When John Riordan took on the job of Town of North Hempstead attorney in August 2012, he never imagined he would find himself appointed interim town supervisor a little more than a year later.
“That was not anticipated. It’s a change of circumstance. It’s interesting,” Riordan said during a recent interview in his new office at Town Hall.
Since the town board voted him to fill out the remainder of Jon Kaiman’s term as supervisor at its Oct. 1 meeting, the 70-year-old Riordan has been making the rounds of town facilities to familiarize himself with various department’s operations.
“I’m learning a lot about the town aside from the legal circumstances,” he said. “It’s fun. I enjoy it.”
Riordan, a former county district court and surrogate court judge who lives in East Williston, said his knowledge of town facilities had pretty much been limited to visiting the town High Department facilities on Denton Avenue in New Hyde Park over the years – once to get gas in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy last year.
Even then, receiving an orientation of the work handled by the workers at the facility proved to be educational.
“I didn’t know the extent of the operations,” Riordan said.
He said he has also now visited a facility he’s passed many times at the Department of Senior and Aging in Roslyn to get a first-hand look at what goes on there.
“I get to see what they do, all those enthusiastic people,” Riordan said.
He said his wife, Lynn, has referred to what he calls his “short stint” as supervisor, which ends Dec. 31, as his 15 minutes of fame.
But he has a serious perspective on the role he will play in the town government for the remainder of the year.
“For my tenure, I see my job to see that the government continues to operate and everything is done that should be done in the fashion that’s required,” he said.
Riordan said the most important aspect of town business at the moment is the consideration and adoption of the 2014 town budget.
Submission of the tentative budget was the last official act Kaiman performed, along with submitting his resignation, when he left Town Hall on Sept. 23. Kaiman spent the rest of that day in his new state job as the storm czar in Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s administration, overseeing the continuing cleanup of Long Island in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy.
“If problems come up, I plan to be in the role of supervisor to make sure the government continues to provide the services it has to,” Riordan said.
He said he’s a “caretaker,” intent to see town business in process through and planning no new initiatives in that role.
Shortly after Kaiman revealed his departure date in early September, Riordan said Kaiman mentioned the prospect of appointing an interim supervisor and asked Riordan if he would be available to take the job.
“I indicated if the other [board] members wanted me to do that, I would do that,” Riordan said.
He had a second meeting with Kaiman to discuss stepping up as interim supervisor and then he said he had a series of individual meetings with the Democratic town council members.
Town Deputy Supervisor Chris Senior automatically assumed Kaiman’s role as a non-voting member of the board when he resigned. But Riordan said the Democrats wanted a voting board member as supervisor and wanted Senior to focus on his primary role of working on the budget.
“They felt both roles should be filled,” Riordan said. “I only wanted to do it if everybody wanted it.”
Town Councilman Thomas Dwyer and other board members made that clear on the night Riordan was appointed.
“I truly believe there are two distinct roles of supervisor and deputy supervisor that have made the town run well,” Dwyer said.
Republican Councilwoman Dina De Giorgio, who is running for supervisor against Nassau County Legislator Judi Bosworth, questioned the need for a voting supervisor. She has since said Riordan should recuse himself from voting on approval of the town budget next month.
Riordan immediately rejected De Giorgio’s suggestion that he should refrain from voting for the budget because he’s part of the board’s Democratic majority.
“I was voted to be the supervisor of the town board. I took an oath to perform the duties. And one of the duties is to vote on things like that. The insinuation that there was some pre-plan on how I would vote on a budget that I hadn’t even seen at that point, is not correct. I have no preconceived ideas on the budget,” he said.
Riordan said the budget vote would be the most important vote he would make as interim supervisor.
At this point, just a few weeks into his new role, Riordan said he was getting a bit more accustomed to his new job.
“I’m more comfortable now than the week before I became supervisor,” he said, smiling.
He said he’s told everyone on his staff that he is going to rely on them for help. But he said his knowledge of the legal issues the town has been dealing with gives him a good starting point.
He’d been a practicing lawyer for 25 years before running for Nassau County District Court Judge, the result of a “coincidence of things,” he said.
Town Councilman Thomas Dwyer’s father, also named Thomas, had been a colleague of Riordan’s in a law firm and Riordan helped campaign for the elder Dwyer when his friend successfully ran for county district court judge. In 1993, Dwyer suggested Riordan also run for district court judge on the Democratic ticket.
Riordan won and was subsequently re-elected in 1999. In 2000, a county surrogate judge’s position was open. Riordan ran for that and served on the bench for another 10 years.
“When I first became a judge, I didn’t know I would like that. I became very confident in being a judge and I felt it very rewarding,” Riordan said.
He returned to private practice in 2012 as senior counsel in the estates, trusts and surrogate’s court litigation department at Reisman Peirez Reisman & Capobianco LLP in Garden City.
He accepted the part-time position as town attorney after Richard Finkel left the job in August 2012. He is currently on a leave of absence from the firm while he serves as town supervisor.
Riordan graduated from Sewanhaka High School, where his mother, Eunice, taught business courses. Aside from academic pursuits, he was a lineman on the football team and also played lacrosse.
When he was in his senior year at Hofstra University, he said, his mother encouraged him to seek a professional degree.
Influenced by her experience of the Depression, she said a profession would assure him of work.
He first gravitated to accounting, but then decided being a lawyer would be a better choice.
“The only lawyers I’d seen were on TV and in the movies. It was interesting to me,” Riordan said.
He said he enjoyed the planning aspects of the law and helping people. And he appreciates that all aspects of town business are tied to legal issues.
“Everything coming through here has legal aspects to it,” he said.
An East Williston resident since 1977, Riordan served in the East Williston Fire Department for a total of 18 years.
He and Lynn raised two sons, neither of whom followed his career lead. Their son John owns a computer business, and James is a fine arts dealer.
In his free time, Riordan said he enjoys golf, even though he said he’s not very good at it. He said he also enjoys boating and puttering around the garden.
When his interim term as supervisor is up, he said he’s uncertain of what’s next. But he said he would like to discuss the town attorney position with whoever is elected supervisor.
