Without fanfare, Hempstead Town GOP appoints Democrat Goosby deputy supervisor

                                                                          

Dorothy Goosby

Hempstead Town Republican board members, in an unheralded, unpublicized move, last week unanimously approved  Republican Supervisor's Don Clavin's appointment of senior Council member Dorothy Goosby -- the only Democrat on the seven-member  board -- as his deputy supervisor.

Goosby, 84, of Hempstead Village, is a well-known civil rights activist on Long Island. She is the first African-American to serve as a Deputy Town Supervisor. She was the first African-American elected to the town board in 1999.

The board sweetened the job by granting her an additional $29,000 to her annual $71,000 town board salary.

But who knew? There were no press releases or announcements-- though the town board did give her a standing ovation.

The town board last fall also renamed the Town Hall plaza "Senior Councilwoman Dorothy L. Goosby Plaza."

Though a Democrat, Goosby has often voted with the Republican-controlled Town Board and been rewarded with extra staff and resources as a result.

She frequently battled with Nassau Democratic Chairman Jay Jacobs, who is also the state Democratic chairman, but has prevailed. 

Just yesterday, she taunted Jacobs at a news conference:  "I'm still here Jay.  I wish you would stop what you’re doing because you’re messing up this country."

Despite intra-party squabbles, Democratic candidates still covet her support. Former Democratic County Executive Laura Curran proudly announced Goosby's endorsement when Curran was seeking re-election last year -- though there was talk of a deal in which Democrats promised not to primary Goosby last year in return for her endorsement.

 Goosby and her late husband, Anderson 'Jay' Goosby - along with civil rights attorney Fred Brewington -  are largely responsible for overhauling the make-up of Hempstead town government by filing suit against the town's at-large voting system in 1988, contending it violated the voting strength of black residents.

By the time the town established councilmanic districts in Hempstead after a federal appeals court in 1999 ruled in Goobsy's favor, she had won an at-large election for the board.