The two small figures seated awkwardly together at the end of a long dais could easily be overlooked in the cavernous ballroom thronging with people at the Crest Hollow Country Club in Westbury. It’s hard to reconcile how they could ever fit their larger-than-life public image spread so far and wide in Suffolk, on lawn signs, on television, in newspapers.
Here they were about to engage in the first meaningful debate of the hottest Suffolk County executive race in years: Babylon Town Supervisor Steve Bellone and Suffolk County Treasurer Angie Carpenter. The contest is wide open because the incumbent Steve Levy willingly took himself out of the running thanks to a secret deal he cut this spring with the Suffolk County district attorney. The two candidates vying to succeed him chatted amicably, perhaps reminiscing about when she’d advised Bellone to take a journal with him on his honeymoon to Italy, or trading stories about his young daughters who are around the age of her granddaughter.
The September breakfast match-up itself was rather bland, but now, almost a dozen debates later, sparks fly when the two clash. The race is almost over, hundreds of thousands of dollars have been raised and spent, and the tone has turned harsh. His backers rail against the evils of “Angie’s Agenda.” Carpenter’s supporters call him “Big Tax Bellone.”
His actual record of service in Babylon would probably leave the residents of Long Island’s sixth largest town wondering if it’s the same guy they know. In his last two elections Bellone’s won more than 73 percent of the vote. He’s cut town taxes two consecutive years, and reduced the number of town employees by 24 percent since he became supervisor a decade ago.
By contrast, the Republican-sponsored ads on the Internet and TV cite a study by the conservative Empire Center for New York State Policy, which focused on the Babylon School District and concluded that the residents paid the highest “effective tax rate” in Suffolk last year. Citing a Newsday analysis, the commercials say Bellone’s raised taxes 108 percent since he’s been in office, an allegation that Bellone’s people dispute.
“I think they count it from when he was fresh off the airplane from the Army,” says his campaign spokesman Dave Hoffman. Bellone was first elected to the town council in 1997.
An analysis of Babylon Town’s budget performed by the county’s independent Office of Legislative Budget Review at Newsday’s request determined that the town “ranks as one of the lowest among Suffolk’s 10 towns in average town tax bills,” and that under Bellone’s leadership as supervisor, property taxes rose an average of 1.3 percent per year, “the lowest rate of increase of any Suffolk town.”
The Bellone campaign has tried to paint a dark picture of Carpenter’s tenure as county treasurer, accusing her of trying to provide patronage jobs to her former political advisor and asking for $800,000 in more budget money so she could expand her staff. None of which came to pass.
Her supporters say Bellone is a “career politician” who’s never worked in the private sector, unlike her background starting her own printing business. His supporters say that Carpenter’s job as county treasurer is “a ministerial post,” and she lacks executive experience unlike him.
Turnout in this off year will be key. The Republicans have recently produced a slick ad full of quick cross-cuts linking Bellone with President Barack Obama, no doubt trying to fire up their base. To inspire the reportedly demoralized Democrats, Bellone has called upon Gov. Andrew Cuomo—twice—to appear on his behalf, and the state party has sent out flyers warning that “the last thing we should do is let the Tea Party win on Nov. 8.”
As Carpenter’s senior communication advisor Rob Ryan put it, Republicans and Conservative voters “will crawl through a blizzard” to get to the polls. That fact has to be worrisome for Suffolk Democratic Chairman Rich
Schaffer, who tells the Long Island Press he’s hoping for 30 percent turnout overall but expecting more than 25 percent. It can’t help his cause that two predominantly minority Democratic legislative districts have no challenger. Schaffer is counting on a vigorous ground game to get out the vote county-wide. Republicans enter this election cycle in Suffolk with approximately 28,000 more registered voters than Democrats and Working Families Party members combined; another 260,000 voters are either “blank” or independent.
Suffolk Republican Chairman John Jay LaValle believes the tide is on his side. “This is a year that is leaning to the Republicans,” he says. He also believes that the county legislature, now a 12-6 Democratic majority (with minor party support) will swing to the GOP, considering that the Democrats are defending three open seats and face an uphill battle in three others. He mocks Bellone’s big fundraising edge, which was reported last week as the Democrats having $365,285 in cash and the Republicans having $37,846 on hand.
“I’ve been a little surprised that Steve Bellone and the Democratic Party have raised and spent approximately $3 million…and he hasn’t gained a whole lot of traction,” says LaValle. “Bellone peaked in August…. If I were running the other show, this race would be over by now. We shouldn’t [even] be in this race. Early money should have been spent to take us out. They failed to do that.” He insists Carpenter has the momentum going into the last week.
Schaffer says he’s not taking anything for granted but he is exuding confidence that Bellone has made his case to the voters—and the results on Election Day will prove him right. He says Bellone has been polling “close to 80 percent in Babylon,” and Carpenter is “weakest anywhere else” outside her former legislative district in West Islip because “her campaign never really got off the ground.
“We’ve been rolling out Steve’s accomplishments in Babylon,” he says. “Their figure is not right. It’s a lie, and I think we’ve proven to the public that that’s the case.”
He slammed Carpenter’s political advertising with “their shrill videos” on their anti-Bellone website as “really amateurish stuff.” “Their campaign is about Obama and all sorts of ancillary issues that have nothing to with reality,” Schaffer says. “He talks in specifics; she talks in generalities. There are too many pressing issues and we can’t have a county executive talking in generalities.”
Whoever wins will face an estimated $135 million hole in Suffolk’s budget, county finances that a highly placed knowledgeable insider says “are literally getting frayed at the seams,” an increase in outstanding county debt, an unprecedented recent reduction in the county’s bond rating, and a cash crunch from the state.
Very tough choices await the next person to get that job.