Riverhead Supervisor Laura Jens-Smith has decided to appoint Councilman Tim Hubbard as deputy supervisor.
The appointment will be formalized by a town board vote at its next meeting on Wednesday, she said.
“He’s a hard worker and very committed to making the town a better place,” Jens-Smith said.
Jens-Smith, a Democrat serving with a Republican-majority board, said the appointment demonstrates a “commitment to working across party lines to move the town forward.” She took office Jan. 1 after defeating Republican incumbent Sean Walter in the November general election. Fellow Democrat Catherine Kent won election to the council seat vacated by retiring member John Dunleavy.
Hubbard, in his third year of his first four-year term, says he believes he can be “a bridge” between the supervisor and the other Republicans on the five-member board, council members James Wooten and Jodi Giglio. Wooten and Giglio are both serving their third terms of office.
“All good ideas are good — it doesn’t matter what party they come from,” Hubbard said.
Once the deputy supervisor position is established by the town board — as it was in Riverhead in 1987 — the supervisor makes the appointment, as per state law. The town board can make the appointment if there’s a vacancy in the deputy supervisor post for more than five days.
The current deputy supervisor, Jill Lewis, who served under both Walter and his Democratic predecessor, Phil Cardinale, is leaving the job on Feb. 20; she agreed to stay on for a short time after Jens-Smith took office to assist with the transition.
“Jill could not have been more gracious,” Jens-Smith said. “She’s a good person and she did a great job for the town.”
Jens-Smith, who initially said her campaign treasurer Daniella Brown of Laurel would succeed Lewis, decided against hiring a full-time deputy after Brown withdrew from consideration for the post. The supervisor instead decided to appoint a “budget officer” and named Bryan Carroll of Miller Place to that job. Carroll starts work on Feb. 20.
Hubbard will receive a $100 stipend but no additional compensation for the deputy post. He will preside over meetings in the supervisor’s absence and assist her with other tasks.
This is not the first time a council member has served as deputy supervisor. When Cardinale was a councilman, he served as deputy under then-supervisor Vinny Villella during his term in office, 1998-1999. Former councilman Lou Boschetti served as deputy in 1984, when then-supervisor Joe Janoski was hospitalized. At that time, the town board created the post on a temporary basis, for just 60 days. The position was revived as a permanent, full-time post three years later and filled by Monique Gablenz, who had been Janoski’s executive assistant before being named his deputy.
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