Developer made campaign donations as project came before board

Bob Morrow, the developer behind a major retail and residential development project proposed in Tuckahoe, made donations to the campaigns of three Town Board members late last year—just months before going before the Town Board to request a special zoning change only that panel can grant.

In past years, those donations would have been revealed in the Town Board members’ annual financial disclosure forms: the law required that town officials list the names of those who made donations greater than $1,000 to their campaigns on a financial disclosure form before acting on any matter that would benefit the donor, according to Assistant Town Attorney Joe Burke. But the Town Board voted in April to change the law governing the documents: Now, the State Board of Elections online listing of campaign contributions stands as the disclosure.

The Board of Elections website shows that Mr. Morrow, his company, Kenilworth Equity LTD, and his daughter Dina Bean have made approximately $23,000 in campaign donations to Town Board candidates over the past five years. Of that total, the largest amount given to any single candidate, $4,550, went to Town Supervisor Anna Throne-Holst’s campaign. An analysis of her 330 donors shows that Kenilworth Equities is among Ms. Throne-Holst’s 10 largest donors.

“It doesn’t affect me,” Ms. Throne-Holst said Tuesday of the donations. “I’ve taken in $100,000 of contributions in office. Never once has it influenced how I legislate.”

Mr. Morrow has been before the Town Board twice since March 2010 to present his proposed project, dubbed “Tuckahoe Main Street,” which would feature a 40,000-square-foot King Kullen, two free-standing restaurants, two restaurants incorporated into larger buildings, 12 to 13 small stores, and 12 apartments on 12 acres off County Road 39 just outside Southampton Village. In April, the Town Board voted unanimously to consider Mr. Morrow’s request for a planned development district, a special zoning designation granted by the Town Board that would be required for the project, which would not be permitted by current zoning at the site. About a month later, the board voted 4-1, with Chris Nuzzi dissenting, to commence a state-mandated environmental review of the PDD proposal.

An earlier form of the proposal, which featured just a King Kullen and a few retail spaces, had been put forth by Ed Glackin, the vice president of real estate for the King Kullen Company, in 2008.

Mr. Morrow also said that he had no direct involvement with the construction project until March 2010, when he officially became a partner with Southampton Ventures LLC, the entity that initiated the development and first applied to the Southampton Town Board for special zoning allowances in the spring of 2009. He did acknowledge that he had been negotiating the deal for four to five months prior—which would be roughly the time of the fall 2009 town elections.

Still, Mr. Morrow contends that he had “no inkling whatsoever” in September—when he said he made many of the donations—that he would be involved in the Tuckahoe development project, in which Mr. Glackin still held an interest. Mr. Morrow, who also built the King Kullen complex on Montauk Highway in Hampton Bays, said that he has been contributing to political parties locally since the 1990s.

“Whatever contributions I made, I made,” Mr. Morrow said Tuesday. “I live in the community. I contribute to charities. I contribute to a lot of things. I do what I feel like doing.”

According to State Board of Elections records, Mr. Morrow, Kenilworth Equities LTD and Ms. Bean donated a total of $3,950 to the “Anna Throne-Holst for Supervisor” campaign in the fall of 2009. But the records indicate the money was donated after the November 3 election; prior to the election, Mr. Morrow had personally donated $600 to her campaign. He also donated to Ms. Throne-Holst’s opponent, Republican nominee Linda Kabot.

Mr. Morrow said Tuesday that he made all of the donations before the election, but that Ms. Throne-Holst’s campaign workers deposited some of the checks more than two months later. For example, he said he wrote a check of $1,200 on September 9, 2009, but that his bank records show it was not deposited until November 27, 2009. Board of Elections records show the donation as received on November 25, a time when Ms. Throne-Holst was still a councilwoman but preparing to take over as supervisor after the November 3 election.

Kenilworth Equities Ltd. made two $1,000 donations to Ms. Throne-Holst on November 16, according to state records. Mr. Morrow noted that those checks, while made on the Kenilworth Equities account, are actually from Hamptons Sunrise LLC and Hamptons Bellows LLC, two companies related to a condominium project in Hampton Bays he is involved with. That project, which calls for condominiums in the hamlet, has not been discussed publicly at Town Hall in recent years.

Ms. Bean also made a donation of $750 to Ms. Throne-Holst on November 5, just two days after the election results were tallied, the records state.

Mr. Morrow’s Open Government Disclosure Affidavit, which was filed with the “Tuckahoe Main Street” application, states that he gave Ms. Throne-Holst $1,200 on September 9, 2009.

Ms. Throne-Holst said she was late turning in some of her campaign finance documents because of a change in her staff. “We filed within the deadline, but on the late end,” she said. “To my knowledge, he hasn’t given me anything after the election.”

The developer has also donated to former Supervisor Linda Kabot. Ms. Kabot received a total of $2,575 from Mr. Morrow—$1,000 in October 2009, when she was running against Ms. Throne-Holst; $150 in July 2009; $175 in January 2009; $250 in October 2007; and $1,000 in September 2007.

Mr. Morrow emphasized that his contributions are not illegal and that he donates to whomever he wants. “People support candidates for whatever reason they want,” he said. “There is nothing illegal about my contributions.”

Ms. Throne-Holst isn’t the only Town Board member Mr. Morrow has donated to—although she is the first Town Board candidate outside the Republican Party to receive financial support in recent years from Mr. Morrow and entities connected with him.

In the recent election, Mr. Morrow, Kenilworth Equities LTD and Ms. Bean made donations to the campaigns of all the sitting board members, except Democrat Bridget Fleming. The “Friends of Jim Malone” campaign received $1,000 on September 17, 2009, from Mr. Morrow; Mr. Malone, a Conservative, was nominated by the GOP in his Town Board candidacy. The “Friends of Chris Nuzzi” campaign received $1,000 on September 9, 2009 from Mr. Morrow. The “Friends of Nancy Graboski” campaign received a donation of $1,000 on August 6, 2003, and $250 on October 15, 2007 from Kenilworth Equities LTD. The Southampton Town Republican Committee also has been the recipient of $5,130 of the $23,000 given to town candidates in the last five years. There are no records of him donating to the Southampton Town Democratic Committee. He also made a donation of $500 to the Southampton GOP, which is a separate entity from the town’s Republican Committee.

Bob DeLuca, president of the Bridgehampton-based environmental advocacy organization Group for the East End, said his group had received phone calls from the public about Mr. Morrow’s contribution history, prompting Mr. DeLuca and his staff at Group for the East End to also research the donations. He concluded that the donations to the Town Board members, and Ms. Throne-Holst in particular, do “not look so good,” especially when there has been public opposition to the Tuckahoe project.

“The several contributions [after] the election unsettles people,” Mr. DeLuca said. “It makes people skeptical of any elected officials’ ability to stay objective.”

Mr. Nuzzi and Ms. Graboski did not return phone calls placed before deadline. Mr. Malone said simply that political contributions do not influence how he serves.

Until the Southampton Town financial disclosure form was modified in April of this year, town officials were required to report—on their financial disclosure forms—who made donations greater than $1,000 to their campaign before acting on any matter that would benefit the donor.

A new law, which took effect in April, allows the listings on the New York State Board of Elections to stand in place of the financial disclosure form, Mr. Burke said. Listing all of the donors on the financial disclosure form filed in Town Hall was “duplicative,” he said.