Brookhaven finalized repairs on Lower Rocky Point Road this past week. Photo from TOB
Brookhaven Town Highway Superintendent Daniel Losquadro (R) and Councilwoman Jane Bonner (R-Rocky Point) announced the complete resurfacing of Lower Rocky Point Road from Woodhull Landing Road to Rocky Point Landing Road, as well as Hagerman Landing Road.
Residents have noticed the repaving of the thoroughfare over the past few weeks, which included some need for cars to take detours to avoid construction. Officials said in a press release that the paving project included the milling of nearly 38,000 square yards of roadway, before 4,400 tons of asphalt were put down on the roadway. The total cost for this paving project was approximately $448,300, a portion of which, $138,643, was funded by a Community Development Block Grant.
Losquadro called the road “a very busy, main thoroughfare,” adding, “I am glad we were able to include it, along with Hagerman Landing Road, in our 2020 paving season.”
Bonner said Lower Rocky Point Road is one of the most traveled in her council district.
“This road and Hagerman Landing Road are much safer for drivers, bike riders and pedestrians,” she said.
The year 2020 in New York State began with excitement about voting access and modernization. Governor Cuomo had signed the bill for 9 days of early voting in November 2019 and New York voters embraced it.
We synchronized federal, state and local primary elections to reduce costs and encourage greater turnout. Young people can pre-register at ages sixteen and seventeen with automatic registration when they turn eighteen. Voters who move within the state will have their registration go with them seamlessly. We also closed the LLC Loophole, meaning that an LLC’s political spending was limited to the same amount allowed to corporations, $5,000 annually. We expected to see the fruit of these efforts this year.
Then, starting in March, we saw the threat of the pandemic on voter safety. After declaring a state of emergency, Gov. Cuomo ordered the presidential primaries postponed from April 28 to June 23 (already the date of state and local primaries) and then ordered Boards of Elections to send Absentee Ballot (AB) applications to all voters in New York State eligible to vote in a primary.
There was great confusion since some voters had already mailed individual AB applications, and those were different from the mass-mailed applications. The NYS Board of Elections announced cancellation of the Democratic presidential primary due to pandemic fears. Then a court declared that cancellation invalid, and the primary was back on. This caused the absentee ballots to be on two pages (presidential on one, other offices on another page) resulting in someeligible voters not receiving both ballot pages.
A huge number of people in Suffolk County applied for Absentee Ballots (more than double the in-person number of voters) and counting mailed in ballots could only begin on July 1 and was expected to end on July 9. Our media didn’t help either; readers were told which candidates were “leading” after the relatively small number of in-person votes were counted on election night (in CD1’s Democratic primary, about 15,000).
As if that amount of confusion couldn’t be any worse, due to the virus a very large number of poll workers chose not to work on election day, regular polling sites refused to be hosts and the Suffolk Board of Elections reduced the actual number of polling places on June 23 by almost two-thirds.
Letters were mailed to voters just before election day, but chaos resulted, including removing neighborhood polling places in communities where transportation was a challenge as well as communities of color. Signage was poor or non-existent in new locations and many places were hard to find.
Voters in New York State have traditionally felt that although we had antiquated aspects to our elections (no early voting, no “no excuse” absentee ballots, no same-day voter registration, and terrible voter turnout) we were in pretty good shape compared to other states that were suppressing the vote. Our blinders have now been removed and much work needs to be done, quickly and thoughtfully, in order to assure a fair, secure, auditable, inclusive and clear process on Nov. 3.
Your voice counts as much as your vote. The New York State Legislature has already closed its session, but the Governor can bring them back. We need money allocated to the Boards of Elections to ensure the Nov. 3 elections are perceived by all voters as valid and reflective of all those who voted.
Study media writeups of the June 23 results during July, learn from them, and in the fall help spread nonpartisan communication about the process. The League of Women Voters’ voter information website, www.VOTE411.org. is a great starting point to see if a voter is registered, learn who is on their ballot, and understand election law and changes in their state.
Threats to the viability of the United State Postal Service will be an issue if the November election is deemed not safe enough for in-person voting. Congress must act immediately to fix the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act (PAEA) which required the USPS to create a $72 billion fund to pay for the cost of its post-retirement health care costs, 75 years into the future. This burden applies to no other federal agency or private corporation.
Nancy Marr is first vice president of the League of Women Voters of Suffolk County, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that encourages the informed and active participation of citizens in government and influences public policy through education and advocacy. For more information, visit www.lwv-suffolkcounty.org or call 631-862-6860.
