Suffolk Closeup - Edward Romaine The "Didn't Intend To Run" Supervisor

SUFFOLK CLOSEUP

By Karl Grossman

 Since Edward P. Romaine was elected supervisor of Brookhaven Town in a special election in 2012, he has been re-elected and re-elected by large margins and is now in his eighth year as town supervisor. 

A Republican, he is very popular in Suffolk County’s largest town (bigger than all of Nassau County), not only winning by substantial margins but with him at the top of the town slate, Republicans have been elected to all six town council positions.

Mr. Romaine, a former Suffolk County legislator and Suffolk County clerk, has brought a focus on environmental issues and financial solidity to the town.

Mr. Romaine “didn’t intend” to run for town supervisor. He was happy and highly constructive as a county legislator. In observing the Suffolk Legislature since it was created in 1970, I’d say he was among the finest county legislators in that panel’s now 50-year history.

But tragedy struck. His beloved son, Keith Romaine, a two-term Brookhaven Town councilman, seen as moving up and becoming town supervisor, died at but 36 years of age. The young Romaine, of Moriches, suddenly contracted pneumonia and passed away from complications caused by a virus which attacked his heart. 

A few years later, the incumbent supervisor, Democrat Mark Lesko, decided to step down to become executive director of the Accelerate Long Island high tech project.

And Ed Romaine, when the vacancy occurred, decided to run for supervisor with a mission of doing what his son “might have done.”

“If my son had lived, he would be supervisor,” Mr. Romaine told me last week. 

“Usually, a son will follow in his father’s legacy—but in this situation it is the opposite: the father is following in his son’s legacy.”

There have been many accomplishments in the administration of Mr. Romaine, who just turned 73. He considers “most important saving the Carman’s River” through legislation he introduced during his first year as supervisor. Then comes “getting the town to a triple-bond rating” by his third year. There’s been the large amount of land put in the Pine Barrens preservation program. And there has been “setting a course” for now 50 percent of the power used by town government coming from renewable energy. “We have put up solar panels everywhere. They’re at the town hall, the airport, the composting property in Manorville” and so on. “And vehicles are all-electric or hybrid.” There are his efforts on climate change “and rising sea level. We are in a battle. We are island people and we must deal with climate change.” He has been spearheading the purchase of land threatened by rising waters “to convert it back to wetlands” to soften the impact of storms hitting. The list goes on. 

Ed Romaine has deep background in Suffolk. When he was six months old, his folks moved from Queens to Suffolk. He’s lived in Sayville, Central Islip, Hauppauge and Bayport—and for the past 41 years in Center Moriches. For 10 years he was a history teacher at Hauppauge High School. (Among his students was the current supervisor of Southampton Town, Jay Schneiderman.)

He graduated with a bachelor’s degree in history from Adelphi University, received a master’s in history and political science from Long Island University and did post-graduate work in political science at Stony Brook University. He first began working for Brookhaven Town as its first commissioner of housing and community development. 

Then he ran for the Suffolk Legislature and initially was a member for three years. He was a major legislative force in battling and stopping the operation of the Long Island Lighting Company’s Shoreham nuclear power plant. It was a hard and successful fight. Mr. Romaine, however, remains very much annoyed that “when LILCO stock dropped to under $5” it was not bought up and LILCO “seized.” That, which he and fellow county legislators and others advocated, would have been instead of what finally happened. This was the state buying LILCO’s assets, such as its poles and lines, at a far, far higher price than if it would have been  by acquiring the undervalued (because of LILCO’s nuclear undertaking) stock. That big mistake is costing Long Island ratepayers many additional billions of dollars in cost, he declares.

Then Mr. Romaine was elected Suffolk County clerk and served in that post for 16 years. He subsequently returned to the Suffolk Legislature and was a member for six more years—“I loved the legislature,” he comments. Keith died in 2009 and he decided to run for Brookhaven Town supervisor in 2012.

Also, in 2003 he ran for Suffolk County executive. He should have won.

Karl Grossman is a veteran investigative reporter and columnist, the winner of numerous awards for his work and a member of the L.I. Journalism Hall of Fame. He is a professor of journalism at SUNY/College at Old Westbury and the author of six books.    

Suffolk Closeup - Suffolk County In Review 2019

SUFFOLK CLOSEUP

By Karl Grossman

The conviction for obstruction of justice, witness tampering and other counts of ex-Suffolk District Attorney Thomas Spota and his former anti-corruption unit chief, Christopher McPartland, was the biggest event in governmental affairs in Suffolk County in 2019.  

