Oyster Bay Town hires Massapequa Park mayor, four others

The Town of Oyster Bay has hired Massapequa Park Mayor Jeffrey Pravato as deputy commissioner of public works.

Pravato, 49, said he will continue to serve as mayor while working for the town. The town job has a $97,000 annual salary. Pravato is paid “about $7,000” as mayor, he said.

He referred questions about his new job to town spokesman Brian Nevin who said Pravato would be involved in sanitation, recycling and vehicle maintenance operations. Town Supervisor Joseph Saladino did not respond to an interview request about new hires.

Pravato left the financial services industry last year after 25 years working as a stock trader in Manhattan where he said his clients were institutional investors such as hedge funds. He said he will continue side work in commercial and residential real estate.

He began serving in municipal government in 2002 as a Massapequa Park village trustee and was appointed mayor in 2013 to replace then-mayor James Altadonna Jr., who left to become Oyster Bay town clerk.

Pravato said town officials approached him about the job.

“They like what I’ve done in the village of Massapequa Park. We have a great village,” Pravato said.

He said he knows how municipalities operate. “I’m very deep in the DPW [Department of Public Works] area: working with the men; doing the budgets.”

His wife, Jennifer Pravato, is also a town employee, working part-time in the department of intergovernmental affairs, he said.

Jeffrey Pravato is one of five people hired by the town since the beginning of the year. The town also hired George Graf as director of governmental research at a salary of $97,163. On Jan. 9 the town board raised the starting salary for that position from $73,550. Graf previously served as Nassau County’s deputy director of finance and as Farmingdale mayor.

Patricia E. Reynolds, who previously served as an election clerk at the Nassau County Board of Elections, was hired as a recreation aide at a salary of $58,874.

Danielle Galasso was hired as a recreational aide at $40,000. Galasso has previously worked for the town and Nassau County. Last year the town board approved a home rule message in support of state legislation that would allow her to enroll in an older, more generous pension plan — Tier 4 rather than Tier 5 — because she had worked for the town for three months in 2003.

Alfred Staab III was hired as a laborer at $54,120.