Brookhaven National Laboratory.
Committee opportunities
Gaughran is pleased to serve on several State Senate committees, including the Committee on Higher Education; the Committee on Corporations, Authorities and Commissions; the Committee on Investigations and Government Operations; and the Committee on Energy and Telecommunications.
Gaughran sees opportunities to advance his goals, as “being on a committee gives you an edge in pushing your legislative priorities.”
The investigations committee, which has subpoena power, can study problems in the state. Last year, that included housing discrimination.
This year, Gaughran would like to see that committee examine waste in government spending.
“We need to look at two investigations: One dealing with state budgets and state costs, [and the other] looking at local governments, where there may be waste, fraud and abuse,” he said.
As a member of the Higher Education Committee, Gaughran also hopes the committee can offer some help to Stony Brook University and Suffolk County Community College by “being a little bit flexible.”
Gaughran hopes these educational institutions can raise in-state tuition for those families that can afford to pay, while developing a scale that allows those who can’t afford higher costs to continue to pay their current rates.
The state senator also hopes to reignite back-burner projects.
“Let’s see how much we can front-load the timetable on fully electrifying the Long Island Rail Road to Port Jefferson,” Gaughran said. “Let’s hope there’ll be major funding for that type of a project. Instead of waiting years to do it, let’s start.”
Plum Island’s habitats include beach and dune covered in native grasses and shrubs (Photo by Robert Lorenz)
The archipelago of Plum Island hosts Roseate Terns, a federally endangered species (Photo by AJ Hand)
Above, Plum Island’s acres of freshwater marsh are lush with life. (Photo by Robert Lorenz)
Plum Island Preserve Vision Concept
By John L. Turner
Situated a mile east of Orient Point, the eastern tip of the North Fork and separated from it by Plum Gut, lies Plum Island, an 822-acre pork-chop shaped island that is owned by you and me (being the federal taxpayers that we are).
The island’s most well-known feature is the Plum Island Animal Disease Center (PIADC), situated in the northwestern corner of the property, but Plum Island is so much more. On the western edge lays the Plum Island lighthouse which was built in 1869 to warn mariners of the treacherous currents of Plum Gut. On the east there’s the brooding presence of Fort Terry, a relict of the Spanish-American War, with scattered evidence in the form of barracks, gun batteries, and the tiny tracks of a toy gauge railroad once used to move cannon shells from storage to those concrete batteries. (The cannons never fired except during drills).
And there’s the stuff that excites naturalists:
■ The largest seal haul-out site in southern New England located at the eastern tip of the island where throngs of harbor and grey seals swim along the rocky coastline or bask, like fat sausages, on the off-shore rocks that punctuate the surface of the water.
■ The more than 225 different bird species, one-quarter of all the species found in North America, that breed here (like the bank swallows that excavate burrows in the bluff face on the south side of the island), or pass through on their seasonal migratory journeys, or overwinter.
■ Dozens of rare plants, like ladies’-tresses orchids, blackjack oak, and scotch lovage that flourish in the forests, thickets, meadows, and shorelines of Plum Island.
■ A large freshwater pond in the southwestern section of the island that adds visual delight and biological diversity to the island.
■ And, of course, the ubiquitous beach plums that gave the island its name!
For the past decade a struggle has ensued to make right what many individuals, organizations of all sorts (including the more than 120-member Preserve Plum Island Coalition), and many public officials consider a significant wrong — Congress’s order to sell Plum Island to the highest bidder, forever losing it as a public space.
This ill-conceived path of auctioning the island was set in motion by a half-page paragraph buried in a several thousand- page bill to fund government agencies in 2009. Fortunately, this struggle has been won — the wrong has been righted — as language included in the recently adopted 2021 budget bill for the federal government, repeals the requirement that the General Services Administration sell the island.
Thank you to Senators Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand of New York, Senators Christopher Murphy and Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut and members of Congress Lee Zeldin,Tom Suozzi, Rosa DeLauro and Joe Courtney!
Thanks is also due to New York State Assemblyman Steve Englebright who sponsored legislation that was signed into law creating a Marine Mammal and Sea Turtle area in the waters surrounding Plum Island.
While this victory is a vital and necessary step to ultimately protect Plum Island, it is a temporary and incomplete one since the island can still be sold to a private party through the normal federal land disposition process if no government agency at the federal, state, or local level steps up to take title to the island.
The Coalition’s next task, then, is to ensure that a federal agency such as the National Park Service (National Monument?), U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service (National Wildlife Refuge?) or the state of New York (New York State Park Preserve?) expresses a willingness to accept stewardship of this magnificent island, since they get first dibs to the island if they want it. A key enticement toward this end is the $18.9 million commitment in the budget to clean up the few contaminated spots on the island.