Suffolk County Police 6th Squad detectives are investigating several vehicle thefts from food delivery drivers in July.
Police said several incidents in July share similar details, where drivers exited their vehicles to deliver food, when the vehicles were stolen. In these incidents, no resident at the delivery address had placed a food order.
The incidents occurred at the following locations:
• A 2015 Toyota Camry was stolen on Old Town Road, Port Jefferson Station, July 7 at approximately 9 p.m.
• A 2015 Kia Seoul was stolen on Provost Avenue, North Bellport, July 7 at approximately 11:50 p.m.
• A 2007 Toyota Rav-4 was stolen on Mayflower Street, Setauket, July 9 at approximately 11:50 p.m.
• A 2004 Nissan Sentra was stolen on Hawks Nest Rd, Setauket, July 10 at approximately 10:45 p.m.
• A 2007 Mitsubishi Outlander was stolen on Eastwood Road, Miller Place, July 11 at approximately 7:10 p.m.
• A 2002 Volkswagen Passat was stolen on Arrowhead Lane, Setauket, July 15 at approximately 9:10 p.m.
• An attempt was made to steal a 2019 Hyundai on Patchogue Avenue, North Bellport, July 15 at approximately 4:35 p.m.
Detectives are asking all delivery drivers to take precautions and keep their vehicle keys with them at all times. Detectives are asking anyone with information regarding the thefts to call 6th Squad detectives at 631-854-8652 or Crime Stoppers at 1-800-220-TIPS (8477).
John T. Mather Memorial Hospital in Port Jefferson. File photo from Mather Hospital
As the number of COVID-19 patients continue to decrease on Long Island, local hospitals say they are working to ensure that the public and patients feel safe walking through its front doors while keeping a safe and clean environment.
Kenneth Roberts, president and CEO of Mather Hospital, stressed the importance of seeking out medical care.
“It is safe to come back — whether it’s coming to the hospital or going to the doctor’s offices,” he said. “People shouldn’t neglect reaching out to their healthcare providers.”
The hospital has been implementing the use of tele-medicine during the pandemic, but Roberts said there is only so much you can do remotely and that some things need to be done in person.
“Being a part of the Northwell Healthcare system, we’ve put into place new processes and procedures at the hospital,” the president of Mather Hospital said.
For hospital employees, they must attest that they are free of COVID-19 symptoms when coming into work, temperature checks are done before each person clocks in.
Roberts said all employees and doctors are required to wear face masks. Those on the frontlines who may be in contact with potential COVID patients are required to wear face shield in addition to the n-95 masks.
Another change at the hospital is the return of visitors.
“We’re allowing two visitors per patient,” Roberts said. “Before they’re able to come in there will be required to answer a series of questions and their temperatures will be checked.”
As of now, those who need to go to the emergency room are being asked to remain in their cars until a hospital employee comes to them.
Roberts said patients that come in on an emergency basis who may have COVID-19 symptoms will be tested immediately. The hospital will be administered a test and be able to get a result back in three days.
In an effort to keep the facilities clean and safe, Mather Hospital will be utilizing PurpleSun devices, which use ultraviolet light to kill germs and provide rapid disinfection.
Roberts said the patient feedback so far has been good and that a lot of them have confidence in the doctors and “have no fears.”
With the restart of elective surgeries in May, the hospital has seen more people coming in to get important procedures done.
“We’ve had over 1,000 operations that were scheduled, now we are playing catch up,” the president of the hospital said.
Each patient scheduled for surgery will receive a phone call from a hospital employee and they will conduct a preprocedural interview gathering health history as well as a screeningfor COVID symptoms or exposures.
Once that evaluation has been completed, patients receive two separate in-person pre-surgical testing appointments. The first appointment may include lab tests, EKG and x-rays. The second appointment is for COVID testing and is scheduled 48 hours prior to the procedure. Patients are instructed to self-quarantine leading up to their surgery.
“They’re going really well, a lot of the patients are grateful to get these procedures, but they also want to shorten their length of stay as much as possible,” Roberts said. “We want to continue to provide a safe place for our patients.”
Families of several young women who died in a limo crash in Cuthogue in 2015 gathered in Smithtown for the five-year anniversary of the crash. Photo by David Luces
For the families of the four women who tragically died in a 2015 limousine crash on County Route 48 in Cutchogue, the grief and pain from that fateful day has never gone away.
Families of several young women who died in a limo crash in Cuthogue in 2015 gathered at the five-year anniversary of the crash. Photo by David Luces
The families of Amy Grabina, Lauren Baruch, Stephanie Belli, and Brittney Schulman gathered by a Smithtown street July 16 that was named in honor of their daughters next to Smithtown High School West. The group tied purple ribbons around the street sign and were also joined by the parents of four women who were injured and survived the crash.
