A Better Nassau Calls For A Better Premise

Throughout his campaign for re-election, County Executive Thomas S. Gulotta repeatedly said that his goal was for Nassau County to be "the #1 place to live in the greatest country in the world by 1999."

This, of course, is a laudable goal, but when we really stop to mull that proposition, what comes back to us is a statement made by another man who was up for re-election this year, but one who ultimately found only defeat at the polls.

It was at the tail end of an interview that Fred Pollock, the Democratic town councilman in North Hempstead, was asked about his future goals should he be re-elected.

Predictably, he talked of the Morewood redevelopment project in Port Washington and of projects that he would like to see through to fruition, and then, almost sheepishly, he uttered what we found to be one of the most profound statements of this year's political season.

"I'm a lawyer," he began. "So perhaps this is just an outgrowth of my interest in laws and ordinances, but I think we really have to take a hard look at our local code and revamp it to bring it in line with today's realities.

"After all, much of the town code was written at a time when our community was still growing and was sparsely developed. Certainly there must be places where the code falls short of meeting today's needs."

Certainly, indeed. Anyone familiar, for instance, with the exponential growth of traffic in a number of local communities and in central Nassau specifically, can see that what's perfectly legal and proper according to our ordinances is quickly eroding the nature of our quality of life.

The same can be said for a great many of our rules and regulations - rules and regulations crafted for our villages, towns, and county for a world that looks much different from our own. Just think how vastly your own neighborhood has changed from the 1970s.

Yes, Tom Gulotta's goal for this county is a fine one. Thanks to charter provisions mandating the development of a "master plan," we know his words are more than just rhetoric. But if we are really to achieve the fruits of Gulotta's vision, we can't just allow the development of the master plan to be a nip and tuck operation. We can't just add new rules, ordinances and provisions to the old ones.

What needs to be done is a top to bottom review of our local codes, not just at the county level, but also in the towns and in the villages. Before we can make a new day, we have to determine what hasn't worked in the past and what isn't working in the present.

Nassau County can be all that the county executive wants it to be, but it's going to take work, and it's going to take not just Republicans like Gulotta and Democrats like Pollock, it's going to take a combined expression of vision to get it done.