Tom Golisano

Blase Thomas Golisano (born November 14, 1941) is an American billionaire businessman and philanthropist.

He is the founder of Paychex, which offers payroll and human resources services to businesses.

Paychex was founded by Golisano in 1971.

He started the company with $3,000 and a credit card.

Golisano served as its president and Chief Executive Officer from 1971 to October 2004.

Golisano unsuccessfully ran for Governor of New York as a third-party candidate in 1994, 1998, and 2002.

Golisano is a founding member of the Independence Party of New York and ran on its ticket for governor of New York in 1994, 1998 and 2002.

Although he was never elected, his percentage of the vote increased with each election.

He spent a combined $93 million on the three campaigns.

By receiving more than 50,000 votes each time, Golisano brought the Independence Party an automatic ballot line for the succeeding four years.

He purchased the Sabres from the NHL who had stripped the team from their previous owner John Rigas, the former Adelphia CEO who was charged and convicted of bank fraud, wire fraud, and securities fraud and had owned the team since 1997.

He owned the Buffalo Sabres of the National Hockey League and Buffalo Bandits of the National Lacrosse League from 2003 to 2011.

He has been the Chairman of Paychex since October 1, 2004, and its Director since 1979.

He changed his party affiliation to Republican, with the Independence Party's chairman's blessing, in October 2005, apparently in preparation for another gubernatorial run.

After New York's Republican governor, George Pataki announced he would not run again in the 2006 election, Republican officials attempted to recruit Golisano to run for the Republican nomination.

In February 2006, Golisano announced that he would not run for the governorship.

In August 2008, Golisano contributed $1 million to the Democratic National Convention.

In July 2008, Golisano formed a PAC called Responsible New York and funded it with $5 million of his own money.

The PAC gives money to candidates for the New York state legislature, regardless of party, and supports candidates for property tax cuts and election reform.

In October 2008, Golisano voiced his opinion in favor of term limits for public offices in New York City.

Golisano vowed to fight Mayor Michael Bloomberg's proposal to extend term limits, arguing that the people of New York City have voted twice in favor of the current law.

Golisano, who had supported a number of Democratic Party candidates during the 2008 election, was dissatisfied with things like the Democrats' effort to solve the state's budget crisis by raising taxes on New York's wealthiest residents.

He orchestrated the defection of Democratic senators Pedro Espada Jr.. and Hiram Monserrate, who voted with Republicans to reinstate Dean Skelos as majority leader.

The attempted coup failed when Espada and Monserrate returned to the Senate Democratic Conference.

There was speculation that he would run for governor again on the Republican ticket, but it was announced, on May 15, 2009, that he was moving to Florida to escape New York's high taxes.

In June 2009, Golisano took partial credit for creating the 2009 New York State Senate leadership crisis in which Republicans temporarily seized control of a body that still retained a Democratic enrollment edge.

He sold the Sabres and its assets to billionaire Terrence Pegula in February 2011.

In February 2011, Golisano became the spokesman for National Popular Vote Inc., a non-profit organization seeking to implement a popular vote system for presidential elections by harnessing the electoral college.

Golisano made a bid for the bankrupt Los Angeles Dodgers franchise in early 2012, but his group was eventually outbid by a consortium led by Magic Johnson and the Guggenheim Partners.

In order to help keep the team in western NY, he also made a bid for the Buffalo Bills when that franchise came up for sale in 2014; that team was also ultimately purchased by Pegula.

In April 2018, it was announced that Golisano was purchasing Greenlight Networks, a Rochester-based fiber internet provider and local competitor to Frontier Communications and Charter Spectrum that was established in 2012.

Following Golisano's purchase of Greenlight, the company began expanding into new areas due to a $100 million investment by Golisano.

However in 2022, Golisano sold his controlling equity shares of Greenlight Networks to the investment firm Oak Hill

In January 2018, Golisano announced the formation of a campaign called Tax My Property Fairly.

Golisano owned Greenlight Networks, a fiber internet provider based in Rochester, New York, from 2019 to 2022.

As of 2020, Golisano had a net worth of US$5.2 billion.

The 2020 Forbes 400 list stated that Golisano was the 238th wealthiest person in America with a net worth of $3.4 billion as of September 2020.

The 2022 list of The World's Billionaires by Forbes ranked Golisano as the 490th wealthy billionaire with a net worth of $5.4 billion.

In 2023, he was ranked as the 552nd wealthiest billionaire in the world with a net worth of $4.9 billion.

Golisano is a former co-owner (along with real estate developer Larry Quinn) of the Buffalo Sabres hockey team and of the Buffalo Bandits lacrosse team.