By Doug Miller
Standing in a church parking lot next to the house where his father grew up, Nassau County Executive Tom Suozzi urged hundreds of supporters who braved the North Shore cold on Saturday to join and support him in his long shot campaign for governor.
Standing beneath the two massive words that have been his legacy and promise to be his campaign¹s theme ‹ ³Fix Albany² ‹ Suozzi recalled his immigrant roots and repeatedly described himself as an outsider who can dissolve the culture of Albany in favor of his vision of a more responsive state government. ³Let¹s make New York a united state,² he said. ³Let¹s cast off the divisions of upstate versus downstate, suburbs versus cities, rich versus poor and black versus white.²
Suozzi also announced his candidacy for governor before a gathering of Orthodox Jews at a Hebrew Academy of the Five Towns and Rockaway dinner at the Brooklyn Marriot on Saturday night.
Suozzi will now face the state¹s popular attorney general, Eliot Spitzer, who has a huge lead in both the polls and in fund-raising, in a primary election Sept. 12. ³My opponent will have the support of almost every single Democratic Party boss,² Suozzi said. ³He¹ll have the support of almost every single Albany legislator, Albany lobbyist and Albany lawyer. He will be endorsed by most if not all of the special-interest groups. And he will certainly have more money.²
Suozzi promised to address what he called the four major problems facing the state: unbalanced and unfair school funding, high property taxes, the sagging upstate economy and the shortage of affordable housing. And he promised to continue his fight to address the state¹s Medicaid problems, which several counties still have not figured out how to fund.
A spokesman for Spitzer¹s campaign, Ryan Toohey, released a statement on Monday. ³Eliot¹s campaign is about bringing sweeping reform to state government,² it read. ³This state taxes too much, spends unwisely, lacks accountability and is simply not focused on enhancing economic opportunities for all its citizens. Eliot is speaking to these and other issues with passion and vigor. That¹s why people across the state have been eager to express their support for his campaign.²
The county executive was preceded at the microphone by his parents, Joseph and Marguerite Suozzi. His father was the first of several elected Suozzis, becoming the youngest judge in New York state history, according to a biography provided by the campaign, before becoming mayor of Glen Cove. Tom Suozzi was also that city¹s mayor before winning his first campaign for county executive in 2001. His cousin Ralph is the current mayor and Ralph¹s father, Vincent ³Jimmy² Suozzi, has also served as Glen Cove¹s mayor.
Suozzi¹s father described him as ³Born to leadership: He is a natural, a doer, and a visionary.²
Comments about this story? DMiller@liherald.com or (516) 569-4000 ext. 213.
