Candidate Profile: Bonnie Brady For East Hampton Town Board

East Hampton NY

03 November, 2019

7:56 PM

Description

EAST HAMPTON, NY — Suffolk County residents will be hitting the polls soon to elect local representatives. The race is on in local town and village races leading up to Election Day, which, this year, falls on Tuesday, November 5. Patch asked those running for office to answer questions about their campaigns and will be publishing candidate profiles in the days leading up to the election. Bonnie Brady, 56, of Montauk is running on the Conservative, Libertarian, and Independence lines and seeking election to the East Hampton Town Board. Her opponents include Democrats Sylvia Overby and David Lys and Betsy Bambrick, running on the Conservative, Libertarian and Independence lines. Brady and her husband Dave Aripotch have two daughters in college. She earned a BA in journalism from the University of South Carolina 1984 and paramedic certification from the State University at Stony Brook, College of Health & Sciences in 1996. She has served as Executive Director of the Long Island Commercial Fishing Association for 19 years. Check out Patch's full Q&A with Bonnie Brady below. Patch: The single most pressing issue facing our community is _______, and this is what I intend to do about it. Bonnie Brady: Affordable housing for local residents, without disadvantaging seniors on fixed incomes. I plan on working with anyone and everyone, builders, planners, school officials, school boards, seniors, to fix this decades-old problem, which has devastated our local communities, before it's too late. P: What are the critical differences between you and the other candidates seeking this post?: B: I live in Montauk, since 1989. I am the only candidate from our hamlet. I am the only 16-year veteran of a volunteer fire department (Montauk FD) and the only former paramedic. During those 16 years, I answered hundreds of calls, both fire and ambulance, worked through Hurricane Bob in charge of 3,000 people at the Montauk Manor along with the late John Mulligan, and became a certified firefighter. I know what it is like to jump out of bed at a moment's notice because duty calls and your community is depending on you. I am uniquely familiar with EMS, local fire department needs, and overall emergency preparedness. As a Peace Corps Volunteer, I spent almost two years in a bush post in Cameroon working on a primary health care initiative for women and infants within my hospital district. I am the executive director of the Long Island Commercial Fishing Association; I have 20 years of experience dealing with regulatory issues at all levels of government, federal, state, and local. I am the wife of a commercial fisherman, my husband moved out east from Babylon to live and fish out of Montauk in the 1970s. He is gone 300 days a year, often for days at a time. I am keenly aware of the difficulty that local people face in making a living in East Hampton sufficient to live here, let alone for our children and retiring parents to stay. I have been an assistant to a US Senator, a reporter, and many more things. I do not believe that any other candidate for office this year has the range of professional experiences that I do, spanning the world. Those experiences not only shape my understanding of what it takes to live year-round in East Hampton but give me a unique tool-kit to draw upon to solve problems. One of the differences that I have with at least one incumbent candidate is that I do not support the Deepwater Wind South Fork Wind Farm (SFWF) for renewable energy in the Town of East Hampton. Offshore wind is an extremely expensive, highly inefficient energy source that only yields on average 36% of the nameplate value yearly, (i.e. 100 MW nameplate =36 MW actual energy) it works even less (26%) in the summer when the wind is less, it requires gas, not batteries, 24/7 not only just for back up but also for electric grid equilibrium and will do nothing toward the LIPA secondary goal of the SFWF RFP directive to improve the area's resiliency in case of extreme events. The primary goal was to defer the need to repair the electric grid- which anyone living on the East End has been watching being done seven days a week for the last year at least, so so much for deferral. The carbon footprint of the creation of thousands of tons of steel and fiberglass and approximately 4000 pounds of rare earth minerals for EACH turbine, along with thousands of gallons of synthetic oils, hydraulic fluids and greases within the nacelle of each turbine, make it far less than a carbon neutral energy source. Add to that they have to ship each turbine on a diesel powered transfer boats to a jack up barge from Europe, kind of blows a rather large hole in the concept of being "green." The biological effects of construction, which include jet plowing (hydraulically liquefying the ocean floor a target of four to six feet) hundreds of miles of ocean floor benthic habitat to lay EMF emitting cable and pile driving turbines hundreds of feet into the ocean floor on an extremely sensitive cod nursery area for the fish themselves, and to whales, including the extremely endangered North Atlantic Right Whale (NARW) and others whales and marine mammals make it a completely ludicrous project for all. Add to it the bird and bat life that occupy the same area traveling through the Atlantic Flyway. Offshore wind is an industrialization of the ocean floor that is unnecessary and will not solve our town's carbon footprint issue, but will make foreign energy companies rich with production tax credits (24% on the cost of construction) and LIPA earning renewable energy credits worth millions, while selling the power back to us at who knows the cost, because they and DWW refuse to release the terms of the Purchase Power Agreement. Additionally, from the beginning the town has done nothing to protect our fishermen, those that will be the most affected by surveying, construction and operation on Cox's Ledge itself and in the area of the extension cord to a final as yet unknown landing destination somewhere within the Town, pitting neighbor against neighbor. No scientifically effective long term monitoring program such as a 3/1/3 year before-during-after-construction monitoring program, nor mitigation or compensation for surveying and the loss of fishing time or gear, or extra travel time to avoid the turbine field itself. Zero long term protection if the fish, those that are left after pile driving and jet plowing, leave the area because of EMF and noise. Zero mitigation from a safety perspective, as the turbines themselves will affect radar, as has been shown