East Hampton - Prudence Carabine has met with several stumbling blocks in her bid for a seat on the East Hampton Town Board this year, yet she is continuing to persevere and still believes victory is at hand.

Bonacker born and bred, Carabine decided to run for office last spring in the wake of the current administration's fiscal mismanagement and an overall lack of transparency in town government that has been cultivated over the years. After being rejected by the Republican, Democratic and Independence Party committees in town, Carabine took it upon herself to create her own Bonac Beach Party.

"The Republicans thanked me very much and said 'good luck,' but I wasn't Republican enough, though I am a fiscal conservative," Carabine explained during an interview in early September, "And then the Democrats liked most of what I said, but found that I was too much of a Bonacker." Carabine also met with Elaine Jones of the Independence Party, however she "thought I might not be able to win against the [party] machines," according to Carabine. "I saw myself as a logical fulcrum," she reasoned, "as an independent for the two extreme attitudes."

Carabine's petition to include her Bonac Beach Party on the Nov. 3 ballot was rejected by a New York judge, prompting her to begin a write-in campaign for town council.

Despite the setbacks, Carabine was determined to carry on. "I feel compelled to follow this path," she asserted, "I feel it's the right thing for me and for the town." The creation of the Bonac Beach Party, according to Carabine, developed largely as a protest of the newly established fee for resident beach parking permits. The name itself was more organic, "I am a Bonacker and everyone loves a party on the beach," she explained.

As chair of the Independence Party, Jones challenged Carabine's petition for a place on the November ballot, citing duplicate signatures and improper practices in their gathering. The challenge was upheld by a New York State court, tossing Carabine's petition and her party line. "The 15 people who I have helping me really tried our best," Carabine maintained, "but we were novices. It does me no good to go back and forth on this petition," she contended, planning to forge ahead with a write-in campaign.

"In a way this hurdle has helped me," Carabine claimed, "People are feeling that the democratic system in East Hampton needs me because there are a lot of wrong, backroom techniques going on." Carabine is hoping that backlash against the established parties will turn in her favor. "I am against backroom politicians telling people who to elect," she insisted, warning that if party politics continues "we will have more Bill McGintees and more dysfunctional Town Boards."

The last write-in campaign in East Hampton was waged by former Town Trustee William Mott in a 2007 run for town council, garnering only 27 votes out of 12,322 cast, amounting to approximately 0.22 percent of the vote.

Though write-in campaigns are generally ill fated from the start, Carabine remains hopeful. As it stands, the system is "basically not geared toward having anyone win it" without a major party endorsement, however "I'm not just in this to win, I'm in this to change the system," she explained, "Because good people are left out."

Carabine has received assurances from the major players that she will be included in the debates and meet-the-candidates nights planned for the future. "I'm treating myself as a candidate and other candidates are still treating me as a candidate," she assured.

"I expect to be elected, I expect to be busy for four years and I expect to retire," the 61-year-old candidate asserted, stating that she does not plan to become a career politician, but rather hopes to "help get us out of the situation we're now in" and then transition out of public life.

I'm From Here And I Care
"We are a family, and have come from families before us, who are actively trying to do the right thing for their family and community," Carabine stated while sitting in her living room with her husband Brian, a retired marine and commander of the East Hampton chapter of the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW). Prudence Carabine traces her bonac ancestry back to her grandfather Ferris Talmage, who was once undersecretary of agriculture for New York State and allegedly the first person in Springs to go to college, according to Carabine.

When their son Sean passed away in 2007 after a trying bout with cancer, "We went into a cloud for a year trying to put our lives back together," Carabine explained. When she re-emerged, Town Attorney Laura Molinari was in the process of resigning her post after her signature was allegedly forged on several bond documents issued by the town. "I realized that [GOP candidate Bill] Wilkinson might be right," she continued, "There was apparently a collusion of people trying to get re-elected and continue to be employed, and that's fraud."

As a former guidance counselor, Carabine likes to apply the Golden Rule to most situations: Treat others as you would like to be treated. "Things were not happening like that in Town Hall," she asserted, "It seemed like more and more people were doing worse and worse things. There's not a lot of common sense down there, there doesn't seem to be a lot of honesty and integrity."

Due to his stance during the 2007 election, Carabine is giving her support to Wilkinson's 2009 bid for town supervisor. "He saw the problem early, tried to go up against it and was shot down," she recalled, adding that she will consider endorsing one of the other four town council candidates over the course of the next few weeks. And of course she plans to support her cousin Tom Talmage as the Republican nominee for superintendent of highways, as "you have to go with family," she insisted.

As a fierce independent without a party line, Carabine was sure of one thing, if elected "I will be beholden only to those who elected me and I will always speak my mind." Carabine's website, BonacBeachParty.com, also provides voters with information on casting write-in ballots from the Suffolk County Board of Elections.