GENERAL MEETING SIXTH DAY April 28, 2015 MEETING HELD at THE
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GENERAL MEETING SIXTH DAY April 28, 2015 MEETING HELD AT THE EVANS K. GRIFFING BUILDING IN THE MAXINE S. POSTAL LEGISLATIVE AUDITORIUM 300 CENTER DRIVE RIVERHEAD, NEW YORK Taken & Transcribed By: Lucia Braaten & Alison Mahoney - Court Stenographers Transcribed By: Lucia Braaten, Alison Mahoney - Court Stenographers & Kim Castiglione - Legislative Secretary 1 General Meeting - April 28, 2015 (*The following was taken and transcribed by Lucia Braaten - Court Stenographer) (*The meeting was called to order at 9:30 a.m.*) P.O. GREGORY: Mr. Clerk, would you call the roll. MR. LAUBE: Good morning, Mr. Presiding Officer. (*Roll Called by Mr. Laube, Clerk of the Legislature*) LEG. KRUPSKI: Here. LEG. BROWNING: Here. LEG. MURATORE: Here. LEG. HAHN: (Not Present) LEG. ANKER: Here. LEG. CALARCO: Present. LEG. LINDSAY: Here. LEG. MARTINEZ: (Not Present) LEG. CILMI: Here. LEG. BARRAGA: Here. LEG. KENNEDY: Here. LEG. TROTTA: Here. LEG. MC CAFFREY: Here. 2 General Meeting - April 28, 2015 LEG. STERN: (Not Present) LEG. D'AMARO: Here. LEG. SPENCER: (Not Present) D.P.O. SCHNEIDERMAN: (Not Present) P.O. GREGORY: Here. MR. LAUBE: Thirteen. (Not Present: Legislators Hahn, Martinez, Stern, Spencer and Schneiderman) P.O. GREGORY: Okay. All right. We're going to start off our meeting with the newly-elected Legislator Leslie Kennedy, who will be given the ceremonial oath of office by the Honorable John J. Toomey, Suffolk County Court Judge, Acting Surrogate Judge and Presiding Judge of the Suffolk County Veterans Court. (*Legislator Leslie Kennedy was administered the Oath of Office by the Honorable J. Toomey*) (*Applause*) P.O. GREGORY: Okay. On behalf of the entire Legislature, I extend our best wishes to Legislator Kennedy for her success in her in new position. Right now, we will have our Salute to the Flag, led by Legislator Kate Browning. (*Salutation*) Okay. The invocation will be given by Pastor Greg Sawyer from the Grace Lutheran Church in Mastic Beach, guest of Legislator Kate Browning. LEG. BROWNING: Good morning. It is my pleasure to introduce Pastor Gregory Sawyer of the Grace Lutheran Church in Mastic Beach. Pastor was born in Torrance, California, which is a suburb of Los Angeles. He attended Concordia University in Irvine, California, and then to the Concordia Seminary in Saint Louis, and he graduated in 1991. Pastor Sawyer is relatively new to Suffolk County, having been installed as Pastor in May 2014 at the Grace Lutheran Church in Mastic Beach. As he approaches his first year as Pastor in Grace Lutheran, I wanted to give him a warm welcome. So it's only appropriate that he opens our meeting today. Pastor Sawyer is married with three children. Prior to serving at Grace Lutheran Church, he served at the ministry -- a ministry in Montana, South Dakota and Michigan. He served as Dean of Students, and is a high school -- was a high school principal at the Hong Kong International School. 3 General Meeting - April 28, 2015 He was also Education Developer for Asia for LCMS World Missions, and the Associate Pastor at Church of All Nations. And I believe you are in charge of over 100 schools in Hong Kong. Pastor Sawyer loves preaching and teaching. He has a passion for sharing the message of God's word with others. He also believes it is a calling to working with our youth. Working with middle school and high school students brings him great joy. Lastly, he believes prayer is a powerful spiritual force, loves praying with others for the hand of God to be made evident in the community around us. Pastor Sawyer is extremely dedicated to fulfilling the needs of the church and the community, and I want to thank him for being here today, and welcome to Suffolk County and the Third Legislative District. (*Applause*) PASTOR SAWYER: It's an honor to be here. In my faith tradition, Martin Luther thought that elected officials held one of the highest callings one could have, giving tirelessly of their time. Not always liked, not always favored, but, certainly, he believed that elected officials were there by the hand of God. Voters vote, but God decides, and you are here because God has a role for you to play right now in Suffolk County, not by mistake, but by design. And so he was always one to say support elected officials, because God allows them to be in place. So, from Psalm 127, "Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labor in vain. Unless the Lord watches over the city, the watchman stays awake in vain. It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest eating bread of anxious