Richard Brodsky, longtime state assemblyman from Westchester, has died

ALBANY – Former Assemblyman Richard Brodsky, known for his bombastic approach to governing and passion for politics, died Wednesday after exhibiting symptoms consistent with COVID-19 in recent days, his former colleagues and family said.

He was 73.

Brodsky, a Democrat from Greenburgh, Westchester, was a towering figure in the state Legislature from 1983 through 2010, always willing to speak his mind and rail for change in state and local governments.

Update:Richard Brodsky, late former Assembly member, tested negative for COVID-19

The news of his death shocked his former colleagues.

"When the virus takes someone that strong and that powerful, it spares none of us," said Assemblywoman Amy Paulin, D-Scarsdale. "He was strong, he was strong-willed. I'm so sad about it. I can't even express myself."

Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie said Brodsky was a close friend who helped him and mentored him when Heastie joined the Assembly in 2001.

"It was an honor to serve with him and watch as he fought, not just for his constituents, but for all New Yorkers," Heastie, D-Bronx, said in a statement.

Brodsky's wife, Paige, said her husband had been sick in recent days with symptoms consistent with coronavirus. He received a test for COVID-19 on Friday, but had not yet received the results.

He died Wednesday morning at home, she said. He also suffered from a heart condition that may have been exacerbated by the virus, she explained.

Update:Richard Brodsky, late former Assembly member, tested negative for COVID-19

"He was an award-winning public servant," she said. "He lived his life to serve the public. He was a fabulous father and a very good husband."

Richard Brodsky, a career in public service

Born in Brooklyn, Brodsky and his family moved to Westchester County when he was 9.

He graduated from Ardsley High School and attended Brandeis University, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in politics, and then Harvard Law School, where he received his law degree.

He is survived by his wife and two daughters.

Socially liberal and fiscally moderate, Brodsky served 14 terms in Albany, raking up a string of accomplishments that still carry on.

As head of the Assembly Committee on Environmental Conservation, he authored the legislation that created the Environmental Protection Fund that has since provided more than $3 billion to protect and grow the state's natural resources.

"In these times when each of us is getting to that inevitable point of having the tragedy of this virus directly impact our personal lives, that time has arrived for many of us in Albany," Assemblyman Kevin Cahill, D-Kingston, said. 

"Richard was a gregarious, acerbic, brilliant and unique statesman and his passing leaves a void in our collective memory." 

Brodsky's most passionate issue was his fight against the state's public authorities, the shadowy offshoot of state and local governments that often worked behind closed doors while overseeing billions of dollars of public money.

He was memorably known to call them "Soviet-style bureaucracies," and they have been at the center of many corruption scandals in New York.  

As chairman of the Assembly Committee on Corporations, Authorities and Commissions, Brodsky investigated the authorities and exposed many of their failings.

In one fight, he took on the New York Yankees for the taxpayer funding it received for its new stadium, issuing a report titled, “The House That You Built.”

“Government’s client is the public and not the Yankees,” Brodsky told the New York Times in 2016, and took a shot at high ticket prices: “When the public subsidizes a stadium, there is a public interest in assuring that people can afford events.”

Before he retired from the Assembly, he got the Legislature in 2009 to create the Public Authorities Control board to install oversight over them. The office still operates.

"This is the most fundamental reform of Albany in decades," Brodsky boasted to the Daily News after the bill passed.

More:New data on New York coronavirus deaths: Most had these underlying illnesses; 61% were men

A 'pugnacious' politician

Few lawmakers walked the halls of the state Capitol with Brodsky's vigor and sense of purpose, making his Democrat and Republican colleagues both revere him and loathe to sparring with him.

"He would poke fun at me for being a Republican, but he fully supported my right to have principled positions contrary to his or those of his party," Senate Minority Leader John Flanagan, R-Suffolk County, said.

"And he deeply respected our mutual desire to vigilantly represent the suburban point of view."

Jim Malatras, a former Brodsky aide from 2000 to 2007 who went on to be a top official for Gov. Andrew Cuomo, remembered how Brodsky once got mad at him for not seizing an opportunity at the Capitol to make a positive change in government.

"I think he enjoyed being pugnacious and combative, but in the end there was no one else you’d want to cut your teeth with in public policy or public service than him," Malatras, now president of Empire State College, remembered. 

"He truly believed in what he did. He fought like hell to stick up for the little guy."

Brodsky ran twice for state attorney general in 2006 and 2010, but was unsuccessful in the Democratic primaries. In 2006, he quit his run for attorney general to donate a kidney to his then-13-year-old daughter, Willie.

"Even if you disagreed with him, you had to love him," said county Democratic chairman Reggie Lafayette. "He had that Brodsky style. He had a style very much fit for government, for public service."

More:Eurythmics II? Annie Lennox meets...Richard Brodsky

In 2007, he was among the candidates for state comptroller when Alan Hevesi resigned, but his colleagues selected Tom DiNapoli for the post.

"I can’t imagine anyone giving this virus a bigger fight, but it has taken this tenacious, intelligent and passionate voice from us," said Dutchess County Executive Marc Molinaro, a former Republican assemblyman.

In recent years, he wrote regular columns in the Times Union in Albany and the Huffington Post.

He had also served as a senior fellow at the Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service at New York University and as a fellow of the public policy group Demos.

In 2018, he received honorary degrees from Glasgow Caledonian University in Scotland for his public service that were handed out by music legend Annie Lennox, who had the honorary title as its chancellor.

The columns reflected Brodsky's style: a fighter who would challenge Democrats in his own party to do better and direct scorn at his political foes.

In his last column March 29 for the Times Union, he even weighed in on the plauddits Cuomo was receiving for his response to the coronavirus pandemic, titled, "Cuomo deserves praise — and some words of caution."

Brodsky mixed kind words for Cuomo with a pragmatic tone.

"A lot of Americans were waiting for a visible alternative to Trump's idea of leadership. Now they have it," Brodsky wrote. 

"But such a gift is not permanent. Sustaining it is not as simple as holding daily press briefings and shining through the darkness Trump spreads around him. It will require discipline and an ability to take advice and adjust course. I hope he succeeds."

Joseph Spector is the New York state editor for the USA TODAY Network. He can be reached at JSPECTOR@Gannett.com or followed on Twitter: @GannettAlbany

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