Westhampton Beach Village Board incumbent ousted in election

Challenger Stephen Frano won a seat on the Westhampton Beach Village Board in a Friday election, unseating two-term incumbent Charles Palmer Jr.

Frano, a member of the village’s planning board, received 126 votes to Palmer’s 98 votes.

Incumbent Ralph Urban also received 132 votes to win his third two-year term on the village board.

Frano, 65, led Southampton Town’s code enforcement department before retiring in 2007 and has been a volunteer firefighter in Westhampton Beach for 43 years. He could not be reached for comment Friday night.

In an interview last week, he said he was running because he’s a lifelong village resident and felt he had time to devote to public service. He also called for more transparency and open deliberations on the five-member village board.

Mayor Maria Moore also won a second term with 132 votes. She was uncontested. Moore and Palmer ran as a team on the Progress for WHB Party line.

Frano ran alone on the Ocean Party line. Urban, 67, a retired music teacher at Montauk School, was on the Key Party line.

Palmer, 59, a Suffolk County Police Department accountant first elected in 2012, could not be reached for comment Friday night. His term ends June 30.

Frano joins the board as officials await a firm’s analysis of the feasibility of installing sewers in Westhampton Beach. Frano has said he would support sewers as a pollution-mitigation measure if they prove cost-effective.

“I’m a boater and I can see how polluted the bays have become,” he said last week.

In February, village officials hired H2M Architects + Engineers of Melville to draft a sewer map and plan for $71,000. Village officials have contemplated installing a sewage treatment plant or connecting to an existing plant at Francis S. Gabreski Airport.