Riverhead Town Board honors Highway worker Scott Vance as employee of year

Scott Vance's daily work can mean hauling away three to five cubic yards of litter, four days a week, from Riverhead roadsides and public spaces. That behind-the-scenes grind earned the Highway Department employee the town's 2025 employee of the year recognition as the Town Board met April 7.

Highway Superintendent Mike Zaleski said Vance's work helps keep the town clean year-round, but the recognition also pointed to a department that does far more than pick up trash. Riverhead's Highway Department says it maintains and improves about 230 miles of town roads, with 32 full-time employees and about 100 major pieces of equipment and attachments. Its responsibilities include street cleaning, snow and ice control, brush control, catch basins, stormwater drains, resurfacing, sealing streets and traffic signs, the daily work that determines whether a road feels maintained or neglected.

The board also took a step with a more direct budget impact for residents: it unanimously approved borrowing up to $1.88 million for a new highway garage in Wading River. The borrowing will be repaid from the general fund, which means the project can influence town finances for years even though the building itself is a back-end municipal asset. Town bid documents identify the project as the Town of Riverhead Highway Department Wading River Storage Barn at 64 East Winds Drive, and they name The Raynor Group, P.E. & L.S. PLLC and WSN Architects, P.C. as part of the project team.

The bid package for the storage barn was prepared in October 2025 and called for sealed bids due Nov. 13, 2025. That detail matters because it shows the garage was already moving through the design and bidding pipeline before the board voted on the borrowing authority, a reminder that capital projects often advance over months before taxpayers feel the effects.

The town's Personnel Department adds another layer to the picture. It says it manages benefits for about 400 active employees and 150 retirees and their families, underscoring how much of Riverhead government revolves around staffing, equipment and the people who keep roads open and facilities functioning. At Riverhead Town Hall, the evening moved from a worker's recognition to the infrastructure and finances that will shape highway service in Wading River and across the town.