Great Neck 2022_11_11

HOCHUL DEFEATS ZELDIN

Santos defeats Zimmerman

Republican rides red wave in Nassau that carries D’Esposito over Gillen, boosts GOP House hopes

BY ROBERT PELAEZ

Republican Congressional candidates George DeVolder-Santos and Anthony D’Esposito declared victory in their respective races on Tuesday night, but only one of their challengers conceded the election as votes continued to be tallied as of Wednesday morning.

Santos received 142,017, or 54.2% votes in the race for the 3rd Congressional District. while his opponent, Robert Zimmerman, received 120,060 or 45.8% votes as of Wednesday morning, according to the state’s Board of Elections. Nassau County Republican Chairman declared Santos the victor at their watch party in Baldwin Tuesday evening before Santos called the race just after midnight.

“This journey started not too long ago in 2019 and I just want to thank each and every one of you that were there every step of the way,” Santos said from his watch party at Il Bacco on Northern Boulevard in Queens. “Only in this country can the kid who came from the basement in Jackson Heights do this. I want you to know

that the American Dream is worth fighting for.”

Zimmerman ultimately conceded the race and said he called Santos to congratulate him on winning and to wish him well representing the state’s 3rd Congressional District in the footsteps of U.S. Rep. Tom Suozzi (D-Glen Cove), who launched an unsuccessful campaign for governor earlier this year.

“It is so important that while our commitment and our passion never wavers, our dedication to respecting our democracy comes first,” Zimmerman said. “We know that we lead by example and that’s what makes us different and better than others in politics.”

Santos, who ran against Suozzi in 2020, has a background in Wall Street as a financier and investor, working extensively in capital introduction, real estate, biotech and capital markets. A supporter of former President Donald Trump, Santos urged officials to intervene in the counting of Electoral College votes after the Jan. 6 insurrection.

Martins defeats Kaplan, Sillitti slips by

BY BRANDON DUFFY AND STEPHEN KEEHNER

Former Republican state Sen. Jack Martins won his old seat Tuesday night after defeating two-term Democrat Anna Kaplan in the general election for the state’s 7th Senate District.

The win comes after the Republi-

can and Democratic Parties split North Hempstead’s four state Assembly seats two-to-two, with none being flipped.

With all 264 election districts reported, Martins has 64,009 of the total 123,144 votes cast, enough for 52%.

Kaplan secured 55,846 votes, or 45.5%

Martins, an Old Westbury resident, previously represented the 7th District

from 2011-2016 and served as Mineola’s mayor from 2003-2010. He also currently serves as an attorney for Harris Beach, PLLC.

Martins said at the Nassau GOP’s watch party at the Coral House in Baldwin that he is going to stand up for local communities and keep families safe.

“This year especially we all knew this was the year we were going to draw the line in the sand,” Martins said Tuesday night. “Right here in Nassau County we stood up and we’re going back to Albany because you and your voices made it happen.”

In the state’s 15th Assembly District, Republican Jake Blumencranz

tive races.

defeated Democrat Amanda Field in the seat left vacantsince Republican Michael Montesano resigned in July. Democratic incumbents Chuck Lavine and Gina Silliti as well as Republican Assemblyman Ed Ra have all also won or are currently leading their respec-

PHOTO BY BRANDON DUFFY

Republican George Santos declared himself victorious in the state’s 3rd Congressional District election on Tuesday night.

Hughes, Rusu file election complaint

Cite concerns over ballots; opponents blast delay in vote

Town fixes errors, approves budget

Special meet needed to OK 5% tax cut

BY BRANDON DUFFY

The Town of North Hempstead adopted a $162.8 million budget for 2023 following a special meeting Monday morning.

The budget includes a general fund tax levy decrease of $1,340,431, or a 5% tax cut, dropping from $26,808,627 in 2022 to $25,468,196 for 2023.

