Orange County Executive Steven Neuhaus has returned to the US after being deployed since mid-March with the Navy in Europe. Neuhaus, who is a Lieutenant Commander with the Navy Reserves, served with the Sixth Fleet in response to the war in Ukraine. He spoke with WAMC’s Jim Levulis on Tuesday.
Neuhaus: You know, it's interesting, I thought when I was first picked for this task that I would be going to do humanitarian work. And when I got there, it completely changed. And we were really on a force protection stance. Basically, the Chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff said, we are there, the 100,000 American troops is there to protect Europe's eastern flank. And the humanitarian work was pushed on to the neighboring countries of Ukraine, like Poland and Romania, and the rest of them. Then the European Union, then NATO, and then the United States. So we were like the fourth ring for humanitarian. So my posture, and my job was to make sure that we had everything was operational, we had a lot of units, a lot of troops, a lot of weaponry in the region. And that's constantly taking, you know, you need to refuel, you need to rearm, you need to make sure things, casualty reps, we call them, like if something breaks down, are constantly being monitored and fixed. So I was the battle watch captain for my section, and I was on call 24/7. And I managed a team of about 50 officers and a few enlisted Marine and Navy assets. And so that was my job pretty much. I was on a working groups to help, you know, execute the presidential drawdown orders from President Biden. Presidential drawdown orders were the exchange of weapons that we had in our inventory to Ukraine. So I was the representative from my fleet to the European Command to make sure that we got those supplies and weapons to the Ukraine so we can actually keep them as a country.
Levulis: And there's been a lot of discussion about the global influx of supplies, aid to Ukraine. What's your assessment of the situation? Is that going smoothly?
Neuhaus: I think it's going well. It's very difficult to give supplies, including weapons to a country in the middle of a war because the enemy in this case, Russia, knows that the weaponry are coming from the West. And they know the different supply routes for the most part. And at the same time, you also have humanitarian aid coming in, sometimes at the same supply route. So it became very challenging, but I will tell you, bar none the United States has done the most out of any of the countries. We appreciate everybody support, the NATO alliance, as well as some of the outside NATO alliance that came in and supported Ukraine with arms. But I fundamentally believe that Ukraine is here today, because they were able to get the support and military support in order to survive those weapons like the infamous Javelin and the Stinger missiles, one’s used to shoot tanks and armor, one’s used to shoot to shoot down rotary and fixed wing aircraft has really helped turn the tide of the war. So I am proud of the American mission there.
Levulis: Were you able to interact or did you interact with any Ukrainian soldiers or Ukrainian civilians?
Neuhaus: We really did not. We kind of dealt with ourselves, the United States. Everybody had their tasking of who was doing what. The president and the Joint Chiefs of Staff announced that we're giving artillery and certain other weaponry to the Ukrainians. And our job was to get that together and move it down the pipeline. And then we had liaisons are able to do the handoff. So we personally did not interact with it. We basically just packaged up the goods and moved it down the pipeline, and where it was turned over at a border crossing.
Levulis: So given what you experienced, what you saw, what's your assessment of the overall war in Ukraine and the future of it, the future for that region?
Neuhaus: I think the future is very positive. I mean, obviously, everybody's on pins and needles now, we still have a conflict going on. But, you know, when I went over there, they I was briefed and told that Ukraine is going to collapse within days. So our mission then was to secure the border and beef up Poland and neighboring countries, and make sure we deal with the humanitarian crisis that was coming over the border at the time. They gave Ukraine the life expectancy of a goldfish. But thankfully to the fighting spirit led by President Zelensky, that changed. And you know, I say this to a lot of people. If you look at the difference in other conflicts that we've been involved in, including Afghanistan, when the going got tough, a lot of these leaders took the American money, put it in a suitcase and got the hell out. And that spirit of fleeing spreads to the population and the country collapse. What happened here is you saw a leader like Zelensky galvanize and say “We're not going to take this” and that changed the spirit. So them holding the line and coupled with Western supplies of anti-armor and anti-aircraft weaponry, allowed them to push the Russians back from the capital, which was really under siege. And really spread that around. So what does that mean for the future, every one of those countries on the border the Balkan states, Poland, Romania are welcoming US and Western troops and equipment, including anti-missile batteries, like the Patriot systems, that will reinforce their lines, and convince the Russians not to go further again. The one last thing I'll say to you is, what this conflict is proved is, and this is what we say in the military overseas, is that the Russians aren't 10 feet tall, and some superpower thing. They took a licking from a very weakened force compared to theirs. And I don't think they have the capabilities of pushing into these other countries at this time. They're going to have to do a rearming of themselves and re-strategizing. So I think the countries that are galvanized now, that are that are intact, including those border countries are going to be, you know, protected going forward. And, you know, we had a speech before we left here, we had a retired admiral talk about he was an animal during the 90s. He talked about in the 80s, the French had a huge army, you're talking about these Western European and NATO countries had huge standing armies, the last 30 years, there's no reason to have one, you know, so these countries really need to, you're going to see a major military buildup in Western Europe to answer this, this potential, to make sure the Russians never think about going west.
