Every election season, people ask whether RiverheadLOCAL will endorse candidates for office. The answer, as always, is no — and it’s been that way since the day we launched nearly 16 years ago.
We’ve never believed it’s our role to tell you how to vote. Our job is to give you the information you need to make up your own mind. Through our reporting, we do our best to dig into the issues that matter most — taxes, development, housing, schools, public safety, and how decisions made at Town Hall actually affect your life.
There was one exception. Back in 2015, I wrote a personal column explaining how I planned to vote in the race for town supervisor. It wasn’t an endorsement from RiverheadLOCAL — just me, sharing my own reasoning as a voter and as someone who covers local government. The supervisor’s race that year had three candidates, each running on different party lines — Democratic, Republican, and Conservative. I voted for the Conservative Party candidate, based on the issues and the record, not the label next to the name.
I’ve always believed that party affiliation shouldn’t determine your vote, especially in local elections. At this level, we’re not talking about national policy or ideology; we’re talking about who will best serve our community, who listens, who does the work, and who has the integrity to put Riverhead first.
My perspective on this comes not just from years of covering local government, but from having served in it. I was elected to the Riverhead Town Board in 1987 as a Democrat with the cross-endorsement of the Conservative Party. Even then, I didn’t vote along party lines — and that often got me in trouble with Democratic Party leaders. But I believed then, as I do now, that local government works best when decisions are based on what’s right for the community, not on political loyalty or ideology. In case you’re wondering, I’m enrolled as an unaffiliated voter — not a member of any political party — and that’s how it’s been for most, if not all, of my 25 years in community journalism.
Most endorsements you’ll see elsewhere are written by people who don’t live here — editorial boards based miles away, folks who aren’t involved in the daily coverage of Riverhead’s challenges and successes. They tend to parachute in around election time, make a few calls, and decide who “should” lead our town. That’s not how we operate.
We live here. We report here. We care deeply about what happens here. And we believe our readers are smart, thoughtful, and engaged enough to weigh the facts and decide for themselves who deserves their vote.
That’s how we started, and that’s how we’ll stay.
Thank you for trusting us to keep you informed — and for showing up in this election to make your voice heard.
The survival of local journalism depends on your support.
We are a small family-owned operation. You rely on us to stay informed, and we depend on you to make our work possible. Just a few dollars can help us continue to bring this important service to our community.
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