We’d be remiss if we didn’t take the opportunity to thank Congressman Nick LaLota (R, NY-01) for his most recent procurement of almost $4 million from an appropriations budget that has been earmarked for stormwater upgrades in downtown Smithtown and Kings Park.
While other members of Congress, Suffolk company excluded, spend their days nationalizing every aspect of their office, LaLota spends his time bringing home the bacon to each of the townships within New York’s First Congressional District.
Smithtown’s stormwater infrastructure is over thirty years old, unable to keep up with the torrential rain that causes flash floods in the streets and basements of businesses, as well as spilling road runoff into the Nissequogue River. A local municipality simply does not have the capital necessary to remediate these projects on their own, prompting help from higher levels of government.
LaLota, along with great partners in Supervisor Ed Wehrheim (R-Kings Park), Senator Mario Mattera (R-St. James), Assemblyman Mike Fitzpatrick (R-St. James), and the Smithtown Board, have been able to deliver on a new vision for Smithtown and bring it into the Twenty-First Century.
Decades of an ineffective supervisor who found that not spearheading large projects and not spending money to modernize the town allowed his approval ratings to remain high have handed Wehrheim and company a true hot potato. But in just seven years since his tenure began, Smithtown has grown leaps and bounds beyond what many could imagine.
The Town has a valuable partner in Congressman LaLota, and we eagerly await to see just what else LaLota can bring home not just for Smithtown, but the rest of Suffolk County. LaLota has made sure that not one inch of his district has gone forgotten, recently securing almost $4 million in federal dollars for Fishers Island Airport.
LaLota deserves kudos on embodying the type of constituent service to which a member of Congress should be committed, and the Smithtown team deserves equal accolades to guiding the Town through a necessary and effective revitalization process.
