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A Few Clouds Curran kicks off county exec. run
Legislator launches bid for Nassau’s highest post
Nassau County Legislator Laura Curran launched her campaign for county executive with a kickoff fundraiser at the Coral House in Baldwin on Jan. 5.
The event attracted dozens of residents, business owners and elected officials, as well as Nassau Democratic Party officials and police union representatives. Curran, 48, a Democrat from Baldwin, thanked her supporters, and assured them that while many of their elected representatives might have forgotten the people they serve, she never would.
“For the past three years, I’ve had a front-row seat to the dysfunction and the self-interest and the simple inability to figure out the county’s basic finances,” the mother of three said. “I’ve heard loud and clear from our residents –– their disgust, I feel it too.”
Other Democrats running or considering running for county executive include State Assemblyman Charles Lavine; County Comptroller George Maragos, who changed his party affiliation from Republican to Democratic to seek the post; and Long Beach City Manager Jack Schnirman, who formed an exploratory committee but has yet to officially declare his candidacy.
Republican candidates for county executive include former Hempstead Town Supervisor Kate Murray, State Sen. Jack Martins and Hempstead Town Councilman Bruce Blakeman. The current county executive, Republican Ed Mangano, now faces federal fraud and corruption charges, but has refused to resign.
Running on a platform of cleaning up county government, restoring trust in local officials and “returning Nassau County to the taxpayers,” Curran drew loud applause with a declaration that she would “put people before politics.”
“Government is not meant to be a long-term career for politicians or a jobs program for their friends and family,” she said.
“Our tax dollars,” she continued, “are meant for services that our residents need and deserve, not to fund a never-ending public-relations campaign to keep those same politicians in office. I’m running for county executive because I want to fix this mess, plain and simple.”
Curran, who was first elected to the Legislature’s 5th District seat in 2014, has been active in a number of community issues, from cleaning up local nature preserves to fighting for the restoration of several Nassau Inter-County Express bus lines and advocating for infrastructure improvements in Baldwin’s business districts. She has also served on the Baldwin School District Board of Education.
“You don’t need me to tell you that trust in the government is stretched to the breaking point,” she said. “The county executive must have the courage and the guts to stand up and very plainly say that we are fed up –– fed up with contracts going to friends and political boosters. We’re fed up with patronage for patronage’s sake.”
Curran said there was much work to do in the county, but even though she was painting a grim picture, she was hopeful about its future.
“We can’t attract young people, we can’t rebuild our downtowns for economic development, we cannot clean up our environment unless we clean up the mess in Mineola,” she said. “We’ve got to get our house in order, and that would be my number one priority.”
