Jerome Halpin leads Tim Hubbard in close Riverhead Supervisor's race, with absentees to be counted

The neck-and-neck race for Riverhead Town supervisor will come down to absentee ballots and could trigger a recount, election officials confirmed Wednesday.

Jerome Halpin, the Democratic nominee, holds a 21-vote lead against incumbent Tim Hubbard, a first-term Republican, according to unofficial returns from the Suffolk County Board of Elections.

Voters in Riverhead were nearly evenly split: Halpin won 3,891 votes, a 50.1% share, while Hubbard had 3,870 votes, or 49.9%, according to unofficial returns Wednesday afternoon.

The race remains too close to call with more than 250 outstanding absentee ballots. If the razor-thin margin holds, state election law calls for a manual recount.

Halpin, 53, a pastor and founder of North Shore Christian Church in Riverhead, said in an interview Wednesday morning he felt “patiently optimistic.” 

Halpin ran as a Democrat but is not registered to a political party. Should his lead hold, Halpin would serve with four Republican members.

He said he is a “true Independent” and would seek to work with his colleagues on the board.

“I’m looking forward to showing the other towns on Long Island and people everywhere … that we can work together,” Halpin said.

Hubbard, 65, a retired police detective who served two terms on the town council, did not concede and said he was “still hopeful” absentee ballots could close the gap.

“I’m very surprised it was this close,” Hubbard said in an interview on Wednesday. “I really thought we were going in a good direction,” he added, referring to ongoing downtown revitalization projects including a new town square and added public safety measures.

In the town council race, incumbent Republicans Bob Kern and Ken Rothwell are leading challengers Mark Woolley and Kevin Shea. 

Highway Superintendent Michael Zaleski and tax Assessor Laverne Tennenberg, both Republicans who ran unopposed, were reelected to four-year terms.

Unofficial totals posted Wednesday include early voting, absentee and machine voting on Election Day. There are 27 ballots that need to be tallied, including 14 from Democrats, seven from Republicans and five from unaffiliated voters, according to the elections board.

A total of 271 absentee ballots remain outstanding in Riverhead, officials added. Those ballots were distributed to voters but the board has yet to receive them back. Of those, 109 went to Democrats, 74 to registered Republicans and 65 to independent voters.

Mailed ballots must be postmarked by Nov. 4 and received by the Board of Elections by Nov. 12. Military ballots must be received by Nov. 17, according to state guidelines.

Kathleen McGrath, a spokeswoman for the state Board of Elections, said county boards will continue processing mail-in ballots, canvassing eligible affidavit ballots and performing any “cures,” or minor fixes.

A manual recount is required if, after the canvassing process, a gap of 20 votes, or margin of error of 0.5%, remains.

Laura Jens-Smith, chairwoman of the town's Democratic Committee and a former town supervisor, said she is confident Halpin’s lead will hold.

“We would have liked a little bit of a wider margin … but we're very happy that we've pulled it off,” Jens-Smith said in an interview.

Riverhead Democrats had chided Hubbard for raising taxes and piercing the tax cap. Last year, Hubbard’s budget included salary increases for elected officials. His salary rose 3.2% from $115,148 to $118,919, though an earlier proposal called for a $10,000 raise.

Voters interviewed at polling places in Riverhead on Tuesday cited taxes and affordability as their top concern.

But Hubbard defended the increases as “unavoidable” due to state-mandated increases to retirement, pension and payroll costs.

“If [Halpin] gets in, then he’s going to have to deal with the same issues,” Hubbard said Wednesday.

Voters in Riverhead haven’t elected a Democratic supervisor since Jens-Smith's election in 2017.

Tammy Robinkoff, the chairwoman of the Riverhead Republican Committee, did not respond to requests for comment Wednesday.

Unofficial results show that about 7,764 voters cast ballots so far in Riverhead, a drop-off from the 8,753 people that voted for town supervisor in 2023 and 9,142 in 2021, according to Board of Elections data.

State elections data shows there are 25,802 registered voters in Riverhead Town.