Levulis: We’ll note that you deployed to Iraq from November 2018 to June 2019, as part of the US military campaign against ISIS. And you also deployed to South Korea in 2017 and North Africa in 2011. Now, obviously, those earlier deployments have overlapped with your time as county executive. You've given a State of the County address from overseas before. How do you manage to stay up to date and lead the county while also being involved overseas?
Neuhaus: Great question. It's actually been proven not only in my deployments in the past, but more during the COVID age that you can get away with and get along and move forward by technology. And that has allowed me to basically be dual-headed at times. And, you know, we had scheduled conversations every day. I was about a six-hour time difference in Europe, and I think it was seven in Iraq. So usually when I would go to bed, I'd have staff meetings, I'd be in my pajamas sometimes doing staff meetings, or even doing addresses to like the Chamber of Commerce. I remember I got up at two o'clock in the morning for the New York State Association of Towns and Villages to their conference and spoken to in the morning with my pajamas on to them. So you make it work. Technology is definitely you know, key. And it becomes complicated sometimes if you don't have it and you always have redundancy. I remember I did my State of the County address live from Baghdad, we did a prerecorded version of it, which I hate doing, because I love speaking off the cuff and I love being live. But we did it just in case I lost communications over there. So you always have that double integrity to make sure that you don't have any problems. But texting also is easy. There's also WhatsApp and Signal are immensely popular for the military over there. They take a lot less bandwidth. So all those coupled with very supportive commanders. You know, the active duty admirals and generals are like fascinated by the private sector because their career military officers, and when they have this great diverse group of Reservists and National Guard called in there, they're pretty supportive. And they’re like “What? You do this? And you're going to do that? And we're going to do it live from here?” So as long as you're not giving any secrets, or anything that's going to reveal some positions, they're pretty cool with it. So I'm very lucky to have some great supportive leaders in the past, too.
Levulis: Now you are set to deliver a State of the County address in person at the Orange County Emergency Services Center in Goshen on May 25. What's top of mind for you as you piece that together?
Neuhaus: So we know we've been working on it for the last month or so, even further. You know, we're going to be talking about economy, we're going to talk about the county’s budget. I mean, we're financially doing phenomenal. We were doing phenomenal before the pandemic. We were able to weather through it. We've always kept a robust rainy day fund. And we have really sexy companies that are growing and expanding here, besides Legoland, which is doing phenomenal here and producing a lot of hotel-motel tax, sales tax and tourist attention. We have companies like Lockheed Martin, that makes state of the art parts for aircraft. They have four manufacturing divisions here in Orange County. Very robust universities like Touro medical school continuing to grow and now, you know, our existing medical portfolio. So these are great jobs, diverse jobs. The entertainment and hotel/motel are growing as well. We have, I think 26 hotels in the planning process right now. Woodbury Commons continues to expand and do phenomenally well. And then we have this really thriving movie industry that has come here because we're so much cheaper to do business in New York City. So we have a lot of actors, Woody Harrelson was just here, you know, so really good stuff, and very diverse, which is growing our portfolio. And we also talked about emergency management. That's always been my baby, I just did a tabletop yesterday, for a potential major airline crash in Orange County. We had all our partners. And so we always prepare for these types of things. And we have a lot of ex-military, and police and fire and EMS that are just really pumped up to get involved with preparation for the what if, and so that's gonna be all part of the state of the county address.
Levulis: You mentioned being able to keep in touch with your county staff through technology while you're overseas. Is it a relief, though, to step away from local politics? Do you, while you're overseas?
Neuhaus: You know, it's funny. I had lunch with my wife yesterday, and my son, my little guy is four-years-old. And at one point I said “Jeez I don’t even know if I feel like going back to work today.” Because I hate the politics. Even though I'm an elected official, I’m the county executive, the taxpayers hired me to run a corporation. It's almost a billion dollar corporation, we have an $830 million budget. And every day when I'm deployed, I read Stars and Stripes. It's probably one of the best printed publications because it takes all the major news industries, radio, and print and even TV, and that's where they get their sources from. So it's very diverse opinions. But New York appeared in it. You know, I was gone for almost three months, and New York was in there for bad reasons. The Lieutenant Governor having to resign. The redistricting going back to court. You know, it's just the politics in New York is very hard to come back to. But I love this community. I love the state. I couldn't be happier to be back at you know, we talked earlier before I went on the air, the air quality, missing my kids. I got four young kids that really missed me. And I'm obviously missing them as well. So I am excited to be back and this job is literally the best job in the world. County executive. It's just phenomenal.