In the town’s $89.2 million gen eral fund, $44.8 million is allocated to the town outside village fund, which covers services for residents who live outside incorporated villages, and $28.8 million for the 20 town-oper ated special districts, which set their own budget.

The initial $158.4 million budget submitted by Supervisor Jennifer De Sena in September was later amended unanimously by the seven-member town board, where Democrats hold a 4-3 majority, when they voted in amendments submitted by Democrat Councilwoman Veronica Lurvey to in clude the 5% tax cut on Oct. 25.

Democrat majority of the Town Board to bog down the process in needless delays, I am proud to announce that my administration has continued the tradition of previous supervisors and passed the Town’s 2023 budget prior to Election Day,” DeSena said in a statement after the budget’s adoption.

“I was disheartened that the ma jority Councilmembers twice blocked my plan that would have delivered an 11% tax cut for all residents, and in stead went ahead with the plan Coun cilwoman Lurvey ofered that present ed more taxes in comparison, raised spending, and defunded health care and our Town’s salt and sand budget to pay for it,” DeSena said. “It’s my sincere hope that next year, the major ity councilmembers do not put politics ahead of people as they did through out this year’s process.”

BY ROBERT PELAEZ

Two candidates to serve on the Great Neck Library board have fled a legal complaint against the library and their opponents, citing concerns of the legitimacy of absentee ballots that have not yet been counted.

Trustee candidates Jessica Hughes and Christina Rusu fled the complaint on Nov. 7, a week after the election.

The two previously fled objec tions to halt the count of 37 proxy ballots, according to board President Liman Mimi Hu and Rory Lancman, both candidates in the election.

A total of 24 of the objected proxy votes were sent by individuals with East Asian or South Asian surnames, Lancman said. The counting of the votes is frozen until a court hearing scheduled for Nov. 16.

Hu is running to retain her seat on the board against Hughes while Lanc man, Rusu and Karen Hirsch-Romero are running in an at-large election for a vacant seat on the board in a race marked by culture war issues.

Sara Khodadadian is running against Kim Schader for an expiring seat on the library’s nominating com mittee.

Both seats on the board have fouryear terms while the committee seat is a three-year term.

Hu, Hirsch-Romero, Lancman, Khodadadian and Schader were all listed as respondents in the legal com plaint.

The library’s method for issu ing, reviewing, distributing, process ing and preserving absentee ballots should be analyzed to ensure it was proper, according to the complaint.

More than 3,000 in-person votes were tallied at the election machines on Monday from 10 a.m.- 10 p.m. while more than 330 proxy votes were submitted to the library, according to court documents.

They said the machines’ results showed that Hughes led Hu by 250 votes, Rusu led Lancman by more than 150 votes and Khodadadian led Kim Schader by more than 190 votes.

Lancman and Hu, in a statement,

saidthe approximate 300 proxy ballots that were counted as of Wednesday night resulted in Lancman leading by 22 votes, Hu’s defcit being reduced to 28 votes and Schader’s defcit reduced to 18 votes.

“This lawsuit is a slap in the face to voters, Library users, taxpayers, and the Library’s professional staf.” Lancman and Hu said. “It is an ex tension of the vitriolic, disrespectful, scorched earth campaign which has been waged both in this election and, truth be told, against our civic institu tions.”

Lancman told Blank Slate Media that the slate of candidates who fled the objections are attempting to pre vent the votes from being counted. Their actions, he said, refect the ef forts of those trying to stop the vote count during the 2020 presidential election.

“These folks are mirrors of Trump in so many ways, including how they’re handling the election results,” Lancman said. “We’re seeing that here.. Another example of Trumpism

This is the frst budget adopted under DeSena, a registered Democrat who ran as a Republican for supervi sor in 2021.

“Despite repeated attempts by the

On Oct. 11 DeSena submitted amendment proposals to her original budget, which included an 11% tax cut that Democrats eventually ab stained from voting on during the Oct. 25 budget meeting before unanimous ly voting in Lurvey’s amendments.

