MAY 16, 2006, FARMINGVILLE, NY –Brookhaven Supervisor Brian X. Foley swore in the five members of his newly constituted Ethics Board at a press conference Tuesday, May 16 at Brookhaven Town Hall.
“These distinguished candidates comprise the strongest Ethics Board that the Town of Brookhaven has ever had,” said Supervisor Foley. “Citizens can be confident that this board will be a key part of reclaiming the good name of our town and ushering in a culture of competence. I reached across party lines to find a balanced cadre of candidates with impeccable credentials and unquestioned character.”
The members of the Ethics Board are Sister Elizabeth A. Hill, CSJ, JD, president of St. Joseph’s College; former Suffolk County Police Commissioner John Gallagher; long-time educator Leonard Adler, most recently superintendent of the Middle Country Central School District; physicist Donald Garber, who worked at Brookhaven National Lab and currently operates a consulting firm; and technology expert and educator Herman A. Washington. The Ethics Code requires that no more than two members of the board be from any one political party; two of the nominees are Republicans, two are Democrats, and one has no party affiliation.
Sister Elizabeth has been President of St. Joseph's College since 1997. S. Elizabeth has been responsible for the building of a state-of-the-art Business and Technology Center on the Suffolk campus as well as launching a comprehensive, capital Master Plan for the Brooklyn campus. Under her leadership, enrollment on both campuses has continuously increased and a number of new programs have been added.
A magna cum laude alumna of St. Joseph's, S. Elizabeth received her M.A. in History from Columbia University and studied theology and scripture in Rome under the auspices of Gregorian University. S. Elizabeth received her J.D. from St. John's University School of Law where she was a Thomas More Scholarship student and president of the Criminal Law Institute.
After receiving her J.D., she spent time as a staff attorney in the Catholic Migration Office in Brooklyn. Prior to being named president, S. Elizabeth served as Executive Assistant to St. Joseph's previous president from 1980 to 1997.
The other members of the Ethics Board have similarly impressive resumes.
Mr. Gallagher served as Suffolk County Police Commissioner for seven years until his retirement in 2004. He served as an assistant deputy county executive from 1992 to 1997 and from 1974 to 1980 he was executive dean of Suffolk County Community College’s Western Campus. He left the college to become Suffolk’s chief deputy county executive and in 1986 he took the post of senior vice president at St. Francis Hospital.
Upon his retirement, he received Suffolk County’s Medal of Honor, its highest award. Only 18 have been awarded in the 31-year history of the award. He resides in Miller Place and he and his wife Patricia have three grown children and seven grandchildren.
Leonard Adler, Ed. D. of Port Jefferson has a long and distinguished career in education. Dr. Adler served as Superintendent of the Middle Country Central School District from 2004 to 2006. From 1997 to 2004 he served as Administrator for Management Services for SCOPE in Smithtown. From 1993 to 1997, he served as an educational consultant to numerous Long Island school districts.
A Port Jefferson resident, he is a member of County Executive Steve Levy’s Task Force on Cutting Costs in Government and Schools, a member of the county Task Force on Child Abuse and is on the executive board of Huntington Township Youth Services.
Herman A. Washington of East Patchogue recently retired as a Professor Emeritus, Computer Information Systems Department, at LaGuardia Community College of the City University of New York after completing 31 years of service. Prior to beginning his teaching career, he was employed for 10 years by IBM as a computer programmer, systems analyst, and programming systems development manager and for 3 years as vice president of an independent consulting firm working on systems development projects for the Model Cities program, for the OEO anti-poverty program, and for the New York City Human Resources Administration.
He earned a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from Manhattan College and a master’s degree in business administration from New York University.
He has always been active in community affairs and volunteer service. In Roosevelt, he served terms as PTA president and as NAACP branch president. He has served on the board of directors of several non-profit organizations including Family and Children’s Association, United Way of Long Island, Catholic Charities of Long Island, and the 100 Black Men of Long Island. Awards and recognition include Long Island Newsday Every Day Hero, FCA Humanitarian of the Year, UWLI United Caring Award, 100 Black Men of LI Man of the Year and Junior League of LI Volunteer Merit Award.
He is married to Daryl E. Jordan, who is a soprano classical musician and retired music educator. The couple has six adult children: Keith, Lori, Michael, David, Tunja, and Gina. Herman and Daryl reside in East Patchogue.
Donald Garber of East Setauket was a physicist at Brookhaven National Laboratory from 1967 to 1982 and did research involving the High Flux Beam Reactor, published numerous nuclear data compendia, and was involved in evaluating data production, and creating advance reactor simulation computer programs.
He founded GMLC Associates, Ltd., a consulting firm, in 1982 and operated the one-person consulting firm with clients in the United States, Canada and Scandinavia through 2004. Clients included supercomputer manufacturers, large electric utility companies and other consulting firms. Many of the projects included numerical method solutions to very complex problems. Some involved programs to learn patterns to provide rapid solutions. Some involved solving millions of equations in symbolic form to produce symbolic equation solutions.
He has been involved with the Civic Association of the Setaukets since 1988 and is currently president of the group. He has been a member of the Affiliated Brookhaven Civic Organizations since 1992. He also served as president Brookhaven Lab Community Advisory Council (CAC) and has been a member since 1997 of the Stony Brook University Community Advisory Council (CAC), and was appointed chairperson in 2005.