toile, but He, the Lord, gives his beloved rest and sleep." From a hymn written in 1941, the verse reads, "Thus, Lord Jesus, every task be to you commended. May your will be done, I ask, until life has ended. Jesus, in your name begun, be the day's endeavor. Grant that it may well be done to your praise forever." We pray. Lord God, you have called your servants to ventures of which we cannot see the ending, by paths as yet untrodden, through perils unknown. Give us faith to go out with good courage, not knowing where we go, but only that your hand is leading us and that your love is supporting us. This we pray through Jesus Christ, your son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God now and forever. Amen. P.O. GREGORY: Okay. Please remain standing for a moment of silence in recognition of Worker's Memorial Day. Let us remember workers who lost their lives due to a workplace injury or illness. We mourn their passing, honor their memory, and commit ourselves to the struggle to ensure a safe and healthy workplace for all. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the people of Nepal as they mourn and struggle to heal from the effects of the recent natural disaster. And also, please keep in your thoughts and prayers all those men and women in the military who put themselves in harm's way every day to protect our country. (*Moment of Silence*) 4 General Meeting - April 28, 2015 D.P.O. SCHNEIDERMAN: Okay. We're going to move on to proclamations. We'll start with our Presiding Officer. DuWayne Gregory will be presenting a proclamation on behalf of the Suffolk County Legislature to Vito Dagnello on his retirement as a Correction Officer of Suffolk County Sheriff's Office, and the longest serving Correction Officer Association President. P.O. GREGORY: It's a pleasure -- come on up, Vito. It's a pleasure to stand before you today to make this proclamation on behalf of the Legislature to Vito Dagnello, who has since retired recently. And Vito is not only a long-serving member of our law enforcement community, but I consider him a close friend. We had some good times, and, you know, we fought the good fight together, as I like to refer to it. But he's always a person that's fair, and someone who's willing and always puts himself out in front of his members to advocate for them and their best interest, and for that, you have earned the respect of not only myself, but all of my colleagues and everyone in Suffolk County government. And we congratulate you for your service and wish you the best in your endeavors. MR. DAGNELLO: Thank you. (*Applause*) D.P.O. SCHNEIDERMAN: Hey, Vito, I understand you're not going to be a stranger to this horseshoe, right? MR. DAGNELLO: No. D.P.O. SCHNEIDERMAN: Vito will be working as an Aide to our newest Legislator, Legislator Leslie Kennedy, as well. (*Applause*) All right. Next, I'd like to invite Legislator Tom Cilmi up to the podium to present proclamations to Probation Officer Trainees Britney Grasman and Aaron Ferretti. LEG. CILMI: Thank you, Mr. Deputy Presiding Officer. Britney and Aaron, could you join me at the podium, please? Also, I'd like to extend a special welcome to the newest member of the Probation Officers' Union family, the new President of the Probation Officer's Association, Matt Porter is here today, so welcome, Matt, good to see you. (*Applause*) As I have done many times before, it's a pleasure to congratulate and say some special words for our Probation Officers. In this case, it's somewhat different, because the Officers who stand before you all today are actually not even Probation Officers yet, they're trainees. So Probation Officer Trainee Aaron Ferretti and Probation Officer Trainee Britney Grasman were -- let's see, 12th -- December 14th of 2014 was the start date of these officers, and they're assigned to the Criminal Court supervision out in the Probation Department's Coram office. On March 25th of this year, Officers Ferretti and Grasman were conducting home visits in the morning and stopped for lunch at a bagel store in a shopping center on the southeast corner of Route 112 and Horseblock Road. While walking out of the bagel store, they noticed three individuals 5 General Meeting - April 28, 2015 standing against the building, one of whom was leaning against the building and looking quite ill. Probation Officer Trainees Ferretti and Grasman entered their vehicle and drove to the location of the three individuals to check on the welfare of them, and as they approached the group, the individual who looked ill started to slump to the ground, and they noticed that he was foaming at the mouth and looked in quite a bit of distress.