Southampton Town supervisor candidates verbally spar over youth programs, affordable housing in Flanders

Recommend

Comment

Email this article

Print this article

Get news alerts

RSS Feeds

Share Digg Mixx Linked In Facebook Twitter Delicious

see all images

Neither candidate for Southampton Town supervisor wants to look Flanders, Riverside and Northampton children in the eye and tell them that their youth programs have been cut.

Instead, Republican incumbent Linda Kabot and Democratic challenger Anna Throne-Holst offered different solutions on how to possibly save the programs offered by the town’s Youth Bureau, which is facing deep cuts if the Town Board passes Ms. Kabot’s proposed $78.8 million 2010 budget on November 20.

Ms. Kabot explained during a debate Monday night that was hosted by the Flanders, Riverside and Northampton Community Association that surgical cuts must be made to next year’s budget because the town is facing multimillion-dollar deficits. She told the nearly 50 people in attendance at the David W. Crohan Community Center in Flanders that her proposed budget is $4.5 million leaner than the current spending plan.

The Youth Bureau will be hit with a 38 percent reduction in next year’s budget if the town’s spending plan passes as-is. The bureau’s full-time salary line will drop from $245,000 this year to $131,000 next year, while its part-time staff salaries will be reduced from $140,000 this year to $102,000 in 2010.

Fewer staff members mean that the hours at the drop-in centers in Flanders and Southampton, which provide a safe place for kids to hang out after school, may be scaled back. The Youth Bureau stands to lose two full-time workers, a youth counselor and an assistant director if the 2010 budget passes as currently proposed.

Taking an opposite position from her opponent, Ms. Throne-Holst said that restoring Youth Bureau services in Flanders is a priority of hers, adding that she will fight to restore cut funding.

“You have my commitment, like you did last year, to get funding back,” Ms. Throne-Holst said.

She also said that cutting youth programs will only cost the town more in the long run because if children and teenagers do not receive these services, they are more prone to getting involved with crime and drugs.

Even with the necessary cuts to next year’s budget, which also includes 44 layoffs throughout the town, Ms. Kabot said she is still committed to offering youth services in Flanders.

“That commitment will be there,” she said, but added that unless residents wanted their taxes to go up, the town has to scale back on staffing levels.

The town might also have to rely on more volunteers to keep programs running at the Flanders Community Center, which operates as a drop-in center for children, Ms. Kabot said.

The issue of the proposed cuts to the Youth Bureau was raised twice during Monday’s debate, once by FRNCA President Brad Bender, who moderated the debate, and again by 16-year-old Zachery Smith. Zachery, who says he participates in Youth Bureau activities at the Flanders center, said he was worried about the children of Flanders, Riverside and Northampton, and what they would do if certain programs were no longer available. He said that some kids might turn to drugs and crime.

“[These programs] keep kids off the street,” he said. “It worries me. Where are these kids going to go?”

The two supervisor candidates also sparred over affordable housing properties in Flanders. Ms. Throne-Holst said that the hamlet was already saturated with affordable housing units and should not be subject to more.

“You have your fair share,” she said.

Ms. Throne-Holst added that she has applied for grants to turn blighted and foreclosed properties into affordable housing units instead of building new ones.

Suffolk County gave the town about a dozen properties in the community with the stipulation that it build affordable homes on them, Ms. Kabot said. She said the town’s housing authority could build affordable homes rather than rental units.

Both Ms. Kabot and Ms. Throne-Holst claimed to be the fiscally responsible candidate. Ms. Kabot said she has “tirelessly worked” to find solutions to financial problems that were left behind by the previous administration. Ms. Kabot has called for temporarily piercing the town’s 5 percent tax rate cap to pay off old capital fund debts.

“They said they are asking tough questions,” she said, referring to her Democratic opponents, “but we are looking for solutions.”

Ms. Throne-Holst said she feels as if she “live[s] in an altered reality” when she listens to Ms. Kabot’s explanations of the budget. She said there were millions of dollars that were mismanaged and “until we find what that means, I will not pierce the tax rate,” she said.

Republican John McGann and Democrat Alex Gregor, the two candidates looking to succeed outgoing Southampton Town Highway Superintendent Bill Masterson, also debated on Monday night. They verbally sparred over who is more qualified to run the town’s second largest department, and both men accused each other of being politicians and not public servants.