Why the sale in the first place? Since 1956 PIADC has been conducting top level research on highly communicable animal diseases such as foot-and-mouth disease. To this end, several years ago staff developed a vaccine for this highly contagious disease that holds great promise in controlling the disease globally.
Despite this successful research, Congress determined the facility was obsolete and should be replaced, approving the construction of a new state-of-the-art facility, known as the National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility (NBAF), to be located on the campus of Kansas State University in Manhattan, Kansas. NBAF is complete and will soon be fully operational so as a result PIADC is no longer needed; PIADC is expected to transfer all operations to Kansas and close for good in 2023.
Plum Island is a rare place — a remarkable asset that holds the promise of enriching Long Islanders’ lives —your family’s lives, if we can keep it in public ownership. The Preserve Plum Island Coalition, with the input from hundreds of Long Islanders, has painted a vision for the island … so, imagine throwing binoculars, a camera, and a packed lunch enough for you and your family into your backpack and participating in this realized vision by:
— Taking a ferry across to the island, debarking to orient your island adventure by visiting a museum interpreting the cultural and natural riches and fascinating history of the island before you wander, for countless hours, to experience the wild wonders of the island. A most worthwhile stop is the island’s eastern tip where, through a wildlife blind, you enjoy watching dozens of bobbing grey and harbor seals dotting the water amidst the many partially submerged boulders.
— Standing on the edge of the large, tree-edged pond, watching basking turtles and birds and dragonflies flitting over the surface.
-Birdwatching on the wooded trails and bluff tops to view songbirds, shorebirds, ospreys and other birds-of-prey, swallows, sea ducks and so many other species. Perhaps you’ll see a peregrine falcon zipping by during fall migration, sending flocks of shorebirds scurrying away as fast as their streamlined wings can take them.
— Strolling along the island’s eight miles of undisturbed coastline, with the beauty of eastern Long Island before you, offering distant views of Great Gull, Little Gull and Gardiner’s Islands, Montauk Point, and the Connecticut and Rhode Island coastlines.
— Lodging at the Plum Island lighthouse, converted into a Bed & Breakfast and enjoying a glass of wine as the sun sets over Plum Gut and Orient Point.
— Learning about the role Fort Terry played in protecting the United States and the port of New York as your explore the many parts of the fort — the barracks where soldiers stayed, the gun batteries that once housed the cannons angled skyward to repel a foreign attack.
— At the end of day, if you don’t stay over, taking the ferry back to the mainland of the North Fork, tired after many miles of hiking in the salt air of the East End stopping at a North Fork restaurant to share a chat among friends and family about what you’ve learned relating to this fascinating place.
This legislation has given Plum Island (based on the above perhaps we should call it Treasure Island!) a second chance and an opportunity for us to achieve this vision. But this law is only the first step. We need to take the vital second step of new ownership and management in the public interest if all of the above adventures are to become realities. We collectively need to tell those elected officials who represent us, and who can make a difference in determining the island’s fate, that we want Plum Island protected in perpetuity and the opportunity for its many wonders to become interwoven into the fabric of life on Long Island.
Go to www.preserveplumisland.org to learn more about the Coalition, receive updates, and what you can do to help.
John Turner is the spokesperson for the Preserve Plum Island Coalition.
For the first time, people could choose to complete the U.S. Census online, by phone, or by mail. Stock photo
By Iryna Shkurhan
The 2020 Census couldn’t have come at a more inconvenient time.
I was one of the half million people employed by the U.S. Census Bureau this year enlisted in the follow-up operation for non-respondents. When I applied to be an enumerator in Suffolk county in January, I couldn’t imagine that I would be going door to door in the midst of a pandemic.
Iryna Shkurhan
When Census Day came April 1, enumerators were set to start visiting the homes of millions of non-respondents, but in person operations were postponed indefinitely as many states entered lockdowns. Around the same, the bureau formed an outreach and ad campaign to encourage Americans to respond online for the first time, or by phone or mail.
When drafting the Constitution, the nation’s founders mandated a count of the populace to be held every decade, starting in the 1790s, with the main goal of getting a count of every single person living in the United States. Included was questions on age, sex, race, relationship in the household and home ownership form data that paints a picture of who makes up the country.
This information is crucial to determine congressional representation and allocating hundreds of billions in federal funding, for education, hospitals, roads and healthcare. The data that will directly affect the resources that communities across the country will receive for the next decade. For a government to represent people and fairly fund its programs, it has to know how many people there are and where they live, making the census initiative crucial for democracy.
Enumerators typically work in their communities because their familiarity with the area helps in locating homes and also establishes trust and mutual understanding with respondents. Still, the questions are personal, and not everyone wants to share that information with a stranger.
I always let people know that they had the option to refuse a question, if they were not comfortable answering. The question that mattered most was how many people lived in a household, which was used for the population count. The other questions had their own importance, but less so.
