Judith "Judy" Jacobs (January 13, 1939 – September 13, 2016) was the presiding officer of the

Nassau County Legislature The Nassau County Legislature is the lawmaking body of Nassau County, New York. The county is divided into 19 legislative districts, each represented by an elected legislator. It was formed in 1996 to succeed the Nassau County Board of Superviso ...

. In her fifth term as a legislator, Jacobs represented legislative district 16, which includes: Woodbury;

Jericho Jericho ( ; , ) is a city in the West Bank, Palestine, and the capital of the Jericho Governorate. Jericho is located in the Jordan Valley, with the Jordan River to the east and Jerusalem to the west. It had a population of 20,907 in 2017. F ...

; Plainview; Old Westbury;

Roslyn Heights Roslyn Heights is a hamlet and census-designated place (CDP) in the Town of North Hempstead in Nassau County, on the North Shore of Long Island, in New York, United States. It is considered part of the Greater Roslyn area, which is anchored by ...

; and parts of

Syosset Syosset is a hamlet and census-designated place in the Town of Oyster Bay, in Nassau County, on the North Shore of Long Island, in New York, United States. The population was 19,259 at the time of the 2020 census. Geography According to the ...

; Old Bethpage; and Roslyn Estates. Her district in the past also included Bethpage, Cove Neck, East Norwich,

, Laurel Hollow, Muttontown, Oyster Bay, Oyster Bay Cove, Plainview,

, and Woodbury. She was elected to the newly formed legislature in 1995, and was chair or vice-chair of a number of committees: rules and procedures; planning, development and the environment; legislative budget review; and government services and operations. She was also minority leader of the legislature from March to December 1999. A former teacher in the Elmont school district, Jacobs received her

B.A. A Bachelor of Arts (abbreviated B.A., BA, A.B. or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is the holder of a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the liberal arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree ...

degree from

Hunter College Hunter College is a public university in New York City, United States. It is one of the constituent colleges of the City University of New York and offers studies in more than one hundred undergraduate and postgraduate fields across five schools ...

, where she also did graduate work. She was politically active for more than thirty years, including a campaign to close the Old Bethpage landfill. She ran for a Town Council seat in the

Town of Oyster Bay, New York The Town of Oyster Bay is the easternmost of the three towns that make up Nassau County, New York, United States. Part of the New York metropolitan area, it is the only town in Nassau County to extend from the North Shore to the South Shore o ...

, twice in 1977 and 1993, losing both times. She was also the Democratic Leader for the Town of Oyster Bay for years. She was a trustee at Syosset Hospital and a member of the Syosset Chamber of Commerce. She was also a member of other community organizations, including the Women's American ORT and the North Shore

Synagogue A synagogue, also called a shul or a temple, is a place of worship for Jews and Samaritans. It is a place for prayer (the main sanctuary and sometimes smaller chapels) where Jews attend religious services or special ceremonies such as wed ...

. She was selected to the 2002 class of the "Top 50 Women in

Long Island Long Island is a densely populated continental island in southeastern New York (state), New York state, extending into the Atlantic Ocean. It constitutes a significant share of the New York metropolitan area in both population and land are ...

" by the ''Long Island Business News''. Jacobs focused on

quality of life Quality of life (QOL) is defined by the World Health Organization as "an individual's perception of their position in life in the context of the culture and value systems in which they live and in relation to their goals, expectations, standards ...

and

child care Child care, also known as day care, is the care and supervision of one or more children, typically ranging from three months to 18 years old. Although most parents spend a significant amount of time caring for their child(ren), childcare typica ...

issues, and was active in

breast cancer Breast cancer is a cancer that develops from breast tissue. Signs of breast cancer may include a Breast lump, lump in the breast, a change in breast shape, dimpling of the skin, Milk-rejection sign, milk rejection, fluid coming from the nipp ...

awareness efforts. She was a resident of Woodbury for thirty-nine years, and had three children and six grandchildren. She was known around her district as "Grandma Ju Ju". She died in

Manhasset, New York Manhasset is an affluent Hamlet (New York), hamlet and census-designated place (CDP) in Nassau County, New York, Nassau County, on the North Shore (Long Island), North Shore of Long Island, in New York (state), New York, United States. It is co ...

, on September 13, 2016, after a

fall Autumn, also known as fall (especially in US & Canada), is one of the four temperate seasons on Earth. Outside the tropics, autumn marks the transition from summer to winter, in September (Northern Hemisphere) or March ( Southern Hemispher ...

at her home. She had been diagnosed with

myelodysplastic syndrome A myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) is one of a group of cancers in which blood cells in the bone marrow do not mature, and as a result, do not develop into healthy blood cells. Early on, no symptoms typically are seen. Later, symptoms may includ ...

four months prior and had been weakened by the effects of the disease. On December 5, 2016, the Plainview-Old Bethpage Board of Education voted to rename the Parkway Elementary School as the Judy Jacobs Parkway Elementary School in her honor.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Jacobs, Judith 1939 births 2016 deaths Deaths from myelodysplastic syndrome New York (state) Democrats Politicians from Nassau County, New York County legislators in New York (state) Women in New York (state) politics Hunter College alumni People from Woodbury, Nassau County, New York 20th-century American Jews Accidental deaths from falls Accidental deaths in New York (state) 21st-century American women politicians 20th-century American women politicians 21st-century American Jews 20th-century New York (state) politicians 21st-century New York (state) politicians