THE CIRCUS BEGINS!
The REAL show is the way the Nassau County Legislature conducts itself.
Here's a story posted on Newsday.com's blog site by Bill Murphy describing the looney circus that unfolded during the legislative meeting on Tuesday, July 7th. This all took place hours after our small, but poignant, Save The Bay rally took place out in front of the Theodore Roosevelt Executive & Legislative Building in Mineola.
Senate split? You oughta see Nassau Legis at work!
Those wacky guys and gals in the state Senate are getting some competition from the Nassau County Legislature, where backbiting, griping, sniping, innuendo, shouting and other bad behavior goes hand in hand with attempts to legislate.
The presiding officer, Legis. Diane Yatauro (D-Glen Cove) would no doubt challenge that assertion, maybe even calling it, “bull,” a word she used three times in quick succession Tuesday night during a debate on sewage.
Or maybe she would call the criticism, “nonsense,” another word she also used three times in quick succession.
The Tuesday night meeting may have set a new standard for grandstanding, silliness and posturing.
And most of the audience looked askance early in the evening at these two protesters (pictured) from Bay Park, part of a group that was critical of the county’s sewage plans. They turned out to be a sideshow.
Yatauro bridled at one witness, Barbara Reill of Bay Park, who raised her voice when criticizing the legislators for ignoring her community, the home of one of the county’s two sewage treatment plants.
“Take your temper down,” Yatauro told the woman.
“You’re not my mother,” Reill replied.
“And you’re not mine,” Yatauro shot back.
Minutes later, at 9:45 p.m., Yatauro cut off public testimony. “We’ve done more than an hour public speaking,” she said, ignoring the fact that most of that hour had been taken not with public testimony but with legislators arguing among themselves over financing and executing a sewage plan.
“I have to get the session started. Madam Clerk,” Yatauro said, turning to Clerk of the Legislature Chumi Diamond and ignoring the next Bay Park witness who was waiting at the podium to speak.
That witness was gently nudged aside by James Altadonna, the mayor of Massapequa Park, who had been waiting almost four hours to testify about the lack of dedicated police patrols in this village.
“This is not right. I think the people are here to be heard... I don’t run the village the way you run this board,” Altadonna told Yatauro.
“Well, maybe you should,” Yatauro replied. “Now excuse me. I’m going to get back to work.”
Republican Minority Leader Peter Schmitt of Massapequa jumped in that point to say, “I wish I could say this is unusual Mr. Mayor, but it is not.”
Things settled down for a few minutes, but heated up again when the legislators took up the appointment of a new member of the board of trustees of the Nassau Community College.
Legis. John Ciotti (R-North Valley Stream) suggested that there might be some unspecified “taint,” involved in the process, setting off spirited commentary from Democrats.
One of the current board members, John Durso, who is also head of the Long Island Federation, got himself dragged into the debate, and bristled when he thought the questions were getting personal.
Durso, probably the most powerful labor leader on Long Island, shushed Legis. David Denenberg (D-Merrick) at one point. “I was looking at John Ciotti,” Denenberg said.
“Then look that way,” Durso said, pointing across the dais at Ciotti. At another point, Durso cut off Denenberg, telling him, “You’ll know when I’m done.”
The chairman of the board of trustees, former U.S. Rep. John LeBoutillier, stood next to Durso at the podium. When the legislators began debating among themselves, Durso absently played with a laptop computer on the podium, turned it on, but appeared not to be able to turn it off.
Durso sat down as the debate raged on, and LeBoutillier began playing with the computer, finally logging on to the Web site of Sport Illustrated. After a few seconds, and chuckles from the audience, LeBoutillier realized his surfing was being displayed on the four jumbo screens hanging from the ceiling of the chamber.
About half-way through the meeting, one participant got an e-mail reading: "WCBS...is reporting that Governor Paterson is is considering appointing Suozzi Lt. Governor now to break the deadlock in Albany."
Anyway, the legislature finally adjourned a bit after 12:30 a.m. Wednesday.