I was issued a badge, a preprogrammed iPhone 8 and a messenger bag filled with various information sheets and a clipboard. In past decades the clipboard would’ve gotten more use.
But this is the first year that the Census Bureau was collecting data digitally, allowing people to respond online, and enumerators to use mobile apps to record data. Enumerators no longer had to just record information with a pen and paper on their clipboards.
With the unpredictability of the pandemic, no one knew when and if in-person operations would continue, but in August I received a phone call asking if I would be willing to work for 4-8 weeks depending on when the count would be completed. I began working in the Stony Brook area less than ten minutes from my home. The number of cases I was assigned ranged from 20 to 70, depending on how many hours of availability I entered. Some days when I would work eight hours, I was assigned up to 80 nonresponse follow up cases.
While on duty I imagined how different it must have been to be an enumerator ten years ago, before technology made the role much simpler. Now all I had to do was click on an assigned case and the GPS would direct me there. If a resident was home and willing to respond, the questions and answer options would pop up in the correct order on my screen. I never had to write anything more than a case number on paper. The apps on the issued iPhone were used to report for work, view assignments, track hours and mileage, and navigate to households.
The biggest challenge I ran into was a reluctance to answer. In the 20 hours of virtual training, I was taught the appropriate response for almost every type of reason a person is hesitant to share information, whether it’s privacy concerns, or distrust of the government. But many people were set in their decision and refused to cooperate, with many disputing my attempts at easing their fears and persuading them to cooperate.
Enumerators also had a list of addresses to stay away from, which were marked as dangerous. These cases were marked with a caution sign on the map and signified that the resident was hostile, or violent in some way to an enumerator. In some cases, people were physically threatened and yelled at, and we were discouraged from attempting these homes alone.
I witnessed a polar difference between the people who were happy to answer any questions and viewed it as a civic duty and those who avoided us at all costs and slammed the door in my face. I understood that people’s attitudes to their personal data was shifting, but living in a polarized county where the census became politicized didn’t help. With disinformation about the census floating around, explaining the purpose of the census, and the importance of each question, became a main part of my job.
Another challenge was the technical difficulties that came with digital collection being implemented for the first time. Issues were bound to come up during the transition, but there were times where mid interview, the phone would crash, and I would have to restart all over. Other times my cases wouldn’t load, or I was sent to homes that were already visited by a dozen enumerators, with residents not hiding their annoyance.
The sense of urgency was made apparent by higher ups as they offered incentives to work overtime and on weekends, when people were more likely to be home. Several bonuses were offered for working more than forty hours a week, and working Sundays and nights came with a higher pay rate. Initially, we had to request permission for overtime, but within a week that was scrapped. We were encouraged to work as much as possible to ensure everyone was counted.
Once Setauket and neighboring regions were fully completed, I was sent out farther east to Riverhead, then farther to Orient and Mattituck. After the entirety of Suffolk County was counted, enumerators were offered to drive to other states, as far as Alabama to help complete the counting efforts there.
One overnight shift was set aside to count the homeless population, which the pandemic made harder to account for. The Census was also forced to come up with new ways to count college students, who many towns depend on to get the adequate funding.
In the few weeks I worked as an enumerator, there were difficult days but also rewarding ones. A certain satisfaction came with finally getting to interview a household that kept reappearing on my case list. With each case I closed, we came closer to reaching the goal. Little acts of kindness like some people offering to put their masks on, or a chair to sit on and a drink on a hot day, went a long way.
Iryna Shkurhan is a junior at Stony Brook University majoring in political science, with a minor in journalism. She is an incoming editorial intern for TBR News Media.
Steven Klipstein, who taught at Suffolk County Community College for 49 years, is also the academic lead for the Center for Social Justice and Human Understanding. Photo from SCCC
Stony Brook resident Steven Klipstein may be retired from his college post, but it seems hard to stop him from teaching.
Klipstein spent one year shy of five decades at Suffolk County Community College, where he taught in the English department, though he is much more widely known for his course on the Holocaust perpetrated by Nazi Germany during World War II.
Steven Klipstein continues as the Center for Social Justice and Human Understanding at SCCC despite being retired. Photo from SCCC
He talks with a soft urgency about his passions, whether it’s teaching, his time as adviser to the college newspaper, or his work with the college’s Holocaust center, which is now called the Center for Social Justice and Human Understanding. For those students who knew him, that demeanor bled into his lectures, especially in the Holocaust class. He has taught that course for well over 30 years, and even now after he is a professor emeritus at SCCC, he still tries to teach young people about the massacre of over 6 million Jews.
And as people of the Jewish faith reach the end of Hanukkah this year and looking back to last year where New York was the site of multiple anti-Semitic attacks at the end of the Jewish holiday, such understanding becomes ever more important.
