North Hempstead Deputy Supervisor Joseph Scalero is the town’s highest-paid employee and received a 15% pay increase this year, according to information provided by the Town of North Hempstead and See Through NY.
Scalero receives an annual salary of $193,800 in 2024, according to Town documents.
Scalero’s salary surpasses that of Town Attorney Richard Nicolello – the second-highest-paid employee – and all of the town’s commissioners and superintendents.
Blank Slate Media received a list of the Town of North Hempstead’s 25 highest-paid employees and their respective salaries as of April 15 through a Freedom of Information Act request.
Scalero’s salary grew by 15.36% in 2024. He was allotted a salary of $168,000 in 2023 and was the town’s third-highest-paid employee, according to See Through NY, a government transparency website with information using government sources.
“Compensation for these officials is commensurate with those in surrounding municipalities and reflects both their years of professional experience and their work responsibilities,” town spokesperson Umberto Mignardi said in an email to Blank Slate Media.
Last year, the town’s highest-paid employees were former Town Attorney John Chiara with a salary of $175,662 and former Planning Commissioner Michael Levine, who earned $170,998.
Scalero’s 2024 salary exceeds those of both the two highest-paid employees in 2023.
The Town of Oyster Bay also has a deputy supervisor, Gregory W. Carman Jr., who was appointed by Supervisor Joseph Saladino. In Oyster Bay, the deputy supervisor serves under the supervisor and takes over the supervisor role, until another individual is appointed, if the office becomes vacant.
Carman was the highest-paid employee in the Town of Oyster Bay in 2023 with a salary of $188,808, according to See Through NY.
The Town of Hempstead’s deputy supervisor position is fulfilled by one of the elected councilmembers – different than that of North Hempstead and Oyster Bay. This is Hempstead First District Councilmember Dorothy L. Goosby.
Goosby was given a salary of $94,343 in 2023.
Scalero was investigated in 2022 after former Town Attorney Chiara filed an Equal Employment Opportunity complaint against him on behalf of the town’s former director of purchasing, Moira LaBarbera.
Scalero was cleared in an internal investigation into harassment and retaliation complaints released in October.
“I can no longer work in this hostile and retaliatory environment perpetuated by both you and the Town,” LaBarbera wrote to DeSena in July when she resigned, according to Newsday.
North Hempstead Town Attorney Nicolello earns an annual salary of $185,000. Behind him is the Commissioner of Public Works Kristin Seleski, who receives $167,000 and the Superintendent of Highways Douglas Schlaefer with $165,215.
Nicolello, who was hired to replace Chiara, has a first-year salary greater than the one Chiara ended with in North Hempstead.
DeSena, an elected official, is the 23rd-highest-paid employee in the town with a salary of $133,000.
DeSena received the same salary in 2023, which is set by the Town. This is the same salary that the prior Supervisor Judi Bosworth received at the end of her service.
