Here are some of this week’s top stories from RiverheadLOCAL. Be sure to visit our website for more coverage of news and events in the local community.
1. Suffolk Sheriff offers ‘safe transaction zones’ for online marketplace buyers & sellers.
Suffolk residents buying or selling items through an online marketplace this holiday season can complete their in-person transactions in a safe zone established by Suffolk County Sheriff Errol Toulon.
2. Police seek public’s help locating Riverhead man.
Riverhead Police are asking for the public's help in locating a Riverhead man, Scott Pepples, 45, 5-11, 210 lbs., brown eyes, black hair. Police said Pepples has ties to the Bay Shore area.
3. Plans for Route 58 & Mill Road site, where four restaurants, including Chick-fil-A, are proposed, move forward.
The developer looking to build four restaurants on the seven-acre mostly vacant site at the corner of Route 58 and Mill Road was back before the Planning Board last night to discuss new revisions to his proposed site plan.
4. End of an era on Main Street: Balzano brothers, barbering for more than half a century, to retire: ‘It’s time for us to sit down’.
Barbers named Balzano have been clipping hair and shaving faces in downtown Riverhead for 62 years. But come Jan. 28, brothers Tony and Andy will be giving their last haircuts at the barbershop opened by their father Jerry in 1970, when he moved the business from the Peconic Avenue shop he opened in 1960.
5. Riverhead Town inks deal with PBMC to buy Second Street property for new Town Hall.
The site, originally developed by Suffolk County National Bank, includes a three-story office building, a two-story office building, a bank branch currently leased to M&T Bank and a two-story wood frame house that has been converted to office space.
6. Fifty-four Riverhead High School students named AP Scholars.
Fifty-four Riverhead High School students have been named AP Scholars, and three earned national recognition by the College Board for their scores on the PSAT/NMSQT exam in 2021.
7. Sonic says no to Riverhead because approvals took too long, according to developer.
“The years to collectively procure all necessary project approvals exceeded their limits,” developer Marc Kitchhoff told RiverheadLOCAL. The original application was filed in 2015. It gained final site plan approval last month.
8. Town Board presented revised plans for large Main Street apartment complex.
The five-story, mixed use building at 203-213 East Main Street, proposed by applicant Robert Muchnick, owner of Metro Group Properties of Long Island, has “changed significantly." since last presented, said town planners, who advocate starting the environmental review process from scratch.
9. An open letter to Palumbo and Giglio from residents of Manorville: ‘We need your help!’.
Residents of Manorville, where many private wells are contaminated with toxic chemicals, are angry that NY State has again denied grant funding for public water to 128 homes near the former Grumman facility in Calverton.
10. No time left for dawdling: Town Board needs to wake up and kick it into overdrive on comp plan — and that includes a meaningful moratorium.
Failing to adopt a moratorium while at the same time dawdling on the comprehensive plan, allowing new land uses and increased development density without the transfer of development rights — in other words, maintaining the status quo — indicate that the Town Board either doesn't grasp the urgency of these matters or just doesn't care.
RiverheadLOCAL is free to read thanks in part to the generous support of readers like you. Keep local news free. Become a member today.