John T. "Jack" O'Connor, Long Island commercial real estate broker, dies at 78

He was a "larger-than-life" character, the dean of Long Island commercial real estate brokers, a man who had brokered some of the biggest development deals on modern Long Island. But if you wanted to know the essence of Jack O'Connor, the man, said longtime friend and business associate Jim Morgo last week, it would be this: "As good a businessman as he was, he was an even better friend."

John T. "Jack" O'Connor was found dead Sept. 7 at his home in Blue Point, apparently the victim of a heart attack. He was 78.

"Anybody you talk to on Long Island commercial real estate, I don't know anyone down the road who hasn't done a deal with Jack," said Morgo, the former Suffolk County chief deputy executive and first commissioner of economic development and workforce housing. "He was smart. But, his personality was larger than life. He was very funny, charming, and interested in people — and able to make a connection."

Born Nov. 14, 1941, in Brooklyn, O'Connor was a graduate of St. John's Prep and St. John's University.

He began a career as a banker with Security National Bank, where, he told Newsday in a 2002 interview, his job was to bring in new accounts. He did so, he said, by doing research on who was moving from the five boroughs to Long Island — and then call brokerage firms seeking more information.

Truth was, he said, he soon was working with so many brokers — and doing so many deals — that he came to realize it was the deals he liked putting together, and the time he spent dealing with people while putting those deals together.

In 1974 he took work at Island Realty in Jericho. A dozen years later, he bought it. Ten years after that he sought out national affiliations before he began a relationship with Northbrook, Illinois-based giant Grubb & Ellis Co. in 1997, finally selling Island Reality Group to them in 1999.

O'Connor became an executive vice president and managing director at the Long Island office of Grubb & Ellis, then senior managing director at CBRE — Coldwell Banker Richard Ellis, the largest commercial real estate services company in the world. Later, he was the executive director of Newmark Frank Knight's Industrial Practice Group, his team serving as the exclusive representative for Suffolk County real estate during County Executive Steve Levy's administration.

You name the big deal, O'Connor was behind it, though some of those deals later became embroiled in controversy involving the subsequent developers.

It was O'Connor who brokered the deal to have Suffolk OTB develop a betting parlor and slots casino off Exit 64 in Medford, a development that ran into strong community opposition. It was O'Connor who brokered deals to develop the old Northrop Grumman site in Calverton and the rebirth of downtown Riverhead.

Along the way he was awarded Man of the Year Award by Tuoro College, as well as being named Long Island Power Broker, Broker of the Year and recipient of a Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2002 he was awarded the "Most Ingenious Deal of the Year Award" by the Association for a Better Long Island — that, for a multiyear effort to sell the former Northrop Grumman flight-test facility in Calverton, a project called Enterprise Park at Calverton, on behalf of the Town of Riverhead. That award covered his efforts to lease the property's 18 buildings, totaling more than one million square feet.

"The thing about Jack was he was a very outgoing guy," longtime friend and business associate Brian Lee, a principal at Nemark Frank Knight, said. "Everyone liked Jack. He's one of the only people I know who was liked equally by Republicans and Democrats and, as you know, there's something monumental to be said when you can cross party lines."

As O'Connor told Newsday in a 2007 story about attempts to finalize major deals for the Brookhaven Rail Terminal in Yapank and an industrial development at Gabreski Airport: "When you're dealing with municipalties and politicians, it's difficult, but it's something that we readily handle. It takes time and patience, that's all."

In addition to the casino deal, O'Connor brokered a Commack real estate deal to sell commercial offices for drugmaker Forest Laboratories Inc., did deals for Vicon Industries and Empire Scientific Inc., and worked on deals that would have brought a massive indoor ski resort, a racetrack and minor league hockey team to Suffolk. He often worked more than 60 hours a week in his pursuit of making deals happen, he once told Newsday, though he relaxed by hiking and also fishing on his beloved 40-foot sportfisherman.

Of course, friends and associates said "relaxing" took on a different meaning with O'Connor. "He had ants in his pants and could never sit still," Lee said, adding: "There was always the question when we played golf how long he could go without getting the phone. The over/under was somewhere between the first and second hole."

His son, Drew O'Connor, said while business associates knew his dad as the "hand-charging broker" who was always doing deals they didn't see the side he kept private: the house in the Catskills, where the family spent a lot of time, the time spent with his children and eight grandchildren. "He had boundless energy," Drew O'Connor said.

Jack O'Connor is survived by children, Liz Hahm of Greenlawn, Kathleen Morrisroe of Huntington and Drew O’Connor of Port Jefferson, as well as their mother Regina O'Connor of Stony Brook, and eight grandchildren — Emily, Connor, Matthew, Clare, Erin, Molly, Jack and Meg. The funeral Mass was Saturday at the St. James Roman Catholic Church in Setauket.

By John Valenti

john.valenti@newsday.com

John Valenti, a reporter at Newsday since 1981, has been honored nationally by the Associated Press and Society of the Silurians for investigative, enterprise and breaking news reporting, as well as column writing, and is the author of “Swee'pea,” a book about former New York playground basketball star Lloyd Daniels. Valenti is featured in the Emmy Award-winning ESPN 30-for-30 film “Big Shot.”