Halfway through his first term, Greenport Mayor Kevin Stuessi is facing mounting scrutiny over his leadership, including allegations of overreach, targeted enforcement and municipal mismanagement, according to a Suffolk Times investigation — which also found that he is facing personal financial setbacks that could affect his ability to serve as mayor.
The energetic first-time politician is a vocal and articulate advocate for his community’s needs and a ubiquitous presence at local events, big and small. He’s forged ties with some counterparts in neighboring East End communities, as well as the governor’s office. By all accounts, Mr. Stuessi puts in far more hours than the part-time, $30,000 position requires of him.
Yet growing frustration with what many say is his unyielding micromanagement of village affairs has alienated colleagues on the board, angered fellow officials and frustrated many small business owners, real estate agents, architects, developers and builders — even his own staff.
‘Scofflaw’
Last month, a default judgment was issued in a foreclosure action on the mayor’s Clark Street home, court records show, meaning an eviction for lack of nearly $30,000 in mortgage and other payments may be imminent. Last Thursday, Mr. Stuessi’s mortgage company filed for a final judgment of foreclosure and sale, which would grant it the right to sell the home to recover the debt. An eviction could imperil his ability to abide by the state residency requirement for municipal mayors.
While foreclosures are increasingly common in today’s overheated real estate market, a review of Mr. Stuessi’s past has uncovered a history of legal complications. In 2013, he was sued by a Manhattan law firm for more than $25,000 in unpaid bills related to an effort to lease space for a restaurant on Lexington Avenue, according to court records, resulting in a default judgment against Mr. Stuessi after he failed to respond. As recently as last month, Mr. Stuessi was being sued for more than $6,000 in unpaid credit card bills, records show, though the current disposition of that case remains unclear.
Last fall, Mr. Stuessi’s driver’s license was suspended for aggravated unlicensed operation of a motor vehicle and driving an unregistered vehicle on Shelter Island. Last month he was deemed a scofflaw for failing to respond to the Shelter Island traffic summonses. State DMV records show that it’s the second time in six years Mr. Stuessi has had his license suspended for failure to respond to a summons.
‘Unconscionable’
On March 3 at Village Hall, Mr. Stuessi declined an unscheduled Suffolk Times interview request, saying he was busy with back-to-back meetings. At the time, he was handed a list of detailed questions and copies of court records and other documents and asked to respond to the questions in writing.
On March 11, after being told publication could move forward without his input, he provided limited responses via email to some of the questions.
Mr. Stuessi declined in his email to respond to direct questions about the status of his residence in the village or issues related to license suspensions and his failure to appear at Shelter Island court hearings. “My personal challenges dealing with cancer and recovery have been spoken about before,” Mr. Stuessi said. “That, and taking a step back from my professional career has been difficult.”
Responding to a question about his finances, Mr. Stuessi said the personal economic issues of a Village Board member “aren’t relevant to any village matters, unless [a board member] … has abused their position to favor themself at the expense of village coffers and taxpayers.”
On March 13, his mortgage company filed for the final judgment of foreclosure and sale.
The next day, in a letter posted to the village website, the mayor revealed that deputy mayor Mary Bess Phillips and her husband owe roughly $100,000 in unpaid village taxes and other bills. Ms. Phillips, who has served as a trustee since 2009, is vying with five other candidates for two open seats on the Village Board in Tuesday’s election.
“It’s unconscionable to me someone could run for office while being indebted to the village,” the mayor said in his March 11 email to The Suffolk Times. Mr. Stuessi is in the middle of his four-year term and is not on the ballot in Tuesday’s election.
In Friday’s public statement, Mr. Stuessi said he had asked Ms. Phillips to resign as deputy mayor, explaining that he “felt it necessary after I became aware of significant indebtedness to the village,” and noted that he “immediately notified counsel to work with the treasurer to collect.”
Ms. Phillips responded Saturday, saying she’d been working for months with the village treasurer to come up with a payment plan. She said Mr. Stuessi had been aware of her debts and efforts to resolve them well before his statement, and accused him of interfering with the election and trying to force her off the board.
A source with direct knowledge of the situation confirmed that Mr. Stuessi has known about the Phillips’ financial problems for at least six months.
Late Monday morning, Mr. Stuessi acknowledged he had learned about the Phillips’ debt “in recent months,” and claimed that he was working out a payment plan of his own with his mortgage company.
Ms. Phillips denied resigning as deputy mayor “because of my indebtedness,” saying she stepped down because “I did not want to be acting as deputy to a mayor I don’t believe is currently acting in the best interest of the residential and business community in the village.”
Friday’s revelations came as a shock to many in the community and dominated the conversations on local social media over the weekend.
“She’s been his tutor from the start,” one person close to the situation said in a Sunday interview. “It’s unbelievable.” Others were stunned to learn the size of the Phillips’ debt.
The Suffolk Times had planned to withhold publication of this investigation until after Tuesday’s election, but the mayor’s public revelations about Ms. Phillips’ debts pre-empted that plan.
‘Only Zach’
In a recent interview, former Greenport building inspector Alex Bolanos, who is in embroiled in a labor dispute with the village over his recent termination, said he met last month with investigators from the Suffolk County D.A.’s public corruption bureau.
Mr. Bolanos said he recounted multiple instances to the investigators in which, he claims, Mr. Stuessi either overrode cease-and-desist or stop work orders he had issued for serious safety hazards or, in other instances, unfairly targeted individual business owners to “make an example” of them in his early days as mayor. Mr. Bolanos said he has also filed complaints with the New York Department of State. While both agencies, per policy, declined comment, Mr. Bolanos provided time-stamped text and email exchanges with officials from both offices.
