Paul Vallone, former New York City councilman, veterans advocate, dies at 56

Paul Vallone, New York City’s deputy veterans services commissioner and a former city councilman who was a scion of a dynastic Democratic family, has died at age 56.

Details of Vallone’s death, which was confirmed by the mayor’s office, weren’t immediately available. He died of a heart attack over the weekend, according to a source close to the family. His family couldn’t be reached Sunday for comment.

Paul was the son of Peter Vallone Sr., the longtime City Council speaker and former candidate for mayor and governor, and brother of Peter Vallone Jr., who was also a city councilman and now is a judge. Paul and Peter’s grandfather was also a judge.

“There have always been intensely political families in New York City, like the Cuomos, the Wagners and the Vallones,” The New York Times wrote in 2005.

Among his duties in the city's veterans services agency, Paul Vallone appeared last year in Times Square with retired Army Staff Sgt. Travis Mills, a quadruple amputee who was critically injured in Afghanistan by an improvised explosive device while on patrol, losing parts of his arms and legs.

On the City Council, Vallone, a lawyer, represented nearly a dozen neighborhoods close to the Queens-Nassau border, including Auburndale, Bay Terrace, Bayside, Beechhurst, College Point, Douglaston, Flushing, Little Neck, Malba and Whitestone.

According to his biography on the council website, which lists almost 800 bills he sponsored and nearly 2,000 votes he cast, Vallone was married to Anna-Marie, and had three children, Catena, Lea and Charlie.

The page says Vallone secured more than $40 million in funding for his district, almost as much as the district got in the prior nine city budgets.

In a news release Sunday, Mayor Eric Adams mourned Vallone, whom he appointed in 2022 to the veterans post after Vallone supported Adams for mayor.

Calling Vallone “a true son of Queens," Adams said, "he upheld a family legacy through his service in the New York City Council and with the New York City Department of Veterans’ Services. Throughout his time in office, the blue-collar community he represented knew they had a fighter from the neighborhood representing them in City Hall.”

The Queens borough president, Donovan Richards Jr., said in a news release: “Paul didn’t just carry on his family’s immense legacy of service — he personified and embodied it. He inspired me every single day to be a better elected official, but it’s his lessons in friendship, family and fatherhood that I will cherish for the rest of time. Queens is a better borough because of Paul.”

Tom Suozzi, a Democrat running for the 3rd Congressional District seat, which overlaps with some parts of Queens Vallone represented, posted on X, formerly known as Twitter, that he was devastated by the death, which he said was Saturday night.

"Just yesterday, Paul ran a 3-hour phone bank for me,” said the post from Suozzi, who also comes from a political family dynasty.

By Matthew Chayes

matthew.chayes@newsday.comchayesmatthew

Matthew Chayes, a Newsday reporter since 2007, covers New York City.