Levulis: Well, I will ask you about some politics and political happenings. In New York, Governor Kathy Hochul has selected Congressman Antonio Delgado, a Democrat who has been representing the 19th District as her next lieutenant governor. He replaces Brian Benjamin who resigned following his arrest on federal fraud charges, which he denies. What are your thoughts about Representative Delgado serving as lieutenant governor?
Neuhaus: I really don't know him. I know he's got a great pedigree and went to Harvard and he was a congressman just north of me. But, you know, whether you're Republican or Democrat, the governor has to pick she has to do damage control. You know, she picked the former Lieutenant Governor. That obviously ended in embarrassment and we had just had, Kathy Hochul, our governor, who I get along with she and I've always gotten her at a great relationship. You know, she replaced a governor leaving in scandal. So you just got to get out of this pattern of elected officials that are just bringing negative attention to the country and actually get back to getting the job done. And, you know, so I wish her and him well, because we have a lot of challenges in the state. And at the end of the day, you know, whether it's George Bush, or Barack Obama or President Trump or President Biden, I want the country to do well, the same thing I want the state to do well, and, you know, we do have challenges, and when they're distracted by scandal, it doesn't make for an effective government.
Levulis: And what has been your experience working with the Hochul administration since she took office in August?
Neuhaus: You know, we've had one of the best budgets for counties. Republicans and Democrats can admit to this, you know, if they don't, I will. I call it how it is. You know, I wish that they did other things differently, spend more money on infrastructure, and everybody has their own opinion on where, where money should go to and when you tax people, you better use it for the right resources. But, you know, this has been the most productive budget for county government in probably the last 20 years. We're usually the last part that gets looked at. So we get less funding, more mandates, and all this negative pressure, down pressure being pushed from the state. So we did have a good budget to us. They put a lot of things that were hampered on us, they relieved them. One of them is AIM. They made to the counties pay all the local government aid through AIM, that has been pulled back under her budget, and a lot of other things have been pulled back. So I will say that that's been a good part of it. I would appreciate probably more communication, nowadays, now that she's governor, but again, I can't complain, I've been gone for a few months. But in particular, as it relates to Stewart International Airport, I think they could give more love to it. One of the airlines that was supposed to come here announced last week that they're going to JFK instead, I think the governor could use her powers to say, “Hey, you could do both.” How about you have a big presence at JFK? But you continue with your intention of doing at least a small presence in Stewart and give them a chance. So those are the types of things that you know, that's a criticism and a praise of her administration.
Levulis: County executive, you mentioned reading about redistricting in Stars and Stripes. And while the final congressional maps are tied up in court, Republican State Assemblyman Colin Schmitt is challenging Democratic Congressman Sean Patrick Maloney in the 18th District, which includes your county, Orange County. Who are you supporting in that race?
Neuhaus: I mean, I'm a Republican. And, you know, I would definitely be if I was voting I'd be voting for Colin Schmitt. I know him. He's a member of the military. And we'll see how the districts map came up, because originally I heard that we were going to get pushed up from I think Mondaire Jones's district. But, you know, I've had a good working relationship with Sean Patrick Maloney. But I think that you're going to see a major red wave in this midterm election. And that red wave, you know, it's obviously historical with presidents anyway, their midterm, the infamous midterm elections. But I think the country has to go more to the middle and get away from these left and right wings and get back to doing the people's business. So I think you're going to see people if you know, I love Pat Ryan over in Ulster County and Marc Molinaro, you know, the three of us were very close working county executives. To see those two in a congressional race is going to be very interesting, because the two of them are pretty close to each other as well. So it's going to make for a very unique congressional race.
Levulis: Yeah, that would be the race to replace Congressman Antonio Delgado in the 19th District. You brought it up. I’ll ask you, who might you support in that matchup? County Executive Ryan versus County Executive Molinaro?
Neuhaus: You know, I probably hope to get mobilized again. But I have very long relationship with Marc, but you know, I'm going to probably stay out of it unless I need to. We'll see what happens with it. But you know, Mark and I are pretty close. And I have to tell you, Pat and I are too. And I've said this, Dan McCoy, the Albany County executive and I are probably some of the two closest county execs in the state. We would love working together. You know, we were at the tip of the spear for the opioid lawsuit, and everybody else in the country jumped on it because he's the chairman of the board for the County Executives of America. But last year, him and I talked, I said, you know, I got a lot of Democratic friends. And some of the Republicans are pushing me and some of them, they're good Democrats, they're John F. Kennedy Democrats, what we like to call them and I said “What do you do when you have a Republican and you don't want to get involved in that race?” He goes, “I say, look it’s a bridge too far, this guy is doing a good job or this girl is doing a good job.” You know, God forbid in politics, that you can have men and women of different parties going out of their way to avoid getting involved in the slugfest and the politics. And I've been very successful. I ran unopposed as county executive last year. And I think one of those reasons is I appeal to both parties. So unless I really need to get involved in races, I try not to.
