UPDATE: Visiting hours
for Senator Ronald B. Stafford '57 will be held Sunday,
June 26 from 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. and Monday, June 27 from
12 p.m. to 8 p.m. at St. Peter's Catholic Church, 114
Cornelia Street, Plattsburgh. The funeral service will
be held Tuesday, June 28 at 10 a.m., also at St. Peter's.
To: The St. Lawrence Community
From: President Daniel F. Sullivan
Date: June 25, 2005
Subject: In Memoriam: Ronald Stafford ’57
I write with the very sad news that trustee
emeritus Senator
Ronald B. Stafford died last night in Plattsburgh
after a very long battle with lung cancer. A member of
the New York State Senate for 37 years, Ron’s impact
on the state and on St. Lawrence was huge. He will be
sorely missed by his St. Lawrence trustee colleagues
and by me personally. I can remember a dozen times in
my presidency where sage advice from Ron taught me something
new and important, kept me from taking a misstep, or
shaped my thinking on an important University matter
with a perspective I had neither thought of nor considered.
His love of St. Lawrence was deep, and his gratitude
for the start in life St. Lawrence gave him was always
clear and evident.
For those of you who didn’t know
him well, here are some selections from his biography:
Senator Stafford was most recently an attorney
with the firm of Harris Beach (which merged with Stafford,
Trombley, Owens & Curtin, P.C. in May 2001) in Plattsburgh,
NY. In the senate he chaired the Senate Finance Committee,
Higher Education Committee, Codes Committee and the Judiciary
Committee and was Deputy Majority Leader. Among numerous
public service activities, he served the Champlain Valley
School of Nursing, Plattsburgh College Foundation and
the Vermont Medical Society. He chaired the New York
State 1980 Olympic Winter Games Commission and was at
his death chairman of the Adirondack Sports Commission.
He was a trustee of Paul Smith’s College and the
Trudeau Institute, served on the Board of Visitors of
Columbia University School of Law and was a Trustee of
the College of Saint Rose. Senator Stafford received
his BA in government from St. Lawrence in 1957 and his
JD from Columbia University School of Law in 1962, where
he was the first St. Lawrence graduate awarded an Edward
John Noble Fellowship. He received a St. Lawrence University
Alumni Citation in 1979, served as Alumni Trustee from
1979 to 1985 and was first elected Term Trustee in 1992.
At its May, 2004 meeting the St. Lawrence Board of Trustees
named our new fitness center in his honor and a few weeks
ago, at his retirement from trusteeship, the Board honored
Ron with the title of trustee emeritus.
Two more things are important for you to
know. First, in the 1970’s Ron Stafford was both
the architect and key senate leader in the establishment
of the state’s Tuition Assistance Program (TAP)
which today provides need-based scholarship support literally
to hundreds of thousands of New York State college students.
His thinking and his leadership in shaping the state’s
approach to making college affordable for students is
something we should never, ever forget. Second, Ron took
a number of very tough stands as a state senator on matters
of basic human rights, and despite heavy criticism from
within his own party stood the course. He was a man of
courage and conviction, he knew his own mind, and we
owe him a deep debt of gratitude here as well.
Our hearts go out to Ron’s wife Kay,
his two sons Damian and Parker (St. Lawrence Class of
2002), and his daughter Katherine Brooke, and all members
of his family, his friends and his colleagues.
