Need to host a presidential debate? Ask Melissa Connolly

Who’s capable of orchestrating the complicated logistics of Hofstra University’s three presidential debates in 2008, 2012 and 2016, as well as a gubernatorial debate in 2010 and others too numerous to mention?

A Malvernite.

Melissa Connolly, who has lived in Malverne Park for 13 years, is vice president of university relations at Hofstra, where she was responsible for readying the campus for a debate covered by hundreds of media representatives, attended by hundreds more political insiders and televised around the world.

So what’s that experience like?

“You have to convert the basketball arena into a live television studio that can host six networks and several thousand people,” Connolly said. “You have to create a transportation network that carts media offsite and brings them in. You have to get everyone credentialed so they can be onsite to work. You have to create as many meaningful volunteer opportunities for students as you can. And you have to connect media to the services they need, so that they can do what they need to. You have to work with security to create a secure environment and create a space for numerous television networks that want to broadcast outside the perimeter of the university.”

It’s an effort that starts with a few people many months before the debate, and grows as time goes on. “You start pulling people from other departments — there were probably 100 people working on the debate alone — and I’m not counting several hundred student volunteers, the trade people who were onsite and the food service people,” Connolly said. “It’s probably close to 400 people who get assigned, plus several hundred vendors.”

No other university has hosted presidential debates in three consecutive election cycles. They were made possible by Hofstra’s top-notch facilities and a team that works to get the job done, Connolly said. “We have an arena that holds 5,000 for basketball, but basically it gets turned into a live television studio — it’s big enough that we can do that,” she said. “Next to it is the physical education building, which can host the media center and journalists who are filing stories about the debate. That part of the campus is segregated from the rest of the campus — and not in the middle of the academic world — so you can work and build and construct without worrying about disturbing people.”

The Hofstra team understands big events, she said, and is willing to do what’s necessary to get the job done. Additionally, the university has other value-adding resources to bring to this kind of event, like its Center for the Study of the Presidency, its communications school, a Center for Student Engagement, which focuses on voter registration, and free issues-oriented educational programs for students and members of the public alike.

“We really try to take advantage of everything that this opportunity gives us,” said Connolly, “so that every student is touched by the debate in some way.”

Now that it’s over, is she relieved? Yes. “When you do this, you have to think of everything that could break, and if you have backup,” she said. “For me, I’m worried until it’s all over.”