“At least New York mandates a day in high school, a mention of the Holocaust, so at least most New York kids know that it happened,” he said. “But most of the country doesn’t, so they have no idea what it is.”
It’s because the point Klipstein makes is while too many people see the Holocaust as a distant event, a pothole in the historical timeline, the reality is that it was not some kind of aberration, but the culmination of years of anti-Semitism both in Europe and in America. The U.S., while touting its role in defeating the Third Reich, was also the home to much of the time’s leading anti-Semites, such as Henry Ford, who in 1938 received the Grand Cross of the German Eagle, the highest medal Nazi Germany could bestow on a foreigner.
But even closer to home, Long Island was one of the few places to have a real Nazi element in its backyard. In 1935, Camp Siegfried, a Nazi youth camp, opened in Yaphank. Though back then it may have seemed more like a camp to celebrate German heritage, even with the young men in brown shirts marching down roads named Hitler Street with arms outstretched in the classic Nazi salute. Klipstein talked about that camp, among other topics, in a recent six-hour American Heroes Channel documentary, “Hitler’s Empire.”
Although it is common knowledge today, Klipstein said it took decades for a common understanding of those events to take root, both in Germany and in the U.S. But now, he said, he’s seeing some of that understanding slip away.
Though occasionally he received critical glances from students about some point in his lectures, he has never encountered a Holocaust denier in his academic history. Still they are out there. The professor emeritus cited a tale told by Ruth Minsky Senderowicz, a Holocaust survivor from Commack, who has said a denier called to get her to say her story — of her mother being taken from her at the Lodz Ghetto in Poland and the daughter being sent to Auschwitz — was a lie.
“It takes a lot of courage to fight them, because they’re not really scholars, they’re provocateurs,” Klipstein said.
Though the issue is now in getting more students to volunteer to learn about those horrific events. He continues to teach the Holocaust class, but said his lecture is down to small numbers. He stressed how important it is for people to not only learn about those days in the death camps but come to see the world differently through that understanding.
“I think for a lot of students, it’s eye opening,” he said. “And if you’re in tune to it, you learn and you will think about it in different philosophical terms than what you’ve been thinking before about the nature of the world and humanity — the Holocaust can can’t help but make you face those realities.”
Legacy at SCCC
The venerable educator got started at 25 years old, back when academia was coming into its own in Suffolk. Stony Brook University was growing at a rapid rate, and places like SCCC were attracting new blood into its ranks. Klipstein had a good interview and “got lucky,” and was hired on the spot.
That hire would come to bite a few campus administrators in the proverbial butts later down the line. Years later, when he was assistant head of the English department, effectively also the head of the college’s journalism department, he said the campus newspaper, The Compass, was “moribund,” effectively on the brink of death. He came in after there was a reported brawl inside the paper’s office.
“I told the other administrators that something’s got to be done, and they said, ‘Well, OK, do it,’” Klipstein said.
Cutting out the rougher parts of the staff, and just with two or three young people, he revitalized the paper. With the help of new editorial staff, they were putting out a good-sized, 20-page campus newspaper that won awards from the likes of Newsday. The paper also did not shy from getting involved in campus controversy. They went after administrators for nepotism in hiring family members for dead-end jobs or highlighting discrepancies with the college budget.
“It was really kind of enervating and exciting being the troublemakers on campus,” he said. “And we embarrassed them more than once, you know, which I confess that I loved.”
While administration couldn’t fire Klipstein as a tenured professor, he said it would regularly threaten his position as adviser to the paper. He would hold that position at the paper for 13 years.
Of his near 50-years at Suffolk, there are several things that Klipstein said he takes pride in. The paper, for one, was an act of helping to build something from effectively nothing. Though now that he’s stepped back from a full-time role in academia, the professor can’t help but see what he called a decline of people’s appreciation for arts or culture, which breaks down into a decline in appreciation for history or even today’s current events.
“A lot of our problems come from the fact that we have completely denuded the liberal arts,” he said. “I said, so many times, it’s going to start creeping into our politics — we are going to elect someone who is just basically from image, no substance, just image. And that person is going to get us into a lot of trouble. I swear I said it so many times, it was coming out of my ears, and sure enough, there he is.”
Though Suffolk has not cut any of its liberal arts programs, he said there has been a steady decline in the number of students taking those kinds of classes. Less degrees are requiring liberal arts classes as well. He points to places like Stony Brook University which in 2018 suspended admission into its theater arts, comparative literature and cinema arts programs.. The backlash led to the then-College of Arts and Sciences Dean Sacha Kopp stepping down.
“A university can’t do that, that’s not thinking in the long run … that basically what students really need to learn, more than anything, is how to critically think,” Klipstein said. “I think without the ability to think, without the ability to understand the classic structure of your society, both politically and culturally, you lose what you have.”
Editor’s note: The author of this article was a student of Klipstein when the educator still taught full time at SCCC.
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