The special meeting Monday was held after it was revealed there were typographical errors discovered by

Manhasset Times: Robert Pelaez 516-307-1045 x203 • rpelaez@theisland360.com

Roslyn Times: Steven Keehner 516-307-1045 x214 • skeehner@theisland360.com

Williston Times: Brandon Duffy 516-307-1045 x215 • bduffy@theisland360.com

Port Washington Times: Steven Keehner 516-307-1045 x214 • skeehner@theisland360.com

PHOTOS COURTESY OF THE GREAT NECK LIBRARY

Two candidates in the Great Neck Library election filed a legal complaint against the library and other candidates regarding the legitimacy of absentee ballots.

PHOTO COURTESY OF THE SUPERVISOR’S OFFICE

The North Hempstead Town Board unanimously voted to adopt the 2023 budget that includes a 5% tax cut.

accused

BY ROBERT PELAEZ

gives

than a decade ago, according to court records. He allegedly held his arms

Lurvey blasts DeSena projects presser

BY BRANDON DUFFY

Councilwoman Veronica Lurvey declared “North Hempstead is not a dictatorship” after Supervisor Jennifer DeSena announced plans Wednesday at a press conference to allocate $9 million in federal funds to fve local projects without the Town Board’s ap proval.

“These decisions must be decided by board resolution, and all seven of us have one equal vote,” Lurvey said in a statement to Blank Slate Media. “It is disappointing that Supervisor DeSena called a secret press confer ence announcing her wish list instead of communicating with her colleagues to ensure she would have the neces sary support. It was misleading and disingenuous to act as if her propos als had been fnalized and approved. The Town Board will discuss potential projects at the Nov. 17 meeting.”

Lurvey said she fled a resolution Oct. 25 on the allocation of funds, provided by American Rescue Plan Act, for consideration at a Nov. 17 board meeting.

“The supervisor cannot unilateral ly determine what projects we spend that money on. The Town of North Hempstead is not a dictatorship,” Lur vey said.

DeSena, a registered Democrat

who ran as a Republican in 2021, made the announcement on Westbury Avenue in Carle Place alongside Nas sau County Executive Bruce Blakeman and County Legislator Laura Schaefer (R-Westbury).

She said at the press conference

she had allocated $3.1 million to connect Plandome Road businesses in Manhasset to a public sewer sys tem,$2 million for sidewalk replace ment along Westbury Avenue in Carle Place, $1 million for rehabilitation of the 8th and Asbury Ballfelds in Carle Place, $1.76 million for Sunset Park

improvements in Port Washington, and $1.2 million for Fuschillo Park improvements in Carle Place.

As chief executive of the town, DeSena was responsible for submit ting her proposed plans to the Trea sury Department to receive the federal

funding, Brian Devine, her spokesman said.

However, the seven-member town board, where Democrats hold a 4-3 majority, must pass a resolution au thorizing the use of the funds.

Lurvey said there was no discus sion with her or any member of the Democratic majority prior to DeSena submitting her resolution before sub mitting the town’s application to the U.S. Treasury Department or ahead of the Nov. 2 deadline for it to appear on the agenda for the Nov. 17 meeting.

“On October 25 I put a resolution regarding the use of the ARPA funds on the agenda for the November 17 meeting and then sometime later she held a press conference saying she put something on the agenda,” Lurvey said. “She never talked to me about it and we didn’t have any formal dis cussions regarding the use of these funds.”

Devine said the town was award ed the frst half of the money upfront and the second half was only awarded this past summer once the town sent the application to the Treasury De partment that identifed the projects we were looking to utilize the funds on.”

He said DeSena identifed a num ber of projects that had been long-

PHOTO COURTESY OF THE OFFICE OF THE SUPERVISOR

North Hempstead Supervisor Jennifer DeSena was joined by Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman and County Legislator Laura Schaefer (R-Westbury) last week during a press conference in Carle Place.