“Due to the irresponsibility of some and negligence of others, those four women did not return, while four passengers returned physically and mentally scarred,” said Steven Baruch, father of victim Lauren Baruch. “It is five years after the fact and we are still tortured by many unanswered questions … that the picture of what actually happened remains unclear.”
At a press conference after the ceremony, Robert Sullivan, a lawyer for the Baruch family, revealed new information on the case. The lawyer showed an email from a Southold resident that was sent to town officials three years before the fatal crash. The resident in the email warned about the potential for an accident to occur on the intersection that killed the four women.
In addition, the attorney showed a newly surfaced ambulance report shows that there was a front-seat passenger in Steven Romeo’s pickup truck when it crashed into the limousine. The report says she refused medical care at the scene.
“It states on the report that she was the front seat passenger in the red pickup truck, so she saw the whole thing, ” Sullivan said. “That information was never given to us for three years. It was never turned over to the families or lawyers. Why is that? It is all part of a cover-up.”
Lawyers for the families have tried to interview the women, but have been unsuccessful as she has been uncooperative, according to the attorney.
“We have tried to depose this lady to find out what she saw, its [been] five years,” Russell said.
The Baruch and Grabina families are suing the Town of Southold and Suffolk County, claiming that they were negligent in failing to make the intersection safe before the accident.
Families of several young women who died in a limo crash in Cuthogue in 2015 gathered at the five-year anniversary of the crash. Photo by David Luces
The limo carrying the eight women, who were out celebrating an upcoming wedding, attempted to make a U-turn on Sound Avenue when it was struck by Romeo’s vehicle. The limo driver, Carlos Pino, was indicted on criminally negligent homicide charges, though the charges were thrown out by the State Supreme Court in 2016. Romeo pleaded guilty in 2017 to driving while impaired and was sentenced to a 90-day license suspension and fined $500.
Family members said they were denied justice.
Following the 2015 East End crash and a 2018 accident in upstate Schoharie County, New York passed legislation aimed at the limousine industry. The bill, signed into law by Governor Andrew Cuomo (D) in January, requires passenger seat belts, drug and alcohol testing for drivers and increased penalties for illegal U-turns and includes a website where complaints can be made.
The families also called for the Safe Limo Act to be brought to President Donald Trump’s (R) desk and signed into federal law. The bill would set new federal limousine safety rules and standards for seat belts, seat integrity and fund crash safety research, among other things.
They said they are hoping something good can come from something tragic.
“The Safe Limo Act will ensure that the industry will follow the same protocols throughout the entire country,” said Nancy DiMonte, a mother of one of the crash survivors. “We have worked tirelessly to help New York become the forefront of advanced limousine safety measures and we are now prepared to institute these bills nationwide.”
Fred Drewes of Mount Sinai came upon this colorful scene on July 10. He writes, ‘The pilings at Satterly Landing on Shore Road in Mt. Sinai Harbor have been decorated with interesting and pleasing art work. Each conveys a hopeful message and hope for the future.’
Brian Murphy, the captain of the Ginny Marie, brought his schooner into Port Jefferson this past week. Photo by Kyle Barr
The 39-foot schooner Ginny Marie has made its temporary home in Port Jefferson, leaving another tally for community members, officials and historians trying to bring in tall ships to the historic harbor.
The Ginny Marie at dock. Photo by Kyle Barr
Captain of the Ginny Marie, Brian Murphy, is a Northport resident and retired Stony Brook University Hospital nurse of 16 years. He said he wanted to bring in this boat to share his love of being out on the water at the mercy of the wind.
“I just want to thank everyone, bring people out and sail,” Murphy said. “I love people, and I love bringing attention on the boat.”
The type of schooner design dates back to William Atkin in 1927. This more modern version of those vessels started being built in the 1980s, but it wasn’t until 18 years later that the Ginny Marie actually launched. Other than a more modern countertop, the boat builders wanted much of it to be without current technologies and amenities.
Other than that, a number of interesting pieces dot the ship’s design. Behind the boat’s wheel stands a binnacle, a “museum piece,” Murphy said. The cleats, or the anvil-shaped devices to which the ropes are tied, are shaped like alligators, dragons are carved into the end of the flagstaff and the vessel even includes an old, verdigris-covered belaying pin from the Shanty, an Atkin-designed vessel.
