A familiar face is returning to the ballot. Viviana Russell, a former North Hempstead councilwoman, is a candidate for Nassau County’s 2nd Legislative District seat, and has highlighted affordable housing, equitable investment and correcting the misidentification of part of Uniondale as key priorities.
Russell, 53, made history when she was elected to the town council in 2009, becoming the first African American councilwoman. She succeeded Robert Troiano, the first Black elected official in North Hempstead’s history.
The 2nd District includes parts of Uniondale, Westbury, Carle Place, Hempstead, Jericho and Hicksville. Russell said she sees shared needs across those communities, especially when it comes to infrastructure and development.
She wants to fix what she calls the longstanding mislabeling of Uniondale. “Uniondale is a very large area,” she said. “Unfortunately, it has been mistitled as East Garden City. If you look at the original maps of Uniondale, it goes all the way down to Old Country Road — the Roosevelt Field mall and all the way … to Merrick, all of that is really Uniondale.”
Postal codes, Russell explained, have caused confusion, with parts of Uniondale assigned Garden City or Westbury ZIP codes. “I’ve already been talking to some of the stakeholders and community leaders in Uniondale,” she said. “That is something that we are going to pursue.”
Russell said the area around the Nassau Coliseum has untapped potential. “Although we’re not going to have a casino there, there is opportunity for development that is in alignment with what the community wants and needs,” she said — a mix of housing and businesses, not just one or the other.
She believes in a grassroots approach that starts with the community rather than having decisions come from the top. Listening to residents is key, Russell said, because government plans work only if they meet a community’s actual needs. She cited New Cassel, where leaders gathered input from residents at meetings and used their ideas to shape a long-term plan that eventually led to the opening of the Yes We Can Community Center in 2012.
Russell points to her experience revitalizing North Hempstead — especially that center — as a model for what’s possible in District 2. “There’s a lot of areas that need development,” she said. “There are underutilized buildings, there’s blighted property. We took an underutilized, underdeveloped property (and) developed it (into) something that the community wanted and needed.”
The idea for the Yes We Can center was generated in 2002, when residents of New Cassel gathered for a five-day planning session with town officials to reimagine their neighborhood. They envisioned an intergenerational space with sports, arts and educational programming. Russell, then a civic activist, helped move the $22 million project to completion as a councilwoman.
“The experience I had as a resident of the Newcastle community, participating in that process, participating along with the elected officials, then getting into office and bringing that community center to fruition,” Russell said, would benefit her in District 2.
She believes every neighborhood in the district needs affordable housing. “People want to have options to live in whatever neighborhoods they want to live in,” she said. “Unfortunately, not every neighborhood in Nassau County is affordable.”
Russell’s opponent, Pepitz Blanchard, did not respond to the Herald’s requests for an interview.
