All 13 Long Island town supervisors met Friday to explore coordination of and possible reopening of summer programs and facilities.
Meeting in a Zoom discussion, they agreed to form th e Nassau/Suffolk Joint Summer Operations Task Force which is expected to produce guidelines by May 18 that are agreed upon by all of the towns.
The Suffolk County Supervisors Association, led by Babylon Town Supervisor Rich Schaffer, and the three Nassau County Town Supervisors identified these goals as essential to any reopening:
• Public Health Messaging – consistent social distancing guidelines across all communities will be vital to
ensuring broad compliance from residents
• Opening (and possible re-closing) Timelines – Syncing the timing of beach, park and facilities openings
as much as feasible, will ensure that variation between towns does not lead to a surge in crowding at one
location, due to closure at another. Additionally, if there is an increase in infection rates at some point in
the summer, coordinating the possible closure of activities will again prevent any one town or
community from being overrun.
• Beach, Park, and Playground Policies – While there is very wide-variation among the size and types of
parks resources across the Long Island Towns, coordination regarding best practices for potential each
usage, park activity, and playground policies will ensure that safest approach is applied uniformly for all
residents of Long Island.
Huntington Supervisor Chad Lupinacci said, “This is a shared effort. Just as we consider the shared service model for other purposes, from purchasing to relieving overcrowding at our animal shelters, inconsistency in policies can lead to greater demand and greater risk at a single location, which we intend to avoid as the purpose of this collaboration We are united in ensuring our residents can enjoy a safe summer. Each Town has something to offer from our parks and beaches to our waterfront facilities — we want our residents and their families to enjoy everything our Towns have to offer without adding unnecessary risk.”