The race for LD15 heats up

Daily Point

Second time around

The field is set for the March 10 special election to fill the seat vacated by the Suffolk County Legislature’s former presiding officer, DuWayne Gregory, who was reelected in November but resigned in January to take a seat on the Babylon Town board. And the race to succeed him in the 15th legislative district takes its place in a familiar power struggle of late.

On the Democratic line is Jason Richberg, clerk of the legislature and former chief of staff for Gregory — the next best thing to Gregory, as Suffolk Democratic boss Rich Schaffer put it.

The Republican candidate, Christopher Connors, who also has the Conservative line, ran against Gregory in November but did not actively campaign and is not likely to this time around, either.

Which means the real contest might be between Richberg and Working Families Party candidate Jackie Duodu-Burbridge, a fundraiser for nonprofit organizations with local advocacy experience who is working on the restoration of the John and Alice Coltrane Home in Dix Hills.

But Duodu-Burbridge also at one point was the civil rights committee chair of the New York 2nd District Democrats. That’s the group founded by activist Liuba Grechen Shirley, who upended Schaffer’s plans to have Gregory run a second time for Congress against Peter King in CD2 in 2018 when she beat Gregory in the Democratic primary. Grechen Shirley frequently has complained about Schaffer’s grip on the party, dating at least to 2017 when he maneuvered Grechen Shirley out of a town board run.

The faces have changed but the establishment vs. upstart ethos is very much the same.

—Michael Dobie @mwdobie

Talking Point

Acrimony among the acronyms?

With the Nassau Interim Finance Authority poised to assume oversight of the Nassau University Medical Center at its meeting Tuesday night, the county’s CSEA leader is deeply concerned, but not frantic. 

The proposed move, which is expected to easily pass a NIFA board vote, will give the state oversight board the power to approve or reject all contracts over a set dollar amount yet to be determined. It also would give NIFA the power to freeze the wages of the 3,000 hospital workers Jerry Larrichiuta represents, which he says is a significant concern he has with the NIFA move, but is far from his only one.

“People forget that years ago [in 2009], we took five zeroes in a contract that passed with 74% of the member vote,” Larrichiuta told The Point Thursday. “We were told ‘Help save the hospital today and we’ll be able to build it back up and make it up to you later,’ but that doesn’t seem to be what’s happening.”

Larrichiuta says he hopes NIFA looks for solutions that maintain NUMC’s status as a full-service mission hospital, and takes input from CSEA workers and the community.

But he also fears Northwell Health’s involvement in the facility and the assertion that the hospital needs to get away from offering so many inpatient services and focus more on outpatient clinics. Outpatient clinics are generally not unionized.

Larrichiuta thinks NUMC and Northwell could be doing more to make the hospital solvent, pointing to a cardiac catheterization lab completed two years ago that has never opened while such facilities at other area hospitals, including Northwell hospitals, have gotten state permission.

“This is very complicated and there are a lot of balls in the air,” Larrichiuta said, “and the fact that Northwell is involved … They say they want to help but they have the ability to take NUMC apart. It’s very troubling.”

And as for the idea that NIFA might be looking not to freeze wages but to reopen certain aspects of the contract that was inked in November and gives workers 8% raises over four years and contains a no-layoff clause, Larrichiuta said: “I’m always open to talk about anything, but it’s awfully unusual to reopen a contract we bargained hard for a couple of months later. This is the first contract with no zeroes in it in many years, and my people deserve and need these modest raises.”

It’s that contract that seems to have pushed NIFA to step in, and perhaps hastened the departure this month of NUMC board chairman George Tsunis.

—Lane Filler @lanefiller

Pencil Point

Under close watch

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Final Point

Variable pricing

President Donald Trump’s campaign is flooding Facebook with a deal for supporters: the chance to have their names on display in a livestream of Tuesday’s State of the Union Address. 

The billboarding comes at a price, according to the ads: “$30 by 11:59 TONIGHT.” But there’s a bit of dynamic pricing going on. Other targeted ads visible in Facebook’s archive put the price at $25, $15, or a measly $5.

Indeed, some Facebook users are seeing ads telling them that the price is $0: Just give away some contact information and guarantee your inclusion in the “list of Patriots.” 

The ads come in various versions and are part of what a new analysis from British newspaper The Guardian describes as Trump’s “sophisticated social media machine.”

Over the last seven days ending Tuesday, the president’s reelection campaign put nearly a million dollars into Facebook ads alone. 

Trump pushed a similar livestream-name gambit before last year’s State of the Union speech. A current ad claims that “over 30,000” names were broadcast during that event. Apparently, impeachment hasn’t made him any less eager to turn the big address into a campaign opportunity. 

The ads also hint at the former “The Apprentice” star’s interest in expanding alternate sources of media for his followers, creating a Trump TV in one form or another. That’s a property that could live on whether or not he’s in office.

—Mark Chiusano @mjchiusano