U.S. Sen. Chuck Schumer began with a joke. Matt Cohen, president and CEO of the Long Island Association, moderated a discussion among Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman, Suffolk County Executive Ed Romaine and Richard Schaffer, president of the Long Island Supervisors Association. Gov. Kathy Hochul spoke about having an impact.
The ballroom at the Crest Hollow Country Club, in Woodbury, was filled with many appointed and elected government officials, along with many more movers and shakers, on Jan. 10 for the LIA’s annual State of the Region Breakfast.
This is a portion of what the elected leaders had to say.
Sen. Chuck Schumer
The former U.S. Senate majority leader, now the minority leader, began the morning with joke. The punch line of a tale about a woman being sentenced to four nights in jail for stealing a can of four peaches is her husband interrupting the proceeds by shouting, “She also stole a can of peas!”
Gov. Kathy Hochul
The governor, who traveled to the event on the Long Island Rail Road, noted that the state would be investing $1.5 billion in the LIRR. The state is also allocating over $51 million for public safety on Long Island.
“We have to have the courage and vision to do more,” Hochul said of the issue of affordable housing.
She acknowledged the impact of climate change, from the wildfires in California to the fires in upstate New York in November, and from flooding in the Hudson Valley in July to flooding in Suffolk County in August.
“So, we have to be ready for this,” Hochul said. “We are the first generation to feel the ill effects of climate change, and we’re the last generation that can do something about it.”
She advocated for offshore wind power generation, saying it’s the way to go.
She also said she was motivated to help businesses big and small, because of the economic hard times she saw growing up. “No large business ever started as a large business — they all started small,” Hochul said, noting her mother’s small business to help displaced homemakers.
Since she became governor, she said, 53,000 jobs have been created on Long Island, and that in 2023 alone, 47,000 new businesses started here.
County Executive Bruce Blakeman
Blakeman touted his record as county executive.
“Nassau County was named by U.S. News & World Report as the safest county of all the United States of America,” he said, crediting officers of the county Police Department. “They do an outstanding job,” he said. “The men and women work very, very hard to keep us all safe.”
On the proposed Sands casino, Blakeman said the process is progressing, and he believes the county has the best application.
“I think it will generate a lot of jobs — we’re talking about potentially $5 billion in construction jobs,” he said. “We’re talking about revenue that will be spread out in various communities. I believe that, hopefully, we can get a favorable decision from the licensing board, and we’ll go full speed ahead.”
On affordable housing, Blakeman said, “We have 80-year-old sewers that need to be revitalized … and we need at least $100 million over the next five years to do that.”
County Executive Ed Romaine
Romaine declared that “Amtrak is coming to Ronkonkoma,” and spoke about affordable housing. Referring to the state’s push to bring development to Nassau and Suffolk counties, Romaine said he agreed that Long Island would benefit from meeting the housing needs of lower-income residents, senior citizens and young people.
He quickly added a caveat, however.
“We also need the infrastructure, including sewers, to support these projects,” Romaine said, noting that there are 3,400 projects under consideration in Suffolk that can’t be built because the county doesn’t have the sewer capacity — and that is the major obstacle for almost every major project undertaken on Long Island.
Increasing affordable housing on Long Island, once a local and regional issue, is front and center in Albany, as the state — dangling lots of state dollars — urges counties, towns and villages to embrace its new housing initiative. He added that the measure has been greeted with mixed reviews, as local officials remain concerned that opting into the state program will undercut local controls like planning and zoning codes.
Romaine was visibly angry about the taxes that Suffolk residents pay on their home electric and heating bills. He promised to suspend those taxes, as well as the gasoline tax.
“We should make it more affordable for the average person to live here,” he said. If not, people will move off Long Island “like the rest of the state. (People) don’t just vote at the ballot box; they vote with their feet. New York lost (more) people than any other state. That’s a wake-up call.
Supervisor Richard Schaffer
Schaffer, the Town of Babylon supervisor and the Suffolk County Democratic chairman, noted his beginnings in the County Legislature, where he worked across the aisle in the late 1980s and early 1990s.
“We’re not elected to come here and put on a show to make it into Newsday or make it onto News12,” Schaffer said. “We’re here to get things done.” He noted that that is his philosophy, and Romaine’s thinking as well.
“The stars have aligned, and not only do we have people who have known each other for a very long time, but also key, trust each other in order to do the right thing,” Schaffer added of his relationships with Romaine and Town of Islip Supervisor Angie Carpenter.
