Janine Sartori never expected to end up in Mineola. But after growing up in Staten Island, living in New Jersey and Brooklyn, she has been living in the village for about 25 years and has become its deputy mayor.
“It was a happy blessing. When I landed here, I was in awe of it,” Sartori said. “It was a pretty lucky coincidence that I landed in Mineola.”
She said she was immediately impressed by the government’s responsiveness and accessibility, even down to the friendly sanitation workers who would come to her house to collect garbage.
“I could not believe how transparent the government was here,” she said. She got to know many of the government officials personally, she said, including Mayor Paul Pereira, whom she met because they had children around the same age.
She said that friendship eventually led her to become interested in contributing to the village government. She said she pursued a seat on the zoning board to become more involved in the community.
“I think it’s important that we all contribute to the place that we live,” she said about the zoning board. “It was a learning curve, but it was a very cool experience, understanding the ins and outs of how this all works.”
In 2021, after two years on the zoning board, Sartori was appointed to the village board by Scott Strauss, the current county legislator and mayor at the time, following Dennis Walsh’s vacating his seat to join the North Hempstead town council.
She said her five-year tenure on the board has included important community-focused work, such as supporting businesses and hosting village events.
“Part of that is the invigorating of our downtown. We were able to secure money through the state, which will help us to make it a wonderful place to be,” she said, referring to the village’s New York Forward Grant from the state. “Now it’s really vibrant down there. There are great restaurants, people living there, and it adds to the sense of community of the village.”
The $4.5 million grant was awarded to the village in early 2024 and is meant to support local governments in revitalizing business districts. She said the grant was a big win for the village and that she hopes to use it to the fullest extent possible in a second term, should she win reelection.
Sartori, along with Pereira and Trustee Jeffrey Clark, is up for reelection on March 18. Sartori is running for her second full term. She said implementing the NY Forward grant, pursuing more community building and continuing fiscal responsibility are her primary motivations in her roles as trustee and deputy mayor.
Sartori knows fiscal and business issues well, and she brings knowledge from her marketing and finance background into her role in the village. She said running the village is like running a company, with balancing the budget and working with little revenue.
“Financially, my background has really helped me to be fiscally responsible in making all those decisions,” she said.
After graduating from Seton Hall, Sartori spent about a decade in marketing in the beauty industry. She worked for Revlon and L’Oréal and said the experience taught her a lot about working with large and small companies and budget management.
When she and her husband, Tiziano, had their twin sons, Anthony and Luigi, she left her marketing job. She said that when the twins were about 4 years old, she was approached by a friend who was starting a small business.
“I was willing to help, and from there I grew into the finance world,” she said, adding that her role in the business included keeping an eye on financial issues for growing businesses. She said she is now self-employed and works with Brio Benefits and Compound Contracting.
“It’s tracking revenue, and then managing expenses and reporting to corporate,” she said, drawing parallels to her work in government.
She said she is committed to Mineola, and that raising her children here and the benefits of a small community were immediately clear. She said she has always been involved in libraries, Little League, taekwondo, and even the school board.
“I would highly recommend everyone raise their kids here,” she said. “I was a kid of the city, so when I came out here, the benefits of being in a village were amazing.”