Mr. Bolanos has shared his concerns about the mayor with The Suffolk Times in a series of interviews that began last fall. He is embittered by the way he says he’s been treated by village officials, and following a recent incident, a village employee filed a police complaint after she said she felt menaced by him during a verbal exchange at Village Hall. Mr. Bolanos yelled but “did not make direct threats to Village Hall employees,” according to a copy of the complaint.
In interviews, numerous former colleagues and village officials who have worked closely with Mr. Bolanos hailed his experience and expertise, though all declined to be identified — saying that they didn’t want to get embroiled in the ongoing animus between the mayor and the former inspector.
In one high-profile 2023 case, according to Mr. Bolanos, the mayor ordered him to issue what he characterized as unwarranted and punitive code violations against celebrity restauranteur Zach Erdem’s new Greenport eatery Z’Erdem, shutting it down twice in four days over an early summer weekend.
The 14 violations included rarely enforced code provisions, such as not having a fenced-in garbage bin, according to Mr. Bolanos.
“I said, ‘Mayor, I can’t give this ticket, because I’d have to give it to everybody else, because nobody has these things,’ ” Mr. Bolanos recalled.
“ ’We’re on Zach right now,’ ” he said the mayor replied. “That was always his reply, ‘Only Zach.’ ”
The preliminary injunction that had shuttered the restaurant was soon vacated by a town justice, who seemed to acknowledge in court that she had no authority to issue the order in the first place. “I’ve done my own research,” she said from the bench, “and I don’t see any authority.” Both Mr. Erdem and his attorney declined comment.
In his March 11 written response, Mr. Stuessi said that “the issue of the trash enclosure was a complaint by a neighbor and was part of multiple code violations which the code enforcement official, and village counsel dealt with through documented violations and court action.” In response to Mr. Bolanos’ allegation of targeted enforcement at the restaurant, Mr. Stuessi said “the village building department and code enforcement has been told since day one of our administration to enforce all laws and code equally to everyone.”
In another 2023 incident, Mr. Bolanos was called to Sterlington Deli by the fire department following a late-night grease fire. He found what he said were dangerous fire safety hazards and ordered the business to close until the violations were mitigated.
“I closed it down and I caution-taped it,” he said.
The next morning, Mr. Bolanos was headed to Village Hall to write up the violations when he passed the deli and found it open.
“I get out of the car, turn on my body camera, and confront the owner,” Mr. Bolanos said. “He tells me on body camera that he is open ‘with the mayor’s consent’. I said, ‘He can’t do that.’ ” The deli owner declined comment.
Mr. Bolanos said he then requested a county fire marshal, who he said corroborated his findings and again ordered the business to shut down. Mr. Bolanos shared copies of his communications with the county fire marshal’s office and the marshal who responded. Reached last month, the marshal declined to comment per agency policy, but directed The Suffolk Times to file a public records request for details about the incident. The request remains pending.
In his emailed response, Mr. Stuessi failed to address the question of whether he had allowed the deli to reopen despite Mr. Bolanos’ order, saying only that deli owner “Freddie [Schultz] and his mom are hard-working members of the Greenport business community,” and that, “it’s not only distasteful but incorrect for a former employee of the village to make any accusations that anything untoward occurred.”
One of the village’s leading real estate agents has repeatedly clashed with Mr. Stuessi in public meetings over what she claims is his ongoing misuse and misrepresentation of his mayoral authority.
“I’ve noticed a pattern of residents, business owners and potential investors operating under the mistaken impression that Mayor Stuessi has the power to influence decision-making, when in reality, those decisions rest solely with the village’s planning and zoning boards,” realtor Bridget Elkin said in a recent statement to this newspaper.
“This can result in wasted time and resources should these individuals encounter unexpected hurdles with the pre-approval process with those statutory boards,” Ms. Elkin said. “Such an environment creates unpredictability for investment and growth and could negatively impact the commercial district, which some might argue is happening in real time.”
In his March 11 response, Mr. Stuessi said that “all determinations are by the building department, Planning Board, historic preservation committee and zoning board, as required. The Village Board really only plays a role as it relates to zoning changes, which go through public review and comment.”
‘Tombstone, Arizona, 1800’
Mr. Bolanos, who went on extended medical leave early last fall, was Greenport’s only full-time inspector and by October 2024, the heads of the village planning and zoning boards all but demanded that the mayor staff up the building department and get the agency back into working order.
Patricia Hammes, the Planning Board chair who unexpectedly entered the trustee race Saturday afternoon, asserted at an October Village Board meeting that Greenport “does not have a functioning building department” and that “it is apparent that the village is struggling with managing day-to-day operations — particularly in respect to matters relating to the building department and code enforcement.”
In response to related questions, Mr. Stuessi said, “We’ve made great strides with the new building department team” and “we are in the process of posting for another full-time position.” The village recently hired a part-time executive assistant for the building department.
At the same October meeting, village Zoning Board of Appeals chair John Saladino described a “village in turmoil,” saying “Greenport right now is Tombstone, Arizona, 1800. There is no enforcement. There’s nobody to take care of business.”
In a recent interview, Mr. Saladino said that since speaking out, “nothing has changed” at the building department.
“They got a part-time [inspector] who works four hours a day, two days a week,” Mr. Saladino said, “but he was out sick yesterday.”
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