Brookhaven Supervisor Ed Romaine has been out of town on vacation since Wednesday, his spokesman Jack Krieger confirmed for Patch.
His exact location is unknown. Also unknown is who Romaine, a Republican, has been communicating with during and after the storm. It is also not known whether Romaine attempted to return to Long Island prior to or after the storm, and if he was even able to do so.
Councilman Steve Fiore-Rosenfeld and Councilwoman Kathy Walsh both said they have not seen or heard from Romaine during the blizzard or afterwards - and say it is having an impact on cleanup across Brookhaven.
“It does have an impact when the leader of a township who has the authority to take command of all departments, and marshal all forces and resources is not at Town Hall,” said Fiore-Rosenfeld, a Democrat. “Clearly, his lack of presence at the helm is not helpful to our ability to respond to residents and their concerns about being snowed in and trapped in their homes.”
The councilman on Sunday wrote a scathing letter to Romaine and acting Highway Superintendent Michael Murphy calling it a "a complete and systematic breakdown in the ability of the Town Highway Department to respond to this crisis."
Walsh, who said she spent the weekend answering calls from residents at the Town's Emergency Operations Center, said many roads in her council district had not gotten a first pass from snowplows as of 4:30 p.m. Sunday, and she could not provide an answer as to why that was.
“Unfortunately, there hasn’t been a whole lot of information shared and I’m just as frustrated as residents,” Walsh said.
Councilman Daniel Panico, who was named deputy supervisor in January replacing Walsh, has been running the town in Romaine's absence.
“Dan Panico has been very helpful," Fiore-Rosenfeld said. "He’s new on the job and is doing the best he can, but he’s not the supervisor or superintendent of highways.”
Panico has not responded to multiple calls from Patch since Saturday afternoon.
Murphy has reportedly been out on a medical leave of absence during the storm, according to Walsh. Like Panico, he is newly appointed to that position following the resignation of John Rouse in January.
This leaves Town Board members asking who is in control of the Highway Department during this crisis.
“I want to praise the average highway worker, who in the last two to three days has in some cases only gotten two hours of sleep,” Fiore-Rosenfeld said. “If people in my neighborhood haven’t gotten their streets plowed, it’s not their fault. It’s the lack of leadership in Town.”
If most or even just many that would go a long way to explain why other roads went unplowed. The Supervisor has a lot to explain about regarding leaving with an impending storm on the way but if the plows the Brookhaven would normally have used were clearing the LIE I doubt if he could have done anything about it. There are only so many snow plows around. It isn't as if they are used every day. Both Islip and Smithtown have similar snow plow problems with their Supervisors still in town. The snow plows here on Long Island are not the heavy duty kind found upstate so they are not as able to handle this much snow. Many are owned privately are were not kept in tip top condition because we normally don't see this much snow. Can anyone recall 3 feet of snow here on Long Island before this storm? Brookhaven got its normal annual amount of snow in one storm.
plowing my street. I grew up in Huntington & lived and plowed through the "big one" in 78, we plowed 36 hrs stright, when we were done the roads were open, no GPS, no smart phones, just a CB radio & a PLAN, and that plan was to plow an assigned route and dont STOP, keep the truck moving, all night, one blade width of open road is easier than a drifted over closed road. We have seen one private plow on our street, at 6:30 sunday night, one pass. As of 5:30 am Tues. our road has not been plowed. It's not the power of the storm here its the, IT'S THE LACK OF A PLAN! Watched a Farmingville fire truck get stuck on the 16" ice shelf that greets you when you turn from Horseblock. Fed up in Crookhaven
I am still waiting to find out when the emergency meeting of the highway dept is going to take place . Because I am expecting S.F.R to ask for the immediate resignation of the guilty . As I stated yesterday the whole crookhaven thing is very boring . Try to ignore the politics Democrat Republican and work on a solution. Do not jump up on the soap box like ( S.F.R. ) this is political grand standing at it's best and when push comes to shove all the politicians will do the turtle , slip back in to their shell until the next opportunity to grand stand comes up. It would be great see standing room only at the big meeting , and give our elected officials an ultimatum. Perform or be gone no more excuses, work together or get out stop whining about each other. Ask our neighbors in Patchogue how they did it. Seek counsel nothing wrong with asking for help. And please someone go to Teds house and give him a hug and maybe cocktail we know he will not be on the road !
"canidate" "isn't doing thier job" Yeah, that's the resume of someone whose advice I want to follow.