The Board of Elections released the candidate list for the upcoming November Town of Oyster Bay elections last week. Energized by a renewed cohesiveness, county Democrats are hoping to make some inroads into the historically Republican-dominated municipality.

Topping the list of candidates for the Democratic ticket will be Kevin Langberg, who is running for the supervisor's position. He stated that as a special assistant to Lew Yevoli, the former Town of Oyster Bay supervisor, for several years, he gained a strong background in the operations of town government.

Anthony Macagnone, Frank Goban, and Bonnie Eisler will run for the three council positions open in this year's election. Macagnone, a carpenter by trade, ran his own 1998 campaign for the State Senate on a shoestring budget. Democratic leadership was impressed with his showing during that campaign where he garnered 36 percent of the vote against a strong candidate, Republican incumbent Kemp Hannon.

Goban, a Hicksville resident, is presently the executive director for Constituent Affairs, 13th NY State Assembly District. A 44-year resident of the Town of Oyster Bay, he has run for elected office several times in the past. Eisler is a founding member of the United Civic Associations of North Oyster Bay, a recently formed conglomeration of several civic organizations in the northern communities of the town. She possesses a MBA in Finance and Marketing.

Martha Murray Offerman, a Bayville resident, is the candidate for town clerk, and James Stefanich, from Syosset, is the candidate for receiver of taxes.

Breaking into a government that has historically been a Republican stronghold and in which each elected position is currently held by a Republican will be a difficult task for the Democratic candidates. However, many political observers see the present political environment as perfect for making some inroads.

"I feel there is a real awareness of the benefits that a competent, competitive opponent can bring to the table," said Darren Bloch, executive director of the Nassau County Democratic Committee. "We are going to exploit that with this strong group of candidates.

According to Bloch, the party will organize a strong grass roots, field-oriented campaign, as well as an outreach program that will involve heavy media contacts. The party's ability to reach out to a greater pool of voters through the media, he cited, is due to a resurgence in the party.

"For the first time in a while we will be able to have a strong media and outreach program that the county [Democrats] had not been capable of before in either county races or town races," said Bloch. "We have a certain resurgence in the party where we now have the resources to take on those types of campaign."

He attributes the resurgence in the party to the current financial woes of the county under Republican leadership and the strong leadership of the Nassau Democrats under Thomas DiNapoli.

"Tom has given the party a certain level of credibility that it has been lacking in the past.," said Bloch. "With his prominent role in the county and state budget negotiations he has forced Republicans to recognize the Democratic party and actually start dealing with us and becoming accountable right now to us, and hopefully at some point to the public at large."

He continued, "What we're seeing is your party loyalists, who had left for any number of reasons over the past 5 or 10 years, starting to come back, and feeling more comfortable with the direction of the party, knowing what is going on out of county headquarters."

Bloch, who admitted the party on Long Island has had trouble in the past organizing a cohesive strategy, characterized the upcoming campaign as being one that would promote strength and solidarity among the party and its candidates in the town and county.

"This is a group of people who are very different in their backgrounds and where they come from, but when you sit down with them you see that a lot of the fundamentals and frustrations that they are feeling and which inspired them to run for office have a very common thread running through them, and that is the fact that Nassau County and the Town of Oyster Bay can no longer afford one-party rule and it is time to have independent, responsible, accountable elected officials running our towns and county.

Bloch feels the slate of Democratic candidates vying for positions in the town government is strong and capable.

"What they offer is that they are not simply going to be rubber stamps to a larger, unelected party leadership," said Bloch. "These are people with very strong ideas about what their own communities and what their own fields need to improve the quality of life in that area. I think they offer a certain amount of independence and criticalness that will help the entire Town of Oyster Bay."

The incumbent Republican candidates in the Town of Oyster Bay elections are Supervisor John Venditto, Councilman Anthony Altimari, Councilman Joe Muscarella, Councilman Martin Massell, Town Clerk Fanny Corsentino, and Receiver of Taxes John O'Leary.