Shelter Island Town Council Member

Not registered with a party

Bebon, 68, of Shelter Island, is making his first run for office on the Democratic line. An engineer, he is a retired Air Force colonel.

• Bebon said he would focus on providing safe drinking water and reducing the nitrogen load on the aquifer and surface water.
• He supports reducing the deer herd by 50% through culling to reduce tick-borne diseases and would reduce the number of four-poster feeding stations that also dispense insecticide.
• Bebon said he would help develop rental and affordable-housing ownership options for single people, young families and seniors.

DEMOCRATIC

Colligan, 72, of Shelter Island Heights, is seeking his second four-year term. He is a retired educator and Vietnam War and Desert Storm veteran, having served three years on active duty and 23 years in the Army Reserve.

• Maintain the island’s water quality by monitoring salinity levels at nearshore wells and developing a plan to deal with nitrogen problems in the middle of town, Colligan said.
• Continue with the town’s deer management plan of culling the herd, killing ticks with chemicals and educating residents about the tick hazards, and finalize a tick management program.
• More affordable housing is needed to attract young families, as well as jobs to support them, to make a balanced community, he said. The town should do more to encourage entrepreneurship and look at ways to create jobs, he said.

REPUBLICAN

Kaasik, 50, of Shelter Island, is making his second bid for office and running on the Republican Party line; two years ago, he lost a run for the board. He is a fisherman and a carpenter and serves on the Planning Board and the Baymen and Anglers Committee.

• Kaasik said more affordable housing is needed to help keep families on Shelter Island. He said the town needs residents to staff its all-volunteer fire department and EMT force.
• He would work for better control of runoff to keep pesticides and fertilizers from causing algae blooms and noticeable decreases in fishing.
• He supports bringing back controlled burning to help eradicate ticks.

CONSERVATIVE

Shepherd, 64, is running on the Conservative, Libertarian and Independence lines. He is seeking his third four-year term on the town board. He previously worked as a carpenter and landscaper.

• The island’s water availability and water quality need to be managed carefully. Saline contamination of wells is a problem in some shore areas, he said, as is nitrate contamination from septic systems in other areas.
• Shepherd said he is concerned that budget growth is continuing at a higher rate than income growth for fixed-income residents, despite not having a lot of “bloat” in town budgets, and what that means to future town services.
• He is concerned about higher housing costs and the shrinking availability of quality jobs and their combined effect on entry-level housing opportunities.

REPUBLICAN

Weisenberg, 45, of Shelter Island Heights, is running on the Republican line in her first bid for office. She is a real estate agent, fitness instructor and a licensed sign language interpreter.

• Weisenberg is a member of the town’s Water Quality Improvement Advisory Committee and said she supports a stewardship and education-based water preservation movement that encourages preserving on an individual basis as opposed to regulation.
• She favors a conservation movement to reduce the deer population and resulting tick-borne disease. She is a proponent of deer culling and dedicated burning to reduce ticks.
• To help provide more affordable housing, Weisenberg said she supports a program in which owners can be evaluated risk-free to see how their accessory cottages could become rentable units. She also supports a townwide focus on flexibility in zoning laws.