Spreading their influence
Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt. announces he is ending his presidential campaign on Wednesday in Burlington, Vt. Credit: AP
Daily Point
Bernie Sanders' looming presence
The New York State Democratic Party will officially appoint delegates to the presidential convention at an Aug. 4 meeting of the state committee, party chairman Jay Jacobs told The Point on Thursday.
But Jacobs said he hasn’t been informed yet as to what the exact percentage will be of delegates for former Vice President Joe Biden vs. Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders.
The Democratic National Committee’s delegate system is complex, and features changing rules and different caches of delegates. One group of delegates is allocated proportionally to high-performing primary candidates statewide, and Jacobs said that Sanders’ pre-primary withdrawal made him not technically eligible for that group. But the Sanders campaign has been vocal about wanting to gain delegates and influence the party platform ahead of the 2020 election. So in the spring, the campaigns agreed that Sanders would have some number of those delegates anyway — an expression of “unity,” Jacobs said.
Read on to find out just how much influence Sanders will have at the convention.
—Mark Chiusano @mjchiusano
Talking Point
Raking in the big bucks
Nassau County Executive Laura Curran raised $496,414.72 from January to July of this year, according to campaign finance filings made public this week.
In the same July filing a year before his own 2019 reelection bid, Suffolk County Executive Steve Bellone pulled in just over $400,000.
Curran was helped by some big donations by big donors: Kenneth Langone of Home Depot fame contributed $25,000. James Hagedorn of Miracle-Gro tossed in the same. Other relatively large donors include former New York Stock Exchange chief Richard Grasso, Jonathan Tisch of the Loews Corporation, and Kathleen Dowling, wife of Michael, president and chief executive of Northwell Health.
Meanwhile, up in Albany, one of Nassau’s most significant development efforts, the redevelopment of Belmont Park, has brought in its own fundraising windfall – albeit this time for Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo.
If you were wondering about the big sums, the new campaign finance limits don’t apply to a county office, and they don’t go into effect for state offices until the day after the 2022 elections, according to the state Board of Elections.
Cuomo received $50,000 from Scott Malkin, and another $50,000 from Jon Ledecky, with both contributions listed as occurring on July 10, according to state campaign finance records. Ledecky and Malkin are the co-owners of the New York Islanders, who are in the midst of building themselves a new arena at Belmont. Belmont is state-owned land – and the project’s approval came after strong support from Cuomo.
Adding to the Belmont sundae just a few days later, an entity referred to in campaign finance data as Sterling Mets LP provided another $50,000 to Cuomo’s political coffers. Sterling Project Development, the real estate arm of Sterling Equities, the owner of the New York Mets, is partnering with the Islanders on the Belmont effort.
The cherry on top came from Oak View Group – another partner in the Belmont effort. Oak View itself contributed $5,000 on July 8. But Oak View chief executive Timothy Leiweke gave Cuomo $50,000 on July 8, and another $3,000 on July 14.
Oak View brings us back to Nassau — as sources have told Newsday that Oak View might be interested in operating the Coliseum.
—Mark Chiusano and Randi F. Marshall @mjchiusano and @RandiMarshall
Pencil Point
Copycats
Joe Heller
For more cartoons, visit www.newsday.com/cartoons
Final Point
New landfill in Brookhaven?
Brookhaven Town Supervisor Edward Romaine has been one of Long Island’s clarion voices when it comes to the need to address the region’s looming solid-waste crisis.
The urgency stems from the scheduled closure of the town’s massive landfill at the end of 2024, and the fact that the facility accepts 350,000 tons of ash burned by the waste-to-energy plants in the region as well as 720,000 tons of construction and demolition debris from Long Island and parts of New York City, the largest by far of two facilities on Long Island to handle C&D debris.
So where is all that garbage going to go?
Some of it, possibly, still to Brookhaven in the form of a new landfill.
“Fortunately, Brookhaven Town owns additional land just east of the landfill that could be used as a regional ashfill for the various waste to energy plants handling solid waste for Babylon, Brookhaven, Hempstead, Huntington, Islip and Smithtown Townships,” Romaine wrote to The Point in an email.
Romaine said such a facility would handle only ash, not C&D debris. And while the fees such an ashfill would generate would help cushion the blow from a total landfill closure to Brookhaven’s budget, it still would leave a huge problem for the region given that disposing all the C&D debris would add to the 2,000 trucks already carting solid waste off Long Island every day, exacting a big toll on the region’s aging road and bridge infrastructure.
Romaine said the town board will be making a decision about the landfill in the near future as it weighs all of our options.
Romaine also outlined his concerns in a letter last month to the Long Island Regional Planning Council, which has been exploring the issue.
“Time is running out to address Long Island’s solid waste disposal issue,” Romaine wrote. “Even if we are able to do so now, it will still take several years to implement any changes. As I have said before, this is a regional issue that will impact all of us on Long Island. We need to come together as a region to find solutions that we can start implementing now.”
The clock is ticking.
—Michael Dobie @mwdobie
