Southold GOP Picks Talbot, Planamento For Town Board

Talbot served on the Southold Town Board from 2010 to 2013 and is currently the Senior Building and Zoning Inspector for the Village of Southampton. He was an 18-year member of the Mattituck Fire Department and is now an active member and elected Commissioner at the Cutchogue Fire Department. He’s a lifelong Southold Town resident and graduate of Mattituck High School.

Mr. Planamento, who had owned a shop on Love Lane in the early 2000s, has been a real estate agent for 18 years, affiliated with Town & Country Real Estate, which recently joined the Connecticut-based real estate firm William Raveis.

In addition to serving on the Zoning Board, Mr. Planamento has served as the town’s liaison to the Suffolk County Planning Commission, as Vice Chair of the Southold Board of Assessment Review, a member of the town’s Architectural Review Board and 375th Anniversary Committee.

“We really need to take a hard look at affordable housing,” said Mr. Talbot. “We have had a lot of talk, but we haven’t had a lot of success in moving too many projects forward. Cutchogue is one of the only communities that hasn’t had any projects, and we probably have some good parcels in the HALO zones [around the center of the hamlet].”

“We need something, in my mind, for the youth,” he said, adding that “one of the most defeating thins for me was when Southold did not approve that project in Mattituck,” referring to a proposal about a decade ago for a sports complex on the Main Road just west of the Mattituck shopping plaza.

“I think it’s a priority for the East End to keep young people here,” agreed Mr. Planamento. “People are very much excited about accessory dwelling units (ADUs). The code allows any full-time resident to develop an accessory structure with an ADU in it, but that structure needs to have a certificate of occupancy that’s three years old.That’s a hot button topic that’s very easily resolved.”

He added that he would also be supportive of allowing second homeowners to convert space on their property to accessory dwelling units, and that he would “like to see more follow-up” to ensure the units are being used for affordable housing.

The zoning update has been a very long process,” said Mr. Planamento. “I come from the private sector, where things happen quickly, and I would argue this is a long time coming.”

He added that, as a member of the Zoning Board of Appeals, he is charged with protecting the existing zoning code, and is “obligated to grant the minimum relief possible.”

“As a Town Board member, my role would switch, and I would help determine the code issues that need to be addressed,” he said. “I’d have a better seat at the table.”

“Zoning updates are a good thing,” said Mr. Talbot. “They’re needed. Some particular uses have been in place for 50 years. I always thought it would be good to get a group of people together and talk about new uses in town — what new things need to be put in the code so they’ll be allowable and people don’t have to work too hard and spend a lot of money to get a project approved.”

Mr. Talbot said he’s winding down his career as a building department official, and now that his kids are grown he feels he has the time to return to a role in government in the town where he’s lived all his life.

“There’s been a change of demographics in town, but everyone that’s out here wants the same thing — a safe community, open air, farming, and I think I’d be in a good position to continue to push that forward,” he said.

Mr. Planamento, who grew up in Yorktown Heights in Westchester County, remembers how his small town became “really heavily developed. That left a big mark on me as far as how I view development.”

He had family in Southold when he was a kid, and decided after college that “sleepy little quiet Southold was the right place to be.”

“I miss the farm fields of cauliflower and potatoes,” he said of the Southold he remembers from his youth. “But the horse is out of the barn, and we need to reflect on where we are today… It’s a changed community. My heart is in our community. I’m here for everyone.”