They were charged with covering up a beating delivered by James Burke of Smithtown, then chief of the Suffolk County Police Department, its highest uniformed officer and previously head of the investigative unit in Mr. Spota’s DA’s office. In the Fourth Precinct police station in Hauppauge, Mr. Burke assaulted a handcuffed heroin addict who had broken into his police vehicle and stole a duffel bag, its contents including a gun belt, ammunition and sex toys.

Mr. Spota of Mt. Sinai was long a figure in the Suffolk DA’s office—a workhorse assistant DA in the 1970s and early 1980s trying numerous cases. Running for DA on the Democratic line in 2001, he defeated Republican incumbent James M. Catterson, Jr. of Belle Terre. He was re-elected DA in 2005, 2009 and 2013 without any major party opposition. 

Assistant U.S. Attorney Justina Geraci told the jurors that Messrs. Spota and McParland orchestrated a cover-up, breaking the law, “to protect” Mr. Burke. Lawyers for the two said Mr. Burke never told them he was involved in the beating before he pleaded guilty to it in federal court—so there was no cover-up, an argument not accepted by the jury. Mr. Burke was sentenced for the beating to 46 months in prison. Now Messrs. Spota and McPartland, of Northport, face up to 20 years. 

The leading political race in Suffolk in 2019 resulted in the re-election of Suffolk County Executive Steve Bellone. He ran against County Comptroller John M. Kennedy, Jr., a Suffolk legislator for 10 years and earlier, starting in 1986, held positions in the offices of county executive and county clerk. Mr. Bellone, of North Babylon, before becoming county executive in 2012 was Babylon Town supervisor. Mr. Kennedy of Nesconset was elected comptroller, the county government’s fiscal watchdog, in 2014 and re-elected in 2018. Mr. Bellone’s handling of county finances was the overriding issue in the race with Mr. Kennedy charging Mr. Bellone “has been a fiscal disaster for Suffolk County.” Mr. Bellone defended his financial management.

There was a financial imbalance involving the campaign itself with Mr. Bellone spending nearly $3.5 million and Mr. Kennedy $720,000. Mr. Kennedy said he “took great pride in the $30 and $50 checks I got,” while Mr. Bellone had big donors. 

Because of term limits, this will be the last of three four-years terms for Mr. Bellone as county executive.

Another major 2019 Suffolk governmental development: this month the person holding what is considered the Number 2 job in county government, DuWayne Gregory, announced he was stepping down from being presiding officer of the Suffolk Legislature. Term limits were the key factor in is decision as this has been his sixth—and final—two-year term as a legislator. 

Mr. Gregory of Copiague will take a seat on the Babylon Town Board held by Jackie Gordon, also a Democrat. She is resigning to run for the Congressional seat held by Republican Peter King, who is retiring. The change will mean quite a salary reduction for Mr. Gregory: a cut from $123,270 to $58,443. 

Mr. Gregory, an African-American in one of the highest positions held by a black in Suffolk history, said that with no state or countywide positions possibly open for more than two years, he was “looking for a spot to land….This was an opportunity, and if this door closes I’m not sure when the next opportunity will be.”

In environmental happenings in 2019, the crash of the scallop fishery in recent times has cast a pall over what has been a major marine resource on Suffolk’s East End. The scallop fishery has been under pressure since 1985 when brown tide hit the Peconic Bay system. That was followed by major efforts by the state and county and Cornell Cooperative Extension to restore the fishery. Although it was far from as bountiful as it was for many decades—with Peconic Bay scallops a prized national delicacy—a partial rebound was happening. In 2017 and 2018, bay scallop landings from the Peconic and adjoining bays exceeded 108,000 pounds.

But with what now has been determined to be a loss of more than 90 percent of adult bay scallops, a major setback has occurred. Why it has happened is unclear. At a symposium this month organized by the Stony Brook University School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences, explanations included high water temperature caused by climate change and predation from cownose rays, a species newly found in Long Island waters.

If the scallop fishery is permanently crippled, it would follow the earlier loss in western Suffolk of the hard clam fishery. For decades, half of the hard shell clams consumed in the United States came from the Great South Bay in western Suffolk. That collapse has been blamed on overfishing and also brown tide. 

Karl Grossman is a veteran investigative reporter and columnist, the winner of numerous awards for his work and a member of the L.I. Journalism Hall of Fame. He is a professor of journalism at SUNY/College at Old Westbury and the author of six books.    

Suffolk Closeup - Billionaire Louis Bacon Preserves Robbins Island

SUFFOLK CLOSEUP

By Karl Grossman

Louis Moore Bacon, the billionaire hedge fund manager who owns Robins Island, is closing his hedge fund. But, according to The Nature Conservancy, with which in 1997 Mr. Bacon arranged a conservation easement for the island, the preservation of Robins Island will remain as it has been. 

