Outside of the county-wide races for Suffolk District Attorney and Sheriff, voters in Brookhaven had to decide only one town-wide race: Town Clerk.
The Brookhaven Messenger endorsed Donna Lent and she won easily with some 54,000, outpolling Democrat Ira Postell almost two-to- one.
In completing her second term as Brookhaven Town Clerk, incumbent Donna Lent continues getting the job done in many little ways in Suffolk’s biggest township, ensuring that her vital, administrative role provides superior service to the town/s residents.
Lent’s experience and education set her apart from the opponent. She helped her shepherd the duties of the office through the COVID-19 pandemic, to ensure that important daily activities – such as marriage licenses and death certificates – were provided on a safe and regular basis.
Starting as Deputy Town Clerk and continuing then in her terms as Town Clerk, Lent applied for two competitive grants that would help provide security and efficiency to the office. First one being the digital archives project. With this, she and her team were able to digitally scan and store 23 million documents. Consequently, the office has saved taxpayer money by cutting overtime with documents now just clicks away. The second project was the storage of the physical documents in a facility located in Bellport. Such hard work and attention to detail makes her particularly proud of these projects. The clerk’s office is now in the twenty-first century because of her tireless efforts.
In addition to the red wave helping to carry her over to the finish line, her opponent helped her by campaigning for causes outside of the scope of employment for a town clerk. The duties of a clerk is a necessary administrative position to handle record keeping, her opponent expressed his intentions to offer counseling services in the office. Unfortunately his bleeding heart misunderstood the job description ultimately leading to his defeat and ran out of pure intentions when attempting to mud-sling against Lent with baseless accusations of fraud.
Lent concluded her campaign from the stage at the Stereo Garden in Patchogue:
“All I can say is this. I ran a positive campaign. I stayed above the fray. It’s a shame my opponent didn’t do that. But I guess all I can say to him is ‘You’re welcome.’ Thank you for your votes… to the public. I so appreciate the trust you’ve placed in me. Thank you.”
County Legislature
Key races in Brookhaven helped the GOP retake the Suffolk County Legislature.
In the 4th Legislative District, incumbent Republican Nick Caracappa easily defeated Democrat Dawn Marie Sharrock by over 5,000 votes, with just under 600 absentees.
“It’s an honor to be on this side of history tonight. The people spoke, and we’re going to respond,” he said at Tuesday’s GOP celebration.
“I thank a lot of people tonight. I want to really thank my Mom for dragging me to those meetings, dragging me to the rallies, dragging me to the Republican clubs when I was a kid…kicking and screaming, but it resonated. It resonated to give back to my community. And I’m here today because of my mother Rose Caracappa. I’m sure she’s looking down, proud of her son, just as I was proud of her,” he added.
“I look forward to serve my community from next two years and well beyond that. to bring positive change to the residents of Suffolk County. The hardworking, middle-class families of Suffolk County are going to see a difference,” Caracappa concluded.
The lawmaker has been a leader in his community for the past 20 years, actively serving on the Middle Country School Board for seven years, and serving as President of the Union Local-393 for 14 years. He campaigned on protecting workers rights, safety, fair and equal pay, health benefits, and security for all of working families.
In the 6th Legislative District, Republican Brendan Sweeney, who currently works for the Town of Brookhaven, handling constituent issues and the ‘zombie home’ demolition program, pulled off an upset by some 1,200 votes, with a similar numbers of absentees, over Democratic incumbent Sarah Anker, who was first elected in 2011.
An excited Sweeney was pleased to join his colleagues, saying “There’s no more Democratic majority in Suffolk County,” and decrying their “crappy politics.”
“I’m just so excited, and I’m ready to get to work,” he said. “We’re going to close the door and put term limits in place for some the county…so we have no more Kate Brownings.”
The 7th Legislative District was the scene of another unexpected upset, and a rematch, with Republican Dominick Thorne defeating incumbent Democrat Robert Calarco, the legislature’s Presiding Officer. Thorne had run and lost to Colarco in 2019.
Thorne campaigned on plans to remove public funding for legislative campaigns, to make living in Suffolk County more affordable, and “to place people before special interests.”
Thorne leads by roughly 1,000 votes with fewer than 800 absentees outstanding.
