Letters

Southampton Town shouldn’t be the plaything for political party chairs. Southampton Town government shouldn’t be the byproduct of nepotism and backroom deals.

Yet, here we are, seven months away from a local election that has been turned upside down by a few unjustifiably arrogant party chairs playing kingmakers [“Republican Candidate Drops Out of Southampton Supervisor Race, Joining Democratic Turmoil,” 27east.com, April 7].

The Southampton Democratic Committee chairman — the guy who insists that no deals were made — has sold out his party, his committee, and betrayed the trust of every Democrat who signed the designating petitions handed to them by committee members.

So, what do we have now? A single Democratic candidate for Town Board, an uncontested win for a town supervisor running on the Democratic and Conservative lines, an uncontested win for a highway superintendent running on the Conservative, Republican and Democratic lines, and some delightful nepotism for a Trustee candidate running on the Democratic and Conservative lines.

Nobody has done more for the local Conservative Party than the Southampton Democratic Party chairman. Golf clap, sir.

I’m not saying that Maria Moore and Charlie McArdle aren’t good candidates. They are beneficiaries of a path without resistance. That is the path bulldozed by party deals. The deals that “don’t exist” but actually do.

But, hey, the Southampton Democratic Committee suddenly finds its backbone by running a candidate to challenge Town Clerk Sundy Schermeyer, who is quite possibly the most respected, nonpartisan person at Town Hall. Now, there’s a power move.

And what of the person chosen to run for Town Board, Tom Neely? Tom is a good man, and his experience as the town’s transportation director and chair of the traffic task force make him ideally suited for the job that he ran for four years ago: highway superintendent.

We can’t have that, though, right? That would violate the selection process, the quid pro quo, the control.

I’m grateful for Michael Wright’s reporting on the matter, and, as he put it, “the crumbling of the major party ballots and the disjointed party tickets.” My hope is that more people will take notice and reject the “selections.”

I continue to call on the Southampton Democratic Committee to remove your executive board. You are being lied to and used as foot soldiers to ultimately betray the people who trust you. Every C next to a D candidate, and vice versa, is a deal that you are selling on behalf of party chairs. Stop doing it.

For the rest of us, it’s clear that we need an alternative. We need to form a new party that exists for the people of Southampton Town. I’m all in for that, because what we have now is broken.

Craig Catalanotto

Speonk