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Voters choose change
Record turnout sweeps new majority into Village Hall; Erland stays trustee
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A record number of residents — 2,355 — voted Tuesday in the Port Jefferson elections in what has resulted in a clarion call for change in the village.
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| | | From right, mayor-elect Margot Garant celebrates her ticket’s clean sweep with broom-wielding trustees-elect Leslea Snyder and Adrienne Kessel at a mobbed Ruvo restaurant in Port Jefferson Tuesday night. Photo by D. Willinger. (click for larger version) | |
Margot Garant, in her first run for elected office (her mother served three terms as mayor beginning in the 1990s) buried her opponent for mayor, sitting trustee Joe Erland, by nearly 400 votes in a landslide victory: 1,360 to 978.
Garant's coattails appeared to have helped two other first-time candidates, Leslea Snyder (1,211 votes) and Adrienne Kessel (1,079 votes), win trustee seats — Snyder by a convincing margin of almost 200 votes over incumbent Village Trustee Virginia Capon (1,013 votes). Also running for trustee was first-time officeseeker Ken Brady, who had aligned himself with Erland and Capon. Brady polled 1,034 votes, more than the incumbent but not enough to win one of the two at-large seats. Village Trustee Harry Faulknor and Mayor Brian Harty did not seek re-election.
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| | | | Residents lined up in Village Hall much of the day, waiting to pull the lever for their candidates. Photo by D. Willinger. (click for larger version) | | |
Mayor-elect Garant said the election shows the Port Jefferson community wants change, and "We're going to give it [to them]." Taking a break from dancing and being congratulated by a throng of supporters at a mobbed Ruvo restaurant following the close of the polls Tuesday, Garant said, "We're going to give the community back to the residents."
Kessel and Snyder were also celebrating at the fashionable watering hole. "The people of the village spoke," Kessel said. "I really feel very good about the win and am anxious to get to work."
At first speechless when asked her reaction to outpolling all other trustee candidates, Snyder said she was grateful for the vote of confidence. "I can't wait to get to work," she said. The best part of the whole campaign experience, Snyder said, was "the connections and friendships I developed."
Around the corner from Ruvo, at Billy's pub on Main Street, Joe Erland met with supporters, including Capon and Village Trustee Carmine Dell Aquila. Effectively sequestered in the back room by a bar packed with a young crowd obviously oblivious to the day's events, Erland appeared stunned by the resounding defeat handed him in the mayoral race. He said he was "surprised" by the lopsided result, summing it up with "It is what it is." Erland added he is looking forward to working with the new board. He returns to the Village Board to complete his second term as trustee.
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| | | After 9 pm the doors to Village Hall were locked, but it took another 20 minutes for those already waiting inside to finish voting. Photo by D. Willinger. (click for larger version) | |
Not so Village Trustee Virginia Capon, whose defeat removes the incumbent from office after one term. Capon said she "enjoyed her service with the board." "I still believe in the issues I pursued," she told this reporter at Village Hall, while waiting for a call to go through on her cell phone. When she got connected she told her party, "We got wiped off the face of the earth — all three of us."
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