![]() ![]() (Photo Credit: Pam Robinson, County Executive’s Office)Īs suburban sprawl gobbled up farmland early in his career, Koppelman’s calls to policymakers for increasing open space preservation and further diversity of housing types have since rung prescient. Pictured: Suffolk County Executive Steve Bellone presents to Lee Koppelman the Suffolk Medal for Distinguished Service in July of 2015. DR GISH SAYVILLE SERIESHe authored a series of books, including widely cited textbooks on the topics of urban planning and coastal zone science that are still read by students in university classrooms across the country. Prior students of his include a who’s-who list of policy wonks, bureaucrats, and elected officials such as Kevin Law, who Governor Kathy Hochul recently selected to chair Empire State Development, to former Suffolk County Executive Steve Levy. Parallel to his lengthy tenure in public service, Koppelman is also known for his work at Stony Brook University, where he served as executive director of the Center for Regional Policy Studies and taught into his final months as a Leading Professor and Professor Emeritus in the Department of Political Science. While political squabbles at the time prevented it’s formal adoption, copies can still be found on the bookshelves of Suffolk County bureaucrats and policy wonks alike. For years, Koppelman’s personal copy of The Power Broker held a prominent spot on the planner’s bookshelf.Ī third plan was later authored by Koppelman. The footprint of his work was enshrined in The Power Broker, the 1974 Pulitzer Prize winning biography of Robert Moses, where author Robert Caro noted the merits of the “young Lee Koppelman, a brilliant planner from Long Island.” To Caro, Koppelman served as an informative source who spoke on the nuances of Long Island’s development, standing in stark contrast to Moses “build first, ask questions later” mentality. His research highlighted the interrelationships between developmental policy and the fragility of the Long Island region’s sole source aquifer, which provides potable water to 3 million or so residents. to establish a formal program to preserve farmland through the purchase of development rights, an innovative new concept at the time that other suburban localities later emulated. Thanks to his efforts, Suffolk County became the first local government in the U.S. Koppelman played a leading role in the preservation of Long Island’s open spaces, and was an early supporter for the preservation of open space and protecting farmland in Suffolk County. The studies captured the imagination of both the public and media, with his team’s findings often gracing the covers of Newsday. During that time, he authored two intricate comprehensive plans that grappled with everything from the explosive suburban growth of the post-war era to the rumblings of a brewing environmental crisis due to Suffolk County’s lack of sewers. Koppelman was the Director of the Suffolk County Planning Department from 1960 to 1988, a 28-year run across Republican and Democratic Administrations that remains unmatched in today’s era of partisan appointments.įrom 1965 to 2006, Koppelman served as the executive director of the Long Island Regional Planning Board. Pictured: Lee Koppelman, seen in 1988 in front of an aerial map of Long Island in the library at Stony Brook University. Koppelman, who was then a landscape architect and civic leader in Hauppauge, was hand-picked by Dennison to shape the then-blossoming locality’s administrative infrastructure from a shared desk that was housed within a dusty trailer.įrom the preservation of the sweeping scenic farmland vistas that would eventually be seen by millions of visitors on the East End to ensuring that there would be clean drinking water each time parents turned on the tap faucet for their children, Koppelman’s lengthy and distinguished career touched every community across Long Island. Lee Dennison, the first executive to be elected to lead a newly minted Suffolk County government, the planner worked to build the framework of the county from the ground up. Koppelman, the urban planner whose policies and plans shaped Long Island throughout the second half of the twentieth century, died on March 21, 2022. ![]() The following was exclusively published by The Foggiest Idea on March 22nd, 2022. ![]()
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