Brendan J. Lyons Times Union, Albany, N.Y. (TNS)
Albany — Joseph L. Bruno, an iron-jawed former state Senate majority leader whose political clout shaped some of the region’s largest economic achievements, died early Wednesday.
Bruno was 91 and had been battling cancer.
A boxer and Korean War veteran in his younger years, the Rensselaer County Republican served as Senate majority leader for 14 years following his 1994 overthrow of Long Island’s Ralph Marino. In the chamber, Bruno’s political moxie eventually made him one of the Capital Region’s greatest rainmakers, funneling state support to projects as diverse as Global Foundries and the minor-league ballpark at Hudson Valley Community College that bears his name.
But his tenure as the Senate’s Republican leader ended abruptly in June 2008 when Bruno announced he was leaving elected office after 32 years as an FBI investigation of his intersecting public duties and private business interests was intensifying. Seven months later, Bruno was indicted by a federal grand jury; he professed his innocence and vowed to stand trial and fight the charges. His criminal trials revealed there was often not much of a line between Bruno’s private business dealings and political duties.
The investigation of Bruno, called Operation Green Pastures, began in late 2005 when FBI agents started examining his use of private jet aircraft supplied by Jared Abbruzzese, his horse-breeding partner and business associate. Abbruzzese was never accused of wrongdoing.
In the five years following his indictment, Bruno endured two federal criminal trials, the first ending with his 2009 conviction on two of eight corruption charges — a jury verdict that was later reversed by a federal appeals court in response to a U.S. Supreme Court ruling. At his second trial in December 2014, a jury acquitted Bruno on the two remaining felony counts he faced.
“I put my head down when I heard ‘not guilty, not guilty’ because I was kind of trying to comprehend what I just heard,” Bruno said at a post-trial celebration that day. “Honest to God, I dedicated my adult life to public service. ... No one can imagine, unless you have experienced it, to have the government, the United States of America, trying to put you in prison — for the rest of your life, probably, in my case.”
Bruno was born on April 8, 1929, at the Glens Falls home of his parents, Vitaliano and Rachael Catherine Bruno, both of whom had emigrated from Italy with their families. The third-oldest of eight children, he endured a hardscrabble upbringing in a flat by the railroad tracks that had no running hot water and an oil stove its only heat source.
Years later — after entering politics — Bruno would say that his support for labor unions was shaped by watching his father abused in low-paying jobs, including as a railroad worker and shoveling coal in a paper mill.
Bruno was 9 years old when he began delivering pastries before school to help earn money for his family to buy food. A year later, he took a job selling newspapers, earning three cents for each paper he sold. At 14, he got a job answering phones for a taxi company that paid him $3.50 a week. According to Bruno, he kept a dime each week and gave the rest to his family.
In Korea, where Bruno was deployed at the end of the war, he was promoted to sergeant first class; his duties included exhuming bodies and deactivating and removing unexploded bombs. He received a Bronze Service Star and other honors, as well as becoming the undefeated light heavyweight champion of 25th Infantry Division based in Hawaii.
After returning from the Army, Bruno worked in various businesses as a salesman. In 1959, he used a $5,000 investment to start an United Telecommunications Corporation. The name was later changed to Coradian Corporation, which at its height employed about 800 people. Bruno later sold Coradian, which sold telephone systems to government and business.
In 1966, Burno worked on the campaign staff of Republican Gov. Nelson Rockefeller, and later became a special assistant to Assembly Speaker Perry Duryea, a Republican. Bruno was elected to the state Senate’s 43rd District in 1976, representing Rensselaer and part of Saratoga counties.
“Libby and I are deeply saddened by the passing of our good friend Joe Bruno,” said former Gov. George E. Pataki, who served in the Senate with Bruno from 1983 until he was elected governor in 1994. “Joe left his mark as the leader of the New York state Senate. For 12 years Joe Bruno was a tremendous partner in Albany as we tackled the tough problems to bring New York back from the brink of ruin. On issue after issue, Joe was an indispensable ally. From reforming our criminal justice system to keep violent criminals behind bars to jobs and economic development, Joe was a stalwart leader. The success of Global Foundries is a testament to our partnership and a huge part of Joe’s lasting legacy of advocacy for the Capital Region.”
Pataki, who served three consecutive terms as governor while Bruno was majority leader, added that in “the best of times and the worst, I could always count on Joe to be forthright with his opinion. And while we didn’t always agree, Joe’s handshake was his bond and together we made a difference. Joe will be remembered for his leadership, wit, candor, grit in the face of adversity and his fierce advocacy for the Capital Region”
Bruno’s first wife, Barbara “Bobbie” Bruno, died in 2008 at age 77 following a long battle with Alzheimer’s disease. The couple met in 1949 and had been married for 57 years. Bruno subsequently built a relationship with Kay Stafford, the widow of deceased former state Sen. Ronald Stafford, who died of lung cancer in 2005. The relationship between Bruno and Kay Stafford was revealed in 2008 when she bought property next to his residence in Brunswick. The following year, she faithfully sat in the second row of the courtroom during his 2009 criminal trial.
At the Capitol, he gained renown as a toe-to-toe lawmaker who preferred climbing stairs to elevators. He brazenly challenged governors in the murky political world where three men, including Bruno, controlled the state budget process — none more so than Eliot Spitzer, whose 15-month tenure in office was marked by fierce disputes with Bruno. The lawmaker expressed shock when he learned that Spitzer was resigning amid a prostitution scandal — just months before Bruno himself announced his exit from the political stage.
Former Congressman John Sweeney, who had been part of the team that helped Bruno become Senate majority leader, credited Bruno as one of the reasons he ran for Congress in 1998.
“He was my mentor. He mentored me and showed that people from our area could make a huge difference, and he certainly lived the life that did that,” said Sweeney, who was in Congress until January 2007. “He helped many people. He was strong and tough and kind at the same time. There will be no other like him.”
Bruno was renowned in the Capital Region for his efforts to steer millions of dollars in tax dollars and government grants to upstate New York. The 4,500-seat minor league baseball stadium at HVCC — dubbed “The Joe” — is named in his honor; a bust of his image is on display at Albany International Airport.
Bruno exerted much of his political muscle in helping to improve the region’s transportation hubs, including the Rensselaer rail station, and also creating a foundation for biotechnology and nanotechnology industries that are thriving across upstate. Those efforts include the Global Foundries computer-chip fabrication plant in Malta and his help securing $1 million in state grants to entice Maplnfo, Inc., a software company, to expand its headquarters at Rensselaer’s Tech Park..
Over his tenure, Bruno served as chairman of various committees, including consumer protection, insurance, elections, commerce, economic development, and small business. He said that his focus on business and technology development was a result of New York losing businesses and population to other states.
In his professional biography, Bruno said he was instrumental in creating the Solid Waste Management Act of 1988, which helped institute an approach that emphasized reduction, recycling, and reuse of waste products, as well as environmentally sound disposal programs.