This is because, explains Joseph Jannsen, conservation lands director for The Nature Conservancy of LongRobins Island is a 435-acre island in Peconic Bay by the eastern end of Long Island off the coast of New Suffolk, New York. The island is privately owned and not accessible to the public and is within the jurisdiction of the Town of Southold in Suffolk County, New York in the United States. Wikipedia Island, the conservation easement runs “in perpetuity.” 

No matter who owns the island, he said, “the conservation easement stays with the property.” It provides for preservation of the “vast majority” of the 435-acre island between Great Peconic Bay and Little Peconic Bay. 

All that is not covered by the easement are some “small areas” on which several buildings on the island sit and land otherwise “disturbed.” But “approximately 90 percent of the island is preserved in perpetuity,” says Mr. Jannsen.

Although Mr. Bacon, 63, is closing his hedge fund, he remains one of the world’s richest people—the “707^th richest person in the world,” according to Forbes magazine. His net worth has been put at $1.7 billion. Moreover, he is a dedicated environmentalist who since acquiring Robins Island has been committed to its preservation as well as preservation of land facing it on the South Fork and North Fork which he subsequently bought.

 Robins Island was once envisioned, as described by then Suffolk County Legislator Steven Englebright of Setauket, now a State Assembly member and chair of its Environmental Conservation Committee, as the “crown jewel” in the Suffolk County parklands and open space programs. It’s “our Yosemite,” he said.

In 1989, under then Suffolk County Executive Patrick Halpin, the county was in 

the process of buying Robins Island—something environmentalists had sought for decades. 

“Suffolk County Agrees to Buy Robins Island and Preserve It,” said the 1989 headline in The New York Times. The article quoted Mr. Halpin (now chairman of the Suffolk County Water Authority) as saying: ”You’re not going to see bulldozers plowing through Robins Island. It is a virtual time capsule of Long Island’s natural and human history.” 

The price was $9.2 million and the transaction was with Herbert Mittermayer and his son, Claus, both of West Germany, who speculated on offshore islands and bought Robins Island for $1.3 million in 1979. The Times in a later piece reported how the Mittermayers had been “offering it to everyone from Prince Moulay Abdullah, a brother of King Hassan of Morocco, to Donald J. Trump and finding no buyer.”

Then in 1990 Republican Robert Gaffney defeated Democrat Halpin for county executive and he scuttled the Robins Island deal that Mr. Halpin had signed. Mr. Gaffney maintained that he wanted to save the county money.

Meanwhile, the Mittermayers filed for bankruptcy for the entity through which they owned Robins Island, Southold Development Corporation. The future of Robins Island then landed in U.S. Bankruptcy Court and Mr. Bacon entered the picture offering to purchase Robins Island for $11 million and to join with The Nature Conservancy to preserve it.

And he and The Nature Conservancy have. 

“Billionaire Investor Louis Bacon Closes Hedge Fund To Clients,” was the headline on Forbes magazine website last month. “Legendary investor Louis Bacon told his investors…that he would be closing his big multi-manager hedge funds, another signal of the increasing difficulty traders are having making hedge fund strategies work,” began the article.

Incidentally, for readers who don’t understand what a hedge fund is, a definition by Investopedia online is: “Hedge funds are alternative investments using pooled funds that employ different strategies to earn active return, or alpha, for their investors. Hedge funds may be aggressively managed or make use of derivates and leverage in both domestic and international markets.” Does that explain things? Not for me either.

But Mr. Bacon did understand how a hedge fund works. As CNBC has reported, he “founded Moore Capital in 1989 with a $25,000 inheritance from his mother” and “rose to Wall Street fame making bets on everything from U.S. equity to European bonds and Asian currencies based on global events.” And he “is considered one of the most successful traders of his era.”

As to his environmentalism, an online biography by writer Allen Salkin about the “reclusive” North Carolina-born father-of-four —titled “Bringing Home Bacon”—notes: “He has permanently conserved nearly 1,000 acres of pristine East End land worth an estimated $85 million, signing away development rights and granting stewardship to environmental groups. Thanks to him, some of the most valuable real estate in the world will remain home to ospreys, deer and mud turtles.”

Karl Grossman is a veteran investigative reporter and columnist, the winner of numerous awards for his work and a member of the L.I. Journalism Hall of Fame. He is a professor of journalism at SUNY/College at Old Westbury and the author of six books.    

