Pontieri to run again

The Patchogue Village election will take place in March 2024. Recently, five-time elected mayor Paul Pontieri announced he will be running again, along with deputy mayor Jack Krieger and village board trustees Thomas Ferb, Lizbeth Carillo, all for four-year terms, and the newly appointed trustee Kevin Weeks, who has been filling in for Patrick McHeffey’s vacated seat, will run to complete the two remaining years.

Also, longtime village court justice Patti Romeo has announced her retirement. In her place, associate village court justice Kerri N. Lecherecker will be running to fill the seat.

A campaign fundraiser will be held for the Patchogue 2024 team on Wednesday, Sept. 20 at 5 p.m. at Lombardi’s on the Bay. Contributions are $150 per person payable to The Friends of Patchogue, 127 South Ocean Avenue, Apt. P. Patchogue, NY 11772.

EDITORIAL PROMISES MADE AND GOALS MET

Back in 2004 our editorial department wrote an editorial holding the new mayor to a set of expectations. All of which have been made.

Including: A business district around the Patchogue Theatre for the Performing Arts to allow entertainment related businesses to thrive and attract shoppers; filling the Four Corners;  road improvements; sewer expansion; theater renovations; waterfront improvements; updating the village’s code books; street closings policy; and lastly creating a positive, working partnership between village hall, the chamber of commerce, the theater board and the business improvement district.

The editorial ended with a hope Pontieri would hang it on the wall, and like his promises to complete the above, he did just that. This editorial still hangs on his wall today.

Furthermore, in 2006, at a time when the Village of Patchogue’s Pontieri administration had just come out of another election, there was opposition to the then-new condos being built at Copper Beach Village and Bay Village.

An op-ed titled “Imagine Patchogue’s future” was written by then-trustee and current village clerk, Lori Devlin, and published in this newspaper.

Mayor Paul Pontieri said he felt as though not being bound to an official master plan allowed for more spontaneous and better-suited projects. Looking back, he said, the village was able to take advantage of opportunities and infill areas identified as blighted in the community, while staying open to the ideas of developers and business owners.

The idea at the time, Devlin added, was to marry the theatre to the arts community at Artspace and bring feet on the street with Copper Beech, the first condo development close to Main Street and the railroad. Then, she said, Bobbique came, attracted by the increase in nearby residents. Other notable developments along the way include Tritec at the Four Corners and Blue Point Brewery’s move to the Briarcliffe building. The idea, according to Devlin in 2006, was to take the opportunity to reshape the village, while also preserving its heritage as a bustling center of commerce and attractive vacation spot.

Then came the restaurant boom, and the rest is, well, history.

The piece also went into detail about “imagining” a fully revitalized village with the theatre, accessible waterfront, new parks, community gardens, transportation, shops and restaurants attracting visitors to shop and dine. Current residents no longer have to imagine. All of those goals have been met.

Additional goals met also include the former Halcyon Manor that has now been made into the recreation center at 380 Bay Avenue, and the development of Copper Beech and the former Smithport Hotel, now known as the Bay Village Condominiums.

And more recently in 2021, Pontieri said wish list items at that time included completing the Shorefront Park shoreline project, filling the now-vacant Burlington building, and continuing to create a family-friendly atmosphere in the downtown. All of which have also been completed with the expected opening of the NYU Langone in the former Burlington Building.

Our community knows the impact Pontieri and his administration has had and we should all applaud him for dedicating another four years in service to our Great Village of Patchogue.