Nassau GOP picks Elaine Phillips as county comptroller candidate

Nassau Republicans have picked Elaine Phillips to run for the open county comptroller seat, turning to the former state senator and Flower Hill mayor in an effort to take back the office from Democrats.

Phillips, 61, served one term in the New York State Senate. She also had a 25-year career in the private sector as a Wall Street financial adviser, working for J.P. Morgan, MetLife and Goldman Sachs, most recently as a vice president.

She will face Democrat Ryan Cronin, 40, a corporate attorney who ran unsuccessfully for State Senate in 2012 and 2016.

"I believe Nassau County really needs me right now," Phillips said in an interview. "They need a strong financial watchdog. They need someone with financial experience. They need someone who's able to make these type of decisions and who’s had this type of oversight in the past," she said.

In choosing Phillips, the county GOP has cemented its slate for the fall.

At the top of the ticket is Bruce Blakeman, 65, a Hempstead Town Council member who will challenge Democratic County Executive Laura Curran.

Phillips was elected to the Senate in 2016, when the chamber was controlled by Republicans, and served as chairwoman of committees overseeing ethics, banking and infrastructure.

Phillips lost reelection in 2018 to Sen. Anna Kaplan (D-Great Neck), when Democrats unseated enough Republicans to regain the State Senate majority.

The dynamics of the county comptroller's race changed in February when incumbent Democrat Jack Schnirman said he would not seek a second term.

Schnirman was investigated for accepting a payment of more than $50,000 for unused sick and vacation time he had accrued when he worked as Long Beach city manager.

State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli and Nassau District Attorney Madeline Singas, both Democrats, issued public reports faulting Schnirman for accepting the payout, which totaled $108,000, as he left city government at the start of 2018.

Singas said the evidence did not meet New York's burden to file official misconduct charges.

Schnirman said he had relied on staff interpretation of city code in deciding to accept the payout. However, Schnirman returned the payment in 2019, after DiNapoli's report became public.

Before serving as Mayor of Flower Hill, a wealthy North Shore village with 4,800 residents, Phillips was a trustee for the village.

Before that, she served as a trustee for the neighboring Village of Munsey Park, with some 2,700 residents, where she and her family had lived.

Phillips holds a black belt in karate and still trains "five days a week," she said. She works as a financial adviser for Captrust, a Raleigh, North Carolina firm that has an office in Lake Success.

Phillips, who is married with three adult children, is a dual graduate of Penn State University, where she majored in political science and earned a master's in musiness administration.

Cronin said in a statement: "I welcome Elaine Phillips to the race and look forward to a spirited conversation about how best to move Nassau forward during this difficult time. As our families and business continue to feel the hardships from COVID-19, I plan to bring my message of reducing Nassau's tax burden to voters throughout our county. We need a true fiscal watchdog protecting taxpayer dollars at a time like this."

Joseph Cairo, Nassau Republican chairman, said voters will appreciate Phillips' financial background — "especially since what's gone on in the comptroller's office in the past four years," Cairo said in reference to Schnirman's payout issue.

Jay Jacobs, Nassau and state Democratic chairman, said he believed Phillips' record in the Senate when it was under Republican control would come under criticism, though Jacobs wasn't specific.

Jacobs said he was "very confident about the qualities and the abilities of Ryan Cronin. I feel very good about that."

By Scott Eidler

scott.eidler@newsday.com@ScottEidler

Scott Eidler is a deputy editor for the towns department at Newsday. Scott has worked at Newsday since 2012 and previously covered municipal government and education.