Episode Details

In this episode, Doug is joined by Thomas Suozzi, County Executive of Nassau County. In 2001 he was the first democrat elected to that office in a generation. Nassau was a mess, characterized by the Syracuse University's Maxwell School as the worst county in the country. By 2005, Nassau had made a dramatic turn-around and Suozzi was named Public Official of the year by Governing magazine, who called him a political transformer. In 2004, disgusted with Albany, he led the “Fix Albany” Movement. He ran for governor in 2006 in the democratic primary - lost to Eliot Spitzer. In 2008, Governor Spitzer named him Chair of the State Commission on Property Tax Relief, which was widely praised but generally ignored by the state legislature. He is currently running for his third term as Nassau County Executive.