The Town Board has moved another step closer to engaging a paid assessor, with leaders of local political party leaders saying they also favor eliminating the elected post.
The board has long ruminated on the question; it came to the forefront following the December resignation of the full-time elected assessor, Craig Wood.
During Tuesday’s work session, the board also heard from Cornell Cooperative Extension scientists who want to plant oyster reefs in Island harbors as part of CCE’s Back to the Bays initiative.
Political parties endorse appointed position
Leaders of the local political parties — Heather Reylek for the Democrats and Gary Blados for the Republicans — spoke together to demonstrate that they’re united in endorsing the switch to have assessor as an appointed position (typically, candidates for assessor run across party lines).
“How often have you seen us stand up here together,” Reylek said as she and Blados shared a small podium in Town Hall. “This really shouldn’t necessarily be a political thing — and this goes back at least 20 years.”
Reylek referred to a recommendation long ago by former long-time Town Assessor Al Hammond to join the vast majority of New York State Towns in making the assessor an appointed position.
“We feel the time has come to make it appointed,” Reylek said. “There will be great benefits to the Town with this change because this position requires very specific skills.”
In fact, with petition deadlines looming, neither party has had success finding a candidate for the ballot for this November to fill the remainder of Wood’s 4-year term. Reylek and Blados said it’d become more challenging to find candidates for the Town’s three assessor posts — one full-time and two part-time.
“It’s not like it was 30 or 40 years ago; it’s really changed,” she said. “The job requires training and experience.”
Regarding concerns about abandoning the electorate’s will, Reylek pointed out that assessors don’t create policy; they don’t vote on legislation. “So it’s time for it to become a nonpolitical position. It would be in the best interests of Shelter Island.”
Blados agreed and praised the two part-time elected assessors — Patricia Castoldi and Judith Lechmanski. However, he wants to ensure that the process does not disrupt their positions. “I think it’s important that you get their input.”
“But I think it’s all something we can get on the same page with,” Blados said.
Councilwoman BJ Ianfolla formerly served as an elected Shelter Island assessor and led the Town Board’s study of this option. Regarding the two part-time assessors, she said:
Should the Town Board decide to appoint a full-time assessor, that person would serve a six-year term. The current part-time elected assessors could be assigned to their posts in the transition process.
“Judith and Pat [have been] part-time key members of the operation. When we get a full-time sole appointed assessor, Judith and Pat will [continue to] be part-time key members of the operation. There shouldn’t be anything different, except how they got the job.”
Supervisor Gerry Siller said the Town might have to add staff to the assessors’ office due to the heightened pace of construction on Shelter Island and a need to ensure the assessment roll accurately captures the changing values that result from development.
Lechmasnki and Castoldi weigh in
Ianfolla said New York State has long encouraged Towns to make the switch (only 4 percent of Towns still have elected assessors), and the state provides a straightforward process. In addition, by converting to an appointed position, Ianfolla said the Town could draw from a wider applicant pool, as election law requires local residency for elected officials.
Castoldi and Lechmanski also spoke. Lechmanski said it’s essential to maintain a strong separation between the Town government and the assessors’ office to avoid any appearance of bias. Assessors, she said, report directly to the state, following state rules, regulations, and guidelines.
“Having it as an elected position does create a good boundary to keep everything separate,” Lechmanski said. “Keeps it, so it’s objective and not personal.”
Former Town Attorney Bob DeStefano, assisting with the new attorney’s transition, said the assessors would continue to report directly to the state.
And, with a six-year term, Ianfollo said, “the job is safe for six years. But it’s not safe at the end of six years. If there’s any indication that bias is happening or favoritism, we could address that as a Town Board.”
Siller also noted that an appointed assessor could be fired for cause.
Deputy Supervisor Amber Brach-Williams asked the assessors, “Is this something you’d like to see happen?”
“As far as we’re concerned, elected has worked just fine for us,” Castoldi said, noting that up until Wood’s resignation, there’s been continuity in the position. Castoldi said she’s been on the job for 12 years and that Ianfolla served for 10. “We haven’t had a revolving door policy, people coming and going.”
“I don’t know what the benefit to the Town would be, other than not having an election every other year,” she said.
Siller said an immediate benefit would be having a qualified assessor on the job from the start.
“In the past, we’ve had some assessors who were wonderful people who can win an election but didn’t have a clue what they were doing,” he said. “The two chairmen are having a tough time finding a candidate, never mind qualified. We owe it to the Town to get the most professional person we can in there.”
Siller said Castoldi, already a real estate appraised, and Lechmanski, trained on the job. “You learned it and did a damned good job. The Town is growing in every aspect, and I feel it’s time to bring a professional.”
