A conflict Bellone didn't need
Steve Bellone is sworn in as his wife, Tracey Bellone, looks on (Dec. 30, 2011) Credit: Photo by Ed Betz
Complex situations will be coming fast and furious for Suffolk County Executive Steve Bellone, and one of the more delicate ones involves his wife, Tracey. It will resolve itself soon, but sooner would have been better.
In his inaugural address last Friday, Bellone said that there's nothing more important to him than his family. Now two new things are happening to the Bellone family. In March they are expecting a third child. But more immediately, Bellone has just become his wife's boss. This echoes an earlier situation: When they became engaged, he was the Babylon supervisor, and she was a town parks deputy. That potential conflict got resolved when County Executive Steve Levy named her deputy county parks commissioner.
Now the new executive has dismissed the parks commissioner his predecessor appointed, and his wife is acting commissioner until her husband-boss names a permanent one. This problem will be solved too, because Tracey Bellone expects to go on maternity leave in March, and the county executive's office says she won't return to the payroll after the leave.
Even for two months, however, the county executive should have been more responsive to the need to avoid even the appearance of a conflict. As we said in 2006, when Nassau District Attorney Kathleen Rice took office and gave her brother's wife a key position, the concern wasn't about credentials, but about appearances. The facts are different in this case, but the core concern is the same.
