NETWORKING® MAGAZINE'S DAVID AWARD HONOREE, JANUARY 12, 2006

REV. REGINALD TUGGLE
Executive Assistant to the President, Nassau Community College,
Pastor, Memorial Presbyterian Church

by Maureen Traxler

When you meet Rev. Reginald Tuggle, you'll most likely receive one of his characteristic bear hugs or strong handshakes. His warm, genuine personality and good humor has touched many lives. From the members of Memorial Presbyterian Church in Roosevelt, he has extended his love and sense of community to people in nations around the world.

Tuggle hails from Denver, Colorado, growing up in the attic apartment of an old house where the kitchen consisted of a hot plate in the basement. His mom tells a story about a five-year-old boy who said he was going to become a preacher. Young "Reggie" was a studious child who had a thirst for learning. He went to Bishop College in Dallas, Texas, washing cars, moving furniture and waiting tables to pay his way, spent his junior year abroad studying at Central Philippine University, and earned a bachelor's degree in philosophy and psychology.

Tuggle came to New York in 1969 on a Rockefeller Scholarship, enrolling in the Master of Divinity degree program at Union Theological Seminary. He pursued a PhD at Yale University, traveling to Ghana in Africa to study the ethical implications of multinational corporate investments in third world countries. In 1973, Tuggle became pastor of a small, fledgling Presbyterian church in Roosevelt with just under 50 members. Over the next 30 years, through divine inspiration perhaps, he transformed Memorial Presbyterian Church into a congregation of over 1,000, now the largest, most community-involved, mission-giving church in the Long Island Presbytery.

His church's success, says Tuggle, developed through "the mystique" they created. The church began to hold forums on social issues, bringing the congregants personal knowledge and empowerment. Forums, such as "Political Impotency," showed people that by exercising your right to vote, you become a community of power; "Taxation without Representation" brought better government services, and "Why Johnny Can't Read" discussed the failings of local public schools. Memorial welcomed well-known guest speakers, like Coretta Scott King and Jesse Jackson, and created a masterful music department, its choir giving concerts in Paris, Vienna and Cuba.

Tuggle instilled a sense of community from within initiating new ministries and focusing on youth through Christian Charmettes (girls 8-11), Christian Charm (girls 12-17), Manhood Training (boys 8-17), and the Memorial Scholarship Program. Since 2000, more than $200,000 has been awarded to church members who graduated from high school and went on to higher education.

Recognizing the limitation of growth imposed by church status, Tuggle helped the faith community found two nonprofit corporations. "The Memorial Youth Outreach Corporation was able to apply for philanthropic and government dollars," notes Tuggle, augmenting church donations. Working through the Roosevelt junior and senior high schools, the Council matches mentors with at risk teens and provides scholarship awards upon completion of the program.

"In response to economic disparity in the community," Tuggle adds, "we applied for a $500,000 federal grant to buy abandoned houses that had become havens for prostitution and drug abuse," through the Memorial Economic Development Corporation. "We hired local contractors, put on new roofs, added kitchens, baths, plumbing, wiring and fixed up the outsides, and sold them to low income wage earners." It was a win-win situation: improving the community, and providing jobs for local contractors and housing for new owners.

Tuggle's enthusiasm shines when he speaks of MEDC's project to build a state-of-the-art community health clinic in Roosevelt. The corporation won a Nassau County request-for-proposal, bought County property for $250,000, borrowed $3.5 million from the federal government and accepted a $366,000 federal grant to make the project happen. In October, 10 years after the project was initiated, the groundbreaking ceremony was held. When open, the County's Medical Center will lease space and provide the doctors and nurses. "The new health clinic will provide quality health care, free-of-charge." comments Tuggle. "Anyone can go there; they don't have to have insurance."

In addition to Tuggle's busy life as pastor, he has always worked in a secular capacity, beginning as executive director of an anti-poverty agency in Roosevelt and as founding director of the Urban League of Long Island. He became executive assistant to the Town of Hempstead Presiding Supervisor in 1979 and spent 14 years as director of public affairs at Newsday, where his responsibilities included public relations, direction of the company's philanthropy, and special events, such as Newsday's Long Island Spelling Bee, Marathon and Regatta.

But family always came first. When his daughters Karleena and Regine were 8 and 10 years old, Tuggle's wife died of breast cancer. Realizing his responsibility to care for them, he left his job at Newsday, and devoted a year to his children. He says he wanted to be there "to give them a hug before they got on the bus" and "give them the proper intellectual stimulus, going to museums and plays, taking trips. A lot of kids don't have that." He currently serves as executive assistant to the president and college relations director at Nassau Community College.

Tuggle's international travels have taken him to numerous church conferences around the world, and he's been a keynote speaker in Havana, Cuba, and at a NATO conference in Belgium. He attended the first World Peace Conference in Israel in 1987. In 2000, he visited Kenya to review the Presbyterian Church missions and spoke to 20,000 people in Haiti. Tuggle was among a small group of international citizens invited by Mikhail Gorbachev to tour the U.S.S.R. Upon his return, he presented a dozen lectures, spreading an awareness of the Soviet Union's turn toward capitalism.

Tuggle married Evette Beckett four-and-a-half years ago. The couple lives in Glen Cove, and in addition to Karleena, a surgical intern, and Regine, they have a daughter, Lauren Beckett-Jackson, 18 years old.

Looking to the future, Tuggle would like to set aside time to write about self actualization, learning to live without excuse making, and overcoming diversity. To break down Long Island's (Not In My Backyard) NIMBYism environment, he counsels,

"Get to know people and their cultures. There are wonderful people here from all cultures who are bright and professional."