Town of North Hempstead seeking to amend financial disclosure law

Joe Nikic

Town of North Hempstead officials are seeking to amend the town’s financial disclosure policy after it discovered it failed to collect financial disclosure statements from the town’s former Democratic Party leader Gerard Terry.

North Hempstead Town Supervisor Judi Bosworth said at Tuesday’s town board meeting the 25-year-old law needed to be updated to ensure that everyone who is required to file will do so.

“Some of those positions no longer exist and there are new positions,” Bosworth said. “We want to make sure all of those who need to file disclosure forms are doing so.”

Pursuant to state law, North Hempstead adopted a code of ethics in December 1990, the online version of the town code says.

Section 16A-7 outlines who is required to submit the town’s financial disclosure statement each year, including elected officials, candidates for town office, purchasing and contract officers, department heads and their deputies, in addition to party leaders.

The form requires filing officials to report financial interests, outside employment, debts, investments and other information for themselves and their spouse and children.

Bosworth ordered a review of town policies and procedures after a Newsday report revealed last month that Terry, who until recently was the attorney for the town’s Board of Zoning Appeals and special counsel for the town attorney, owes more than $1.4 million in federal and state back taxes, has been party to five lawsuits and let his attorney registration lapse for three years.

The town never collected financial disclosure statements from Terry, the head of the North Hempstead Democratic Committee from 2007 until he resigned Feb. 1 except for a brief period, or any other party leader, town attorney Elizabeth Botwin said.

Nassau County District Attorney Madeline Singas has said she is investigating Terry’s tax issues and public jobs.

The North Hempstead ethics board is investigating Concetta Terry, Gerard Terry’s wife and a deputy town clerk, for allegedly omitting her husband’s tax debts from her financial disclosure records.

None of her disclosure reports from the 2006 calendar year list Gerard Terry’s tax warrants or liens, though she did report her and her husband’s outstanding auto loans.

Botwin said she had drafted an amended law and would propose it to the board before the next meeting on March 22.

Bosworth said the town attorney’s office reviewed the financial disclosure policy and received recommendations from the town’s ethics board about who should be required to file disclosure forms.

The town code calls for a civil penalty of up to $10,000 if a filer “knowingly and willfully with intent to deceive makes a false statement or gives information which such individual knows to be false” on a disclosure statement.

“We strive for transparency,” Bosworth said. “We believe that this expansion of the town’s financial disclosure law will further advance that objective.”

The board unanimously voted to set a public hearing for the law amendment on March 22.

Share this Article