Suffolk Closeup: Offering farewell to retiring Senator Ken LaValle

The thing about State Senator Kenneth LaValle, who just announced he will not be running for re-election, is that above all he is an educator. 

He’s been a senator since 1977, indeed he is the longest serving member of the New York State Senate. Later in life he obtained a law degree. But it was Mr. LaValle’s experience in education that led him into a prominent role in government. 

Leon Giuffreda in 1966 took office as a state senator for the same district Mr. LaValle has represented, the lst S.D., which includes most of Brookhaven and Shelter Island and the four other East End towns. Mr. Giuffreda had a real estate and insurance business in Centereach, where he lived.

Mr. LaValle was a fifth-grade teacher and subsequently an administrator in the Middle Country School District. He has a master’s degree in education from SUNY New Paltz.

Mr. Giuffreda, a Republican, became chairman of the Senate Education Committee and Mr. LaValle of Port Jefferson, a GOPer too, became his aide and executive director of the committee. There was a family connection: Mr. LaValle’s uncle, his father’s brother, was married to Mr. Giuffreda’s sister.

It was in this period, back more than 50 years ago, that as a journalist I got to know Mr. LaValle.

Mr. Giuffreda had a great interest in education. And Mr. LaValle knew the nuts and bolts of what education is about. I got to see this close up when Mr. LaValle, a senator then, was also an adjunct professor at Dowling College and invited me to be his guest speaker in his class on government. It was obvious that his relationship with his students was warm and supportive. 

That kind of warmth colored Mr. LaValle’s tenure. Even in years of Democratic election advances in Brookhaven Town, where most of the district’s population is located, and even with the expansion of Stony Brook University and its demographics altering the political affiliation of communities in northern Brookhaven Town, the popular Mr. LaValle stood strong.

The Democratic Party threw some of its best at Mr. LaValle. In 1980, Robert Gottlieb, a former assistant Suffolk County district attorney with a law office in Commack, and who now is a highly prominent Manhattan-based trial lawyer, ran against him and lost. In 1990, television and radio personality Sherrye Henry of East Hampton took Mr. LaValle on and lost. In 2012, Bridget Fleming of Noyac, now a Suffolk County legislator who is seeking to run for Congress, took him on and got a strong vote. But she, too, lost.

At 80, Mr. LaValle could go on and on in the Senate, but he has decided to “pass the torch.” 

On issues as a state senator, Mr. LaValle was a co-sponsor with then assemblyman, now State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli, of the landmark Pine Barrens Preservation Act that has preserved 100,000 acres in Suffolk County. He has been a leader in pushing for accessible higher education, not only as long-time chair of the State Senate’s Higher Education Committee, but as a member of the New York State Commission on Higher Education, and also the National Council of State Legislatures’ Blue Ribbon Commission on Higher Education. 

He was the Senate sponsor of the legislation that established the Long Island Power Authority and was a key to stopping LILCO’s Shoreham nuclear power plant from going into operation. He was a leading figure in the creation of the East End Hospital Alliance and was responsible for legislation providing disabled citizens with greater access to educational opportunities. He had a great role in helping Stony Brook University grow; the sports stadium at the school is named after him. 

Mr. LaValle and State Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele, Jr. (Sag Harbor-I) were the legislative foundation for the Community Preservation Act that has been vital in keeping the East End green. The two — who through the years have worked closely together — joined after Southampton College was shut down to have SUNY take over the campus and for it to become Stony Brook Southampton. 

Mr. LaValle’s accomplishments go on and on.

Extremely proud of his Italian heritage, he has long been involved with the Center for Italian American Studies at Stony Brook University. He received the title “Cavaliere al Merito della Repubblica Italiana” from the government of Italy for his work in promoting cultural exchanges between the United States and Italy.

Assemblyman Steven Englebright (D-Setauket), part of whose district is in the lst S.D., although a Democrat, has no reservation in describing Mr. LaValle as “a great legislator.”