County Executive candidates Tom Suozzi (D-Glen Cove) and Edward Mangano (R-Bethpage) fielded questions from non-profit administrators, media professionals and business leaders at a Fair Media Council forum Friday, laying out their competing visions for Nassau County in advance of the Nov. 5 elections.
The forum, tightly moderated by Fair Media Council Executive Director Jaci Clement, emphasized policy above political attacks. The candidates spoke separately and were prohibited from directly criticizing each other, though that did not stop Mangano and Suozzi from launching the occasional jab.
Suozzi, the former county executive who was narrowly defeated by Mangano in 2009, said his priority in office would be to grow Nassau’s economy and tax base by promoting transit-oriented development that could attract young professionals back to the suburbs.
“We need to star thinking of ourselves as the powerful economic and demographic engine,” Suozzi said. “My whole campaign is about the future of Nassau County.”
And Mangano, the incumbent, argued that his commitment to holding the line on property tax increases had spurred economic growth and made Nassau County a friendlier climate for business.
“I thought a different approach to government was warranted,” Mangano said. “I ran on that approach and pledges, and those were fulfilled.”
Suozzi emphasized the central plank of his economic platform – a Race-to-the-Top style competition that would provide federal grant funds to Nassau County communities to help them rezone and redevelop the downtowns.
Suozzi said he had learned from the failures of a his top-down approach during his first term in office, and would seek to work with willing communities to spur growth and demonstrate the benefits of mixed-use development to other parts of the county.
“We’re not going to make it unless we grow,” Suozzi said.
Mangano touted his administration’s program of converting vacant office buildings into apartments, portraying his policies as proven and Suozzi’s as untested.
“Many people have visions and great ideas, but at the end of the day you have to have accomplishment,” Mangano said. “Many people talk about transit-oriented development but haven’t achieved it.”
Suozzi also acknowledged that he lost focus on Nassau in his second term, when he undertook an unsuccessful run for governor and ran an lethargic campaign for re-election in 2009.
This year, Suozzi said, he has pledged to serve out a full term and is completely committed to improving Nassau.
“That would be a great life accomplishment for me,” Suozzi said.
The candidates also laid out differing takes on plans to redevelop the Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum.
A development group headed by Bruce Ratner, whose Barclays Center arena will house the New York Islanders after they depart from the Coliseum in 2015, was selected by the county to launch a $229 million revamp of the aging venue and enter a revenue sharing agreement with Nassau.
Suozzi said that though he will work with Ratner should win office, the plan does not sufficiently develop the surrounding Nassau Hub and that Ratner’s involvement should draw skepticism given his ties to a potentially competing arena in Brooklyn.
“It’s not as ambitious as it should be,” Suozzi said.
But Mangano touted the deal as a signature economic achievement, saying it would boost Nassau’s economy and bring in millions in revenues for the county will all the expenses being borne by private investors.
“The economics of the deal is probably the best in the nation,” Mangano said.