Castoldi said that Shelter Island would have to “poach” an assessor from another town.
Back to the Bays oyster reefs
Next to speak was Kate Rossi-Snook, a marine biologist who serves as Shelter Island School Board Vice President. She talked about the Cornell Cooperative Extension Back to the Bays Initiative, proposing the Town host one or more oyster hatchery tanks and assist in developing oyster reefs.
Doing so, she said, would create opportunities for Island volunteers to directly engage in improving the health of the Island’s waterways. Kimberly Barbour, CCE’s marine program outreach manager, and Gregg Rivara, CCE’s marine program aquaculture specialist, also spoke.
Currently, the Town participates in CCE’s shellfish restoration project, which is based at its marine learning center and hatchery at Cedar Beach in Southold, Barbour said. Through CCE, the Town receives hundreds of thousands of seed scallops, clams, and oysters for dispersal around the Island to support shellfishing here.
The oyster reef program differs in two critical ways: CCE would establish the oyster reefs just off-shore in known, relatively accessible locations, and the oysters planted there would not generally be available for harvest. CCE would mark the reef sites as no-take zones on mapping services used by individuals engaged in recreational and commercial shellfish harvests.
The construction and maintenance of small oyster hatchery tanks and small reefs (they’re not large structures that would inhibit navigation) would provide CCE with new ways to engage Islanders and summer visitors in community stewardship of marine resources Barbour said.
Back to the Bays, created in 2015, enables people to “touch and feel and see what these things living under the water are and understand their importance to our local marine environment,” Barbour said.
To establish the oyster reef program here, CCE would recruit volunteers to plant and care for the shellfish and participate a shell recycling efforts. In addition, the Town would provide accessible waterfront locations — such as Town-owned Volunteer Park — to house remote hatchery tanks for spat-on-shell oysters. And, the Town would identify possible reef locations in town waters.
CCE would seek private donations and public grant funding to ensure long-term success.
Rossi-snook described the proposed oyster hatchery as a single tank filled with bay water, circulating via a small pump and filter system. First, CCE would place cured shells on trays or bags within the tank. Then, volunteers would add eyed larvae — typically in June.
“Clams, they move around using their foot; scallops, they clap around,” Rossi-Snook said. “Oysters, once they set, they’re there.”
Once set, volunteers would move the oysters to a nearby location to allow further growth in a protected floating system (with no pump) until the oysters are sturdy enough to be placed at the reef sites later in the summer.
Ideally, oyster spat should be set on oyster shells that have been appropriately cured, Rossi-Snook said. She said that Sylvester Manor has agreed to provide space to cure shells gathered by volunteers.
Siller said the Town Board, “conceptually, is all for it.” But would need to work out particulars.
Commercial operations on Town-owned lands
The board continued a discussion of permits for commercial operations on Town-owned land. The latest proposal comes from Mark Mobius, who runs EcoDiscovery, a program that leads children ages 5 to 8 on guided explorations of open spaces throughout the Island, including land purchased with Community Preservation Fund revenues.
Mobius said he’d run the program for two years and that a typical group includes eight children and an assistant.
“The intent is to develop an appreciation for our natural resources,” he said. “The parents really like the results — the kids come out noticing things. I think that’s what its about; exposure to places and activities they normally wouldn’t get to do.”
Town Attorney Stephen F. Kiely noted that many areas Mobius visits with his groups were purchased with CPF resources. The use of these locations depends on the stewardship plans put in place by the CPF Advisory Board.
Other business
In other business, Deputy Town Supervisor Amber Brach-Williams said she’s awaiting a third bid on the Town’s pending GASB75 audit. Now that the Town employs close to 100 people, it must engage an actuarial firm to audit certain aspects of employee benefits programs.
Brach-Williams said she is also working with the Suffolk County Water Authority to discuss West Neck Water customer rates. In addition, town personnel are looking into grants to offset capital costs for necessary improvements.
Bob DeStefano, former Town Attorney who is serving as a consultant during his successor’s transition, reported that the Town has yet to receive a response to its notice of intent to tear down an abandoned house on Cozy Lane. And the board reviewed corrections required for the Town’s Employee Manual that it will vote on a future meeting.
It also confirmed items to be enacted during the regular Town Board meeting on Friday, March 11, including wetlands permits, a public assembly request for a traditional Indian wedding procession to a ceremony at The Ram’s Head Inn on a Friday morning in August, and an appeal from the Highway Department for emergency repairs to a vital piece of equipment.
Supervisor Siller said the Town was working with Shelter Island School Superintendent Brian Doelger to pilot a program to shuttle teachers and staff to the ferries using a Town-owned van.
“He said it saved 45 minutes on his community by walking across and taking the van,” Siller said.