in Europe, plus our own US National Ocean Service has said that both the HF radars used for both search and rescue, and NOAA oil spill recognition, will be rendered ineffective because of the rare earth minerals spinning in each turbine creating a magnetic field. And zero mitigation or compensation to fishermen if the cables become exposed on the ocean floor, as they have in two separate areas on Block Island, and fishermen lose income from no longer being able to access their fishing tows or fishing spots. Renewable and resilient energy should be a true townwide focus, with conservation and behind the meter initiatives that work to create less use, and true resiliency for our residents, for now and the future. And I'm ready to start that process in earnest. But the SFWF is not that project. And with its $1.6 billion dollar price tag, it will bring very limited renewable energy to our town, which will then immediately head up the island, as electrons go where the need is, while all of us on Long Island will be left holding the bill. P: If you are a challenger, in what way has the current board or officeholder failed the community? B: I believe the town board has forgotten their role as elected officials, to work for ALL of the town's residents, and to do it respectfully in a way that includes the voices of all, not just those who agree with them and their plans. Too many issues to count in Montauk, plus those that are town-wide. There is little to no consensus on a variety of issues, and when residents bring up concerns or disagree with the town, instead of working with residents toward solutions that take into account their needs, they are often just ignored, and sometimes ridiculed and treated rudely to boot. Affordable housing is the primary need for our town's locals, and frankly the sustainable future of our local families, and yet barely anything has been done in decades, so that we have lost an entire generation of locals due to the loss of the year-round rental market and home price tags hovering between $500 thousand and $1 million. Ultimately it is the single largest failure not only of this town board, but decades of previous town boards. It must be fixed before it is too late. P: Describe the other issues that define your campaign platform: B: I'm fed up with the zero-transparency and lack of appropriate process surrounding town-wide initiatives that affect us all, like the Deepwater Wind backroom deal that was cloaked in secrecy, one that disenfranchises an entire industry within our town and divides neighbor against neighbor with its transmission cable landing. Or the lack of process that seems to have approved the bones of the Gann Road shellfish hatchery move and upgrade, without SEQRA (State Environmental Quality Review Act) or planning board review. Or the hamlet plan in Montauk that was being forced down the throats of business owners and residents without full consent of the residents. It is my belief that the town board should be working for all of its residents, not just those that agree with them. I would like to see a town-wide drinking water program initiated where we test all well regions within the town to make sure we don't have more hot zones out there, not wait for there to be more contamination and then play catch-up. Wainscott residents had to wait for years for a solution while taking bucket baths and drinking bottled water, though allegedly the town was aware far before action was taken. Every resident deserves safe drinking water, it's time we get the job done for all. Townwide FD emergency communications fixes and upgrades, and emergency preparedness planning (in case of hurricane or other extreme weather event) must be done expediently before there is a tragedy. We've heard all about the Springs communications tower debacle, which has carried on for far too long without a resolution. Other fire departments within the town may also be critically close to being in an crisis situation themselves through no fault of their own. We need the town's communications department staffed fully, those within that program that are vital to our success paid commensurately and others hired if need be, and a written emergency preparedness plan for the town and all of its hamlets must be put on paper immediately, ultimately put online for the public, and updated yearly. We live in an area that is far too isolated to not have the best resources available put to affecting a plan that keeps all of its residents prepared and safe for when emergency strikes, and is updated on a regular basis for the safety of us all. P: What accomplishments in your past would you cite as evidence you can handle this job? B: I've done many things in my past job history. I've broke news stories, I've helped write legislation, I've personally had two direct 'saves,' and wrote the pilot project to bring AEDs to my hamlet in a first for Suffolk County. I've coached Little League softball and helped ease those suffering due to Hurricane Sandy. I've also waitressed, bartended and been a cab driver. Cleaned houses, too. All were worthy and I learned a lot from them. Add to it raising a family in Montauk, building our house, all the while being the shoreside support to our family's business while my husband is at sea. I don't look at any one accomplishment I've had as being that which I can cite to prove my apex worthiness as a town councilman. But what I do believe, from my holding down multiple jobs over the course of my working life, and for the last 30 years living here on the East End, is that my cumulative work history has given me a broad understanding of the needs of residents within the town, seasonally and year-round. I know how to multi-task on multiple levels and I don't give up easily.. What I can promise voters is I will bring my A-game every day to consistently do my very best for them, and all the residents of the town, to constantly try to find consensus through working respectfully with all stakeholders and differing points of view, and to craft solutions that we can all willingly accept and live with together as a community. P: The best advice ever shared with me was ... B: Someone once said to me, "Just because I don't say anything doesn't mean I don't have an opinion." I found it to be an epiphany, myself coming from an Irish family where people always let you know where they stood, they never held anything back. I try to remember that often, so that all involved in a discussion get a chance to be heard. P: What else would you like voters to know about yourself and your positions? B: That I'm competitive and like to do well. Another goal I have is to complete a half marathon before I'm 60!