The Port TIMES RECORD Port Jefferson • Belle terre • Port Jefferson station • terrYVille
Volume 28, No. 14
March 5, 2015
$1.00
Kudos to kids for kidnapping report
Paint Nite at the Whaling Museum
also: ‘I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change’ at Theatre Three, LI Pet expo, Ward Melville’s Brianna Cea
Page B1 Photo by Barbara Donlon
anthony foraci and sean Martinez pose with JfK Middle school assistant Principal theresa etts, school board President John swenning and superintendent Joe rella at Monday’s meeting.
The bald and the beautiful
Shave your head for kids with cancer
Page a5
Two John F. Kennedy Middle School students were recognized Monday for recently assisting police in what they thought was an abduction of a young woman. Anthony Foraci and Sean Martinez, both 12-year-old Port Jefferson Station residents, witnessed a woman being forced into a van at the intersection of Boyle Road and Rush Street in Selden on Dec. 26. The woman had been jogging south on Boyle Road when two people confronted her before taking her into the van, which had been heading north on the same road. The boys, along with 15-year-old Selden resident Liam Wobler, called 911 and gave a description of the van, the license plate number and a description of the woman and what she was wearing. The Suffolk County Police Department’s 6th Squad detectives later reported that the incident was a prank between friends and that no criminal activity had taken place. The Comsewogue Board of Education recognized the boys at Monday’s meeting. They had previously been honored by the Town of Brookhaven with a proclamation. — BarBara Donlon
Making medicine for traffic’s congestion BY elana Glowatz
An engineering firm will design traffic flow changes in upper Port Jefferson, ahead of a long-awaited apartment complex being built. The Port Jefferson Village Board of Trustees hired VHB Monday night to do the design work, which will focus on the frequently congested intersection of Main Street and Sheep Pasture Road. Developer Rail Realty LLC, which is set to build 74 apartments on nearby Texaco Avenue, will pay for the traffic plans at a cost not to exceed $7,500, according to a board resolution. When Port Jefferson-based Rail Realty received approval on its site plan last year, the planning board placed a condition on the approval that the developer would be responsible
for traffic improvement design and construction costs for that intersection. The improvements are also recommended in the village’s draft revitalization plan for upper Port. Some local residents have expressed concern that an additional 74 apartments will make traffic in an already popular area even worse. VHB will design changes to traffic signals and pavement markings, according to Village Clerk Bob Juliano, who read a letter from the engineering firm describing the work’s scope at a Board of Trustees meeting in February. It will also look at the timing of the traffic lights on Main Street, as one element of the revitalization plan calls for the lights to coordinate with the Long Island Rail Road crossing to reduce logjams. TRaFFIC continued on page a12
Photo by elana glowatz
Residents could see improvements at the intersection of Sheep Pasture road and route 25a. above, looking east on sheep Pasture.