Town government and community honor Dorothy Ogar: Clerk’s office will be named for her

At a gathering on Oct. 22 on the lawn next to the community Center honoring Town Clerk Dorothy Ogar, and the naming of the clerk’s office after her, former Town councilman Peter Reich, posed a question to the audience.

“Thirteen. Who knows what that number represents?”

Answering his own question, Mr. Reich said, “Thirteen is the number of U.S. Presidents Queen Elizabeth worked with in her lifetime … and is also the number of Town supervisors Dottie Ogar has worked with so far.”

Assemblyman Fred Thiele, Jr. (D-Sag Harbor) presented a New York State Assembly proclamation in her honor “for all she has done for Shelter Island,” he too noted one of the themes of the event — Ms. Ogar’s longevity at Town Hall. The assemblyman said he and Ms. Ogar “are, I believe, the longest-tenured elected officials on the East End.” He recalled that Sharon Jacobs, Ms. Ogar’s daughter and a former deputy Town clerk under her, had interned in his office.

Ms. Ogar has been in the office since 1961, when she was assistant Town clerk to her mother, Helen Dickerson Smith. Ms. Ogar was elected to the top job in 1978.

Ms. Jacobs was on hand, sitting in the front row next her mother, her father Fred Ogar, her husband Henry, and their daughter Mariah Bader. Mr. Jacobs and Ms. Bader led the gathering in the National Anthem to kick off the event.

Speaking to the audience of family and friends on a bright, warm autumn afternoon, Councilman Jim Colligan, serving as master of ceremonies, said, “It’s a perfect day for a perfect lady.”

On the plaque that will be placed in Town Hall naming the clerk’s office after her, Mr. Colligan said only one person would decide where the plaque will be hung.

“Dottie runs that place,” he said to warm laughter.

He introduced a series of speakers, including former supervisors Albert Kilb and Hoot Sherman, and former councilmen Ed Brown and Glenn Waddington. The speakers noted Ms. Ogar’s unfailing dedication to her work for the Town and how even though the position is an elected office, and Ms. Ogar has run on the Republican line every time, as Mr. Brown said, she “doesn’t stoke any political fires.”

Like other speakers, he also spoke of her reserved and efficient manner in dealing with “some wound-up supervisors and councilmen and members of the public.”

A resident in the audience reiterated that point. Rurik Halaby said he has owned a house on the Island for 42 years and got to know Ms. Ogar through the many questions he’s asked her over the years, “And more than half have been dumb questions,” Mr. Halaby said. “I’m looking forward to more years of asking dumb questions.” 

Mr. Kilb praised her “loyalty, hard work and diligence,” and her “strong skill set, and grace and elegance.”

Mr. Sherman said he had known Ms. Ogar since they were in 1st grade together and how as Town clerk, her deep institutional knowledge of the office saved Town Boards from serious mistakes, including lawsuits that Board members could have stumbled into.

She could make her points known without verbalizing them, Mr. Sherman said, remembering “that look,” which told people in no uncertain terms “to move on, go back to your desk and sit down.”

Ms. Ogar is “always cool and calm and respectful,” Mr. Waddington said, adding, along with the other speakers, how much she helped him navigate the demands of his office when he served on the Town Board. He finished by saying simply, directly to Ms. Ogar, “I love you.”

Along with Ms. Ogar’s longevity, and dedication to the Town, it was another major theme of the beautiful afternoon.