Voting yes has never been this entertaining

Tyler Gildin, Woodmere resident and star of last August’s “Nassau County State of Mind” video on YouTube, which boasts more than one million views, is back to help save the Nassau County Coliseum in his newest video, “Vote Yes for a new coliseum.”

Nassau County Executive Edward Mangano negotiated with New York Islanders owner Charles Wang in June on a $350 million bond referendum to finance the development of a new arena. The plan would finance the construction of the new arena and payment of the debt service by giving the county 11.5 percent of the gross revenue generated by the new complex, with the exception of television contracts.

The agreement would begin when the Islanders’ current lease expires, in 2015, and be in effect until 2045. County residents will help decide the issue in a public referendum on Aug. 1. After that, the county legislature and the Nassau Interim Finance Authority also get to weigh in.

Gildin, a Hewlett High School alum who just graduated from Syracuse University’s S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, said he had a following from his previous videos and felt that making a video would be a great opportunity to help promote the coliseum and get people to go out and vote. “I’m a humongous Islanders fan,” he said. “The thought of the Islanders playing anywhere else besides Nassau County is a terrible thought for me.”

In preparation for the video, Gildin was in need of a director so he reached out to his friend Jonathan Tuccillo of Garden City, who has been making YouTube videos for five years. Tuccillo said Gildin used some of his ideas including one where Gildin is in a garbage can at the coliseum and said, “This is where Nassau County is going if you don’t vote yes — in the garbage.”

“He was easy to work with,” Tuccillo said about his friend. “He took direction well and was down to do anything for the fans.”

Gildin contacted the New York Islanders executive office in Uniondale where he was put in contact with the Islanders’ Digital Media Manager Katrina Doell. “A lot of fans were reaching out to us to see how they can help and he had a unique idea,” she said. “We knew he created the Nassau County State of Mind video.”