Service. Leadership. Integrity. Change.

Ed Szczesniak uses those four words to describe his campaign for Onondaga County Legislature.

“My life’s story is contained in those four words,” Szczesniak said.

Szczesniak, a veteran of Democratic politics from Cicero, is running for Onondaga County Legislature in District 3. He is challenging Republican Bill Meyer, the legislature’s chairman. Meyer was first elected 20 years ago. District3 covers most of Cicero and the northern section of Manlius.

The election is Nov. 3.

District 3 leans Republican. As of September 2009, the district had 5,974 registered Republicans; 5,159 registered Democrats and 820 voters of the Independence Party. Fifteen voters were registered with the Working Families Party.

Szczesniak also carries the endorsement of the Working Families Party.

Szczesniak, 65, was born in Buffalo, N.Y. He graduated from Canisius College, in Buffalo, in 1965 with a bachelor’s degree in history.  Szczesniak served in the U.S. Army for 26 years. He retired as a lieutenant colonel. He is a veteran of the Korea and Vietnam Wars.

After moving to Central New York, Szczesniak worked as a manpower coordinator for Miller Brewing Co. For 16 years, he worked as Democratic commissioner for the Onondaga County Board of Elections. He retired in 2008.

Szczesniak and his wife, Mary Jane, have been married more than 43 years. They have three children and eight grandchildren.

Jessica Zambrano, chair of the Cicero Democratic Committee, says she has known Szczesniak for at least 25 years. Zambrano is running for the Cicero Town Council this fall. Szczesniak helped get her campaign off the ground, she said. “I went door-to-door with him in mid-spring,” Zambrano said. “He introduced me to voters and I got to talk to them about my candidacy.”

Szczesniak offered her advice on the best way to reach voters, Zambrano said. “Ed helped to reinforce how important it was to go door-to-door,” she said. That strategy has been successful, Zambrano said. “I don’t know where my campaign would be without his help,” Zambrano said.

Ed Ryan and Szczesniak have known each other for almost 25 years. Ryan now has Szczesniak’s old job as the Democratic elections commissioner. He praises Szczesniak’s thoroughness and dedication to the Election Board’s work.  “Ed was adamant about crossing every ‘t’ and dotting every ‘i,’” Ryan said. “He had such high moral standards.”

Those characteristics defined Szczesniak throughout his career, say those who know him well. His campaign for county legislature is no exception, say Szczesniak and his supporters,  and his campaign themes are a reflection of his life.

On service, Szczesniak says his military experience prepared him well to serve others. “In 2009, it’s good to have been in the military,” he said. “Twenty-six years of being an officer is saying a lot. It resonates with people.”

Szczesniak is a member of Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 951 in Clay and a 30-year member of the Knights of Columbus. He has served as president of the Greater North Syracuse Chamber of Commerce and chairman of the North Area YMCA in Liverpool.

On leadership, Szczesniak says his time with the county Elections Board taught him how to work across party lines. Szczesniak and Helen Kiggins, the Republican commissioner, had to agree before making decisions. Szczesniak could only recall two instances in 16 years when he and Kiggins could not agree: a dispute about the ballot line-up and a Clay election when no Democratic candidates appeared on the printed ballot.

“Leadership is about solving problems,” Szczesniak said. “Leaders bring together all the stakeholders to define the issue, get a consensus on the best solution and take action.”

On integrity, Szczesniak recalls lessons he learned early in his military career. Such lessons include taking responsibility for his actions and respecting others, he said. “Integrity is doing the right thing when nobody is watching,” he said. “I learned that a long time ago and I’ve practiced it my whole life.”

If elected, Szczesniak pledges change to three areas of county government: decision-making, the budget and a review of spending programs.

On decision making, he said, he will first examine how an issue will affect his district. “Current legislators take too much of a big-picture view on issues like stadiums,” Szczesniak said. “On every issue, I’m going to ask how District 3 residents are affected before anything else.”

On the budget, he said, he supports installing a zero-based budget approach for the county. In this process, the county’s total income minus its total revenue must equal $0. This will cut costs, Szczesniak said. “Zero-based budgeting will force legislators to spend the county’s money wisely,” Szczesniak said.

Szczesniak calls for a review of  county spending programs. Programs are automatically renewed each year even if they are no longer needed, Szczesniak said. “We should be looking at every single program and eliminate those that have outlived their use,” he said. But declined to identfiy programs he would like to see eliminated.

In the campaign, Szczesniak has received strong labor support.

Gabe Rosetti is business manager for the Laborers’ Local 633 union. Many workers in Laborers’ Local 633 have highway construction contracts in the Syracuse area. The union also has a labor agreement with the county for the Onondaga lake clean-up project. Laborers’ Local 633 endorsed Szczesniak in his campaign.

“We believe that Ed is the right man for the right job,” Rosetti said. “He recognizes the importance of keeping these jobs intact and he has always supported us in the past.”

Clyde Ohl, of Camillus, is chairman of the Onondaga Environmental Institute and a former Onondaga County legislator. He has known Szczesniak for about 15 years. Ohl recalls when Szczesniak’s predecessor at the elections board put restrictions on voting by Syracuse University students on campus.  When Szczesniak became commissioner, he made it easier for students to register to vote, Ohl said.

“I give Ed a lot of credit for increasing the number of student voters in Onondaga County,” Ohl said.

To develop his platform and proposals, Szczesniak  launched a “listening tour” -- following in some big footsteps. The idea came from Hillary Clinton’s 2000 winning campaign for the U.S. Senate and Democrat Dan Maffei’s successful 2008 campaign for the House of Representatives, said Jim Aiello, Szczesniak’s campaign manager. “Ed was adamant about doing this,” Aiello said. “But this is something that should be done with every campaign.”

As of Oct. 11, Szczesniak had made three trips around the district. He has visited more than 3,600 homes of likely voters and distributed more than 300 lawn signs, according to his campaign. His goal, he said,  is to move about 1,000 votes from Republican to Democratic. “Most people would be thrilled to reach 1,500 voters in a race of this size,” Szczesniak said. “But I know that I have to reach more in order to win.”

The secret to beating an incumbent is meeting individually with voters, Szczesniak said. “It shows that I am sincerely interested in them,” he said. He added: “I plan on working my tail off from now until Election Day.”

(Dan Scorpio is a junior with dual majors in newspaper journalism and political science.)

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