Riverhead May Day march backs small businesses, pushes ICE law change
More than 50 people marched from the Riverhead courthouse to Town Hall, tying a Main Street boycott to a push for an ICE public-safety law.
More than 50 people walked from the Suffolk County Supreme Court on Griffing Avenue to Riverhead Town Hall on May 1, turning a May Day march into a local test of who feels protected in downtown Riverhead. The rally linked support for small, brick-and-mortar businesses with a demand that town officials advance OLA of Eastern Long Island’s proposed public-safety law aimed at immigration enforcement.
The march ran through Main Street as part of a one-day boycott of major corporations, including Amazon, Target and Walmart, in favor of local shops. Organizers cast the route itself as part of the message: Riverhead’s business district, courthouse and town government all figured in a protest about economic survival, public safety and confidence in local institutions. The Riverhead event was also one of an estimated 3,000 May Day Strong protests held nationwide.
OLA first brought its Riverhead proposal to the Town Board on Feb. 18, after what the group described as increased ICE activity on the East End. Minerva Perez, OLA’s executive director, said the organization has served the East End for 23 years and framed the measure as a public-safety, transparency, accountability and emergency-preparedness law, not an anti-ICE effort. The draft also addressed license-plate recognition technology and called for local police departments to train and designate officers to investigate possible law-enforcement impersonations.
Riverhead’s response remained divided in the spring. Supervisor Jerry Halpin said in February he had no immediate plans to schedule a work session on the proposal, and Council Member Ken Rothwell said he would not support it. By March 10, OLA said Riverhead still had not engaged in substantive public discussion about the revised draft, even as the organization said it had met with every other East End town and village leadership team and their lawyers.
The issue has moved differently across the East End. OLA said Southold unanimously approved a Public Safety Task Force on Feb. 10, making Riverhead one of the municipalities still weighing how far to go. At the Riverhead march, organizer Kerry Flanagan delivered signed petitions to the town clerk’s office after the rally, pushing the issue from the street into the formal record at Town Hall.
Know something we missed? Have a correction or additional information?
Submit a Tip
