mccaffrey advocates pension plan bailout that makes sewer project look like a ten cent superfecta at suffolk otb. note that all residents of suffolk legislative district 14 should form opinion on the mccaffrey bailout
Conservative Tom Gargiulo suspends campaign for Suffolk legislative seat & remains silent on kevin bailout
Tom Gargiulo has suspended his campaign for the Suffolk County Legislature's 14th District seat. Photo Credit: Ed Betz
A Conservative Party candidate for the Suffolk County Legislature who lost his own party's ballot in last month's primary election has suspended his campaign, even though his name will stay on the Democratic ballot line in November.
Tom Gargiulo was designated as candidate for the 14th District as part of a Democratic-Conservative cross-endorsement deal to take on incumbent GOP Legis. Kevin McCaffrey, who had the minor party line in the past. McCaffrey waged a Conservative write-in campaign, winning the June 25 contest 186-146.
Gargiulo’s decision to suspend his campaign came to light after Rich Schaffer, the Suffolk County Democractic chairman, sent an email to party members last week announcing the cancellation of a $150-a-head Gargiulo fundraiser set for July 11 in Lindenhurst.
Schaffer said Gargiulo re-evaluated his campaign after the primary loss diminished his chances of winning on just the Democratic line.
Gargiulo was upset about the harshness of the political attacks during the primary especially on the issue of abortion, which he opposes because of his Catholic faith.
“It really hurt, and it was hard for me,” said Gargiulo, a retired teacher who is active in church work. He said he plans to send a letter to Conservative voters to make clear his stand.
McCaffrey said he has “no regrets” about his campaign, adding that Gargiulo — by accepting the Democratic ballot line — “had to expect some of the splatter” from the party’s liberal stands on such issues as late-term abortion and voting rights for felons.
“I never really wanted to campaign against Tom,” said McCaffrey, who has known Gargiulo for 30 years. “I’m just glad it came to this happy ending.”
Suffolk County Has $4 Billion Plan to Update How It Handles Sewage
The initiative seeks to reduce residents’ and businesses’ reliance on cesspools, septic system
Suffolk County officials announced a $4 billion plan Tuesday to slash residents’ and businesses’ reliance on cesspools and septic systems, which have been identified as a primary source of nitrogen pollution in groundwater and in local bays.
About 74% of the Long Island county’s 1.5 million residents rely on cesspools or septic systems. Cesspools, which collect sewage sludge underground and send it seeping into groundwater, were outlawed by Suffolk in new construction in 1973.
The county’s Department of Health Services said it would roll out the new wastewater plan in four phases over the next 50 years to address nearly 380,000 harmful residential and commercial systems.
The initiative would replace the old cesspools or septic systems with individual nitrogen-reducing systems, or connect home properties directly to sewers. Existing federal and state funding will pay for the first phase of the plan.
Suffolk deputy county executive Peter Scully said excess nitrogen in local waters over several decades had caused harmful algal blooms, destroyed marine habitat and harmed the shellfish industry.
“What has become clear over the past 15 years is that all of the negative impacts that have been predicted are happening,” Mr. Scully said.
He said water quality would noticeably improve within 10 years of the implementation of the plan.
The plan also establishes priority areas where eliminating certain cesspools and septic systems will have the most immediate benefit to the environment, such as communities along the South Shore, according to Mr. Scully.
Christopher Gobler, director of the New York State Center for Clean Water Technology at Stony Brook University, said the septic-based approach was unsustainable and that the new plan was the best way to address the environmental degradation that had occurred in the county.
Suffolk’s wastewater problems haven’t before been addressed countywide. Projects meant to address the problem throughout the years have been delayed by high costs and political corruption, Mr. Scully said.
At the start of July, Suffolk County updated its sanitary code to help address the sewer issue. The county code doesn’t require homeowners to update their existing cesspools and septic systems. But, if residents do replace the system on their own, they must now ensure it complies with the 1973 standards required of systems for new construction.
Suffolk County offers incentives for those who voluntarily replace their cesspools with innovative, advanced-treatment systems.
Earlier this year, voters approved a project to connect nearly 6,400 homes to public sewers, a project to be paid for with $360 million in state and federal grants made available after superstorm Sandy in 2012.
Copyright ©2019 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 87990cbe856818d5eddac44c7b1cdeb8
No comments:
Post a Comment