“It took them 18 years to do this, and you end up with a very unique boat,” the Ginny Marie captain said.
The two-masted schooner is allowed six passengers and a crew, which currently includes Murphy and a fellow seaman who’s training aboard. The dimensions include the 39-feet on deck, plus an 8-foot bowspirit. It weighs 16 tons with an 11.5-foot beam, a 6-foot draft and a 34-foot waterline.
Chris Ryon, Port Jeff village historian and member of the Tall Ship Committee, said they will continue to bring more ships into the harbor. Last year brought in multiple crafts, including the historical 120-foot Amistad and much smaller Lady Maryland.
“I’m so happy to have a schooner here,” Ryon said. “Port Jefferson deserves a schooner.”
The Ginny Marie is moored at the dock next to Harborfront Park for people to see and potentially speak to its captain. The boat is expecting to host small charters at $55 a head, six people at a time for two hours, three times a day.
What’s the best thing about sailing?
“The best part about sailing is you get off the dock, you hoist those sails and you’re gone,” Murphy said.
Port Jefferson Station resident Gerard Romano spied this group of roses blooming by the Port Jefferson Village Center on June 15, a perfect accompaniment to the poem below.
Carl Safina and Patricia Paladines. Photo from WMHO
Save the date! The Ward Melville Heritage Organization continues its Master Class series with Forces of Nature: Travel, Conservation and Love, on Wednesday, July 29 via Zoom at 1 p.m.
Forces of Nature brings you internationally renowned conservationist, Endowed Professor of Nature and Humanity at Stony Brook University, and Macarthur Genius recipient, Dr. Carl Safina and his wife, Patricia Paladines, a photographer, naturalist and writer.
The couple will engage you with powerful stories of travel, their drive to conserve the environment near and far, and their love of nature and each other. With each story, they will challenge you to see the natural world, how humankind is responsible for changing it, and what those changes mean for us and the nonhumans we share it with.
To register for this free event, please email [email protected] or call 631-751-2244.
In the life sciences, progress works incrementally.
The cell theory, for example, began in the 1600s with the observation of a cellular composition of cork bark with one the first microscopes. There was no cell theory (all the organisms we see are composed of cells) until 1838. The cell doctrine (cells arise from preexisting cells) came a generation later in the 1850s. A decade later, stain technology was introduced. In the 1930s electron microscopes were introduced. Molecular biology wasn’t introduced until the 1950s.
With each incremental advance, new tools, new data and new experiments are carried out. This can result in new insights on how life works, and it can be applied to disease in humans and other living things.
We manipulate life when we treat it because nature has no doctors or living things are at the whim of luck for their survival and evolution allows the healthiest, the most adapted, to survive and pass on their lucky genes. But today’s scientists can use a great deal of that incremental knowledge and apply it to our benefit.
One lead I find very exciting to read about and I am confident the next generation of science students will be excited by the advances taking place — It is now possible to begin a field of molecular neurology. The physiology of nerve cells is well worked, and we know how nerve impulses are transmitted and how reflexes form, and many other experimental approaches have provided an understanding of normal and diseased functioning of the nervous system. But the genes involved have been elusive.
Two fields have been added to the arsenal of approaches for exploring this. One is the field of stem cell research. The other is the use of fruit flies as model organisms to study the molecular genetics of fruit fly brains. Flies have the advantage of a limited number of activities that can be explored. They have courtship rituals, they have innate responses to gravity or to light, and they have vision, hearing, and taste as well as response to pain.
Some of the biochemical pathways in fruit flies are also found in humans and there is a surge of interest in using two approaches. One is finding chemicalsthat shift slumbering stem cells into active nerve cells. This would allow treatments in coming years for neuromuscular disorders like multiple sclerosis. It could also slow down the aging process in which our stem cells lose the capacity to replace aged and dying neurons in the brain causing senility and other neurological disorders like Parkinson disease.
I am also a realist and historian of science. I know that such imagined future worlds can take decades or generations to achieve. We do not live in a totally known universe, and we only know a fraction of the way life has evolved over 3 billion years on earth. But by studying gene mutations involved with neuron formation and function, of stem cell activation, and of how humans can devise interventions for our health, we can feel confident that a lot more useful knowledge will emerge.
My realist side also tells me that all knowledge can be abused and we have learned to enact legislation to regulate most of our scientific and technological and malevolent intentions or warped values so that some do not exploit new technologies and shut down the progress needed to enlighten us and benefit us in an always troubled world.
Elof Axel Carlson is a distinguished teaching professor emeritus in the Department of Biochemistry and Cell Biology at Stony Brook University.
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