St James Residents Sidney And Audrey Pearlman Celebrate 65th Anniversary

65^th Wedding Anniversary Celebrated 

Sidney and Audrey Pearlman of St. James (previously of Nesconset) were wed on December 18, 1954 at the Benson Chateau in Brooklyn. They met on a blind date, set up by friends.  Audrey is a retired 1^st grade teacher and Sid is retired from Grumman Aircraft as an Engineer and then the IRS after his retirement.  They have 2 children and 5 grandchildren.  They celebrated with family at the Sunrise Assisted Living in Smithtown, where Sid is a resident. 

Suffolk Closeup - Robert Moses State Park Name Change Introduced In Albany

SUFFOLK CLOSEUP

By Karl Grossman

A bill to change the name of Robert Moses State Park because of the racism of Mr. Moses was introduced last week by State Assemblyman Daniel O’Donnell of Manhattan. An attorney, he grew up in Suffolk, in Commack (and is an older brother of Rosie O’Donnell, the TV personality and author).

His measure declares that “Robert Moses repeatedly abused his power to entrench racial and economic segregation.” Examples cited: when Moses built Jones Beach State Park “he intentionally ordered the overpasses of the connected parkway too low for buses, so that poor people, particularly African-American families, could not access the beach.” He “built most public parks, playgrounds far from Puerto Rican and African-American neighborhoods.” And he “pursued the systematic displacement and segregation of families of color” to build Lincoln Center and “effectively allowed for the discrimination against black veterans and their families in the Stuyvesant Town development.”

“The names of great state parks serve as powerful symbols of which people…celebrate,” the bill says. “The state of New York needs to begin the process of accounting for the historic harm done to communities of color by people like Robert Moses, whose actions still affect many African-American and Hispanic New Yorkers to this day.”

It provides for creation of a commission “to choose a new name” for 875-acre state park that dominates the western portion of Fire Island. 

Mr. Moses’ racism has long been described including in a book published this year, “Saving Fire Island From Robert Moses: The Fight For a National Seashore” by Christopher Verga, who teaches Long Island history at Suffolk County Community College.

Bridges on both Moses’ Southern State and Northern State Parkways were built low because, relates Mr. Verga, Mr. Moses didn’t want buses to pass under them taking African-Americans and Latinos from the city to Jones Beach and other parks on Long Island. “He was very biased,” says Mr. Verga.

Robert Caro of East Hampton who wrote “The Power Broker,” the 1974 biography of Mr. Moses, has described him as “the most racist human being I have ever really encountered.”

Opposing the renaming of Robert Moses State Park—for an unusual reason—is writer Rebecca C. Lewis in a column last week with a head: “Robert Moses State Park already has the perfect name for a notoriously segregated region.”

“The temptation to remove the honor for a legendary mid-century builder, whose legacy has been tarnished by revelations of racist views and exclusionary policies, is understandable,” she writes on cityandstateny.com. “But no one better reflects the history of the island—racist, segregated, car-dependent, but blessed with beautiful public beaches—than Robert Moses.”

Racism “is embedded in Long Island’s history, whether we like it or not. It’s built into the very foundation of its suburban neighborhoods, as minorities were steered into communities away from white families with brokers that outright refused to sell to non-white homeseekers. Levittown, the nation’s first true modern suburban neighborhood, was literally built for whites,” she continues. “Long Island today remains incredibly segregated.”

This is true—and, indeed, an exemplary recent investigative report by Newsday of racism on Long Island in how whites and people of color are steered (illegally) to different neighborhoods is current documentation. Still, in running the “Long Island Divided” series, Newsday went out of its way to publish an “acknowledgement” in an editorial that the newspaper “missed a critical chance to lead” in regard to Levittown. It boosted Levittown although blacks, it noted, were “barred…This was no secret. The covenant was in every early lease, in caps: THE TENANT AGREES NOT TO PERMIT THE PREMISES TO BE USED OR OCCUPIED BY ANY PERSON OTHER THAN MEMBERS OF THE CAUCASIAN RACE.”

That was shameful. And the continuing racism on Long Island is outrageous.

In southern states, there has been a reckoning with efforts to end the display of the Confederate flag and statues of Confederate leaders. There needs to be a similar reckoning here when it comes to Mr. Moses, a resident of Babylon (where a bronze statue of him was put up in 2003).

Full disclosure: Mr. Moses got me fired in 1964 from my first job as a reporter because of an article I wrote about civil rights activists being beaten by private security guards on opening day of the New York World’s Fair, which he ran, as they demonstrated against racism in its hiring. 

Karl Grossman is a veteran investigative reporter and columnist, the winner of numerous awards for his work and a member of the L.I. Journalism Hall of Fame. He is a professor of journalism at SUNY/College at Old Westbury and the author of six books.