Freeport
HERALD Leader
Freeport honors class of 2020
testing for covid antibodies
FHs holds online awards ceremony
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Vol. 85 No. 23
JUNE 4 - 10, 2020
Merchants say they’re hopeful, but worried By RoNNy REyEs and scott BRiNtoN
plants and flowers, she said she was happy that Freeport’s economy could start moving forward. rreyes@liherald.com, sbrinton@liherald.com “A lot of businesses are strugSelect businesses in Freeport gling to pay their bills and rent,” finally reopened on May 27, as Martin said. “It’s a scary time the region encompassing Nassau we’re in, but I hope that everyand Suffolk counties cleared the one can open up soon and have final hurdles that had kept them customers buying again.” shuttered. Mike Sorrentino, Wi t h C ov i d - 1 9 of the Nassau Hobby hospital mortality Center, on West Merrates low enough rick Road, said the and the number of shop has been able contact tracers high to operate with curbenough under the side pickup since the seven-point criteria pandemic began. He set by New York and said the store was its neighboring planning to officially states, businesses reopen on Thursday ranging from florists . sUsaN MaRtiN or Friday to sporting goods to “We’ re hoping landscaping have Duryea’s this can get more b e e n a l l owe d t o Flower Shop happy customers reopen under cercoming to the store,” tain conditions. Sorrentino said. Susan Martin, whose family Despite the reopening plans, runs Duryea’s Flower Shop, on some businesses in Freeport Guy Lombardo Avenue, said she said Phase One would not be was glad the shop could begin enough to help them. opening for customers to pick up Millie Kaland, who runs the their orders. The shop had start- Sea Horse Gift Shop on Wooded curbside pickup on Mother’s cleft Avenue, on the Nautical Day, but now customers can pick Milem with her husband, said up their orders in the store. their business depends on people While Martin would prefer to being able to come in and browse return to the days when her cus- the merchandise. And with restomers could browse the shop for Continued on page 7
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Ronny Reyes/Herald
FREEpoRtERs DaRlEyNE MayERs and Eugene Williams joined the protests in Nassau County on Monday, representing the Freeport/Roosevelt NAACP.
Freeporters ask for change
Join hundreds of protesters at County Legislature By RoNNy REyEs and scott BRiNtoN rreyes@liherald.com, sbrinton@liherald.com
People streamed into a demonstration in front of the Theodore Roosevelt Executive and Legislative Building in Mineola on Monday. They had come to protest the killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer. “It’s unbelievable that these things are still happening,” said Eugene Williams, of Freeport, who is the civic
engagement chairman of the Freeport/Roosevelt NAACP. “People are frustrated, and they’re making their voices heard.” Shouting “I can’t breathe!” and brandishing handmade signs, protesters arrived from across the county and beyond. A coalition of Nassau advocacy groups planned the demonstration, dubbed “Justice for George Floyd.” The protest followed the Memorial Day death of Floyd, 46, an African-American who
stopped breathing after Officer Derek Chauvin pressed his knee into Floyd’s neck for more than eight minutes. According to authorities, Minneapolis police responded to a report of a man attempting to pass a counterfeit $20 at a shop. Barbara Powell, an executive board member of the Hempstead NAACP, described Floyd’s death as a “modernday lynching,” adding, “PeoContinued on page 4
t’s a scary time we’re in, but I hope that everyone can open up soon.