Says supervisor had no authority to allocate $10 million for capital work subject to board vote

Town eyes Harbor Links contract extension

BY BRANDON DUFFY

North Hempstead is considering a one-year extension to the management contract with Har bor Links Golf Course in Port Washington that ends this year while its rebids the terms of the agreement, according to Supervisor Jennifer De Sena’s ofce.

Built in 1998, Harbor Links is owned by the Town of North Hempstead and operated by Ar nold Palmer Golf Management.

It features an 18-hole championship course, nine-hole executive course that is not closed of to the public during private events, a driving range, pro shop, athletic felds and a full-service banquet hall and restaurant.

As part of the rebid process, DeSena will as semble a committee that will provide “the most competitive and open process possible to ben eft our residents,” according to her spokesman Brian Devine.

The committee membership is not fnalized as of now but will be in the future, Devine said.

Since at least 2013, the town has had a management agreement with the golf course, according to a fnancial and operational review released in 2016.

Harbor Links has been a topic of discussion, particularly during the summer, when residents were critical of the course’s limited availability because of private outings.

Port Washington resident Jack Genicof told the board during a July meeting the course was to be partially closed to the public on 66 of the 109 weekdays from May 1 to Sept. 30 – 61% of the time.

The course is partially closed when private outings are held, which the current contract has no limit on.

James Viras, general manager at Harbor Links, previously confrmed to Blank Slate Me dia the championship course is closed when outings are going on and reopened to the public following the event the same day.

In the month of June, Harbor Links had pri vate outings on June 13, 14, 15, 16, 20, 22, 27 and 29. In July, Harbor Links had private out ings scheduled for July 11, 13, 14, 15, 18, 22, 25 and 28.

For North Hempstead residents, a round of golf on Saturdays, Sundays and holidays on Har bor Links’ championship course costs $100 from open to 8 a.m., $95 from 8 a.m. to 11 a.m. and $90 from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m., with prices dropping to $75 and lower throughout the end of the day.

At Bethpage State Park Golf Course in Farmingdale, the Black Course costs $85 for a round of golf for state residents.

Since 2000, Bethpage State Park’s Black Course has hosted three men’s major golf cham pionships, including the U.S. Open in 2002 and 2009 and the PGA Championship in 2019.

Roslyn body, raises $3K for breast cancer awareness

BY STEVEN KEEHNER

Max Lavine, 10, of Roslyn, didn’t realize the severity of his mother’s breast cancer diagnosis when first told in July 2020. But once he did, he wanted to help in any way he could.

“Once she got her surgeries, I would do chores around the house for her,” he said. “I would help her with errands and laundry. It was definitely a hard time.”

Hilary, Max’s mother, underwent her third and final procedure in November 2021. But Max’s motivation to assist had already expanded beyond his house.

Months earlier, in September, he decided to sell pink helmet stickers with the Roslyn High School bulldog logo. Only intended for his lacrosse team, he said the idea quickly garnered attention. By the time October was over, he had raised $2,000, which he donated to the Breast Cancer Initiative Fund at Northwell Health.

Now, for the second year in a row, Max will give Northwell Health a check — this time for nearly $3,300 — after selling tennis racket dampeners.

“I wanted to help others because it was just about a year past my mother’s diagnosis,” he said on starting Max Out For Pink. “I really wanted to just celebrate, but at the same time help others going through it.”

The tennis racket dampeners are a tribute to the sport Max and his mother could not play together for years because of her diagnosis. (While Max said his mother is an excellent player, Hilary admitted Max is now better than she is.)

Max has run and promoted the project on his own. He said thanks to positive responses, it was successful enough to bring it back for 2022.

“It was just incredible that it was such a negative part of our life that he turns into a positive,” said Hilary. “I think that’s a good message for people to know: that even when things are bad, there are always good things that can come about from bad things.”

Breast cancer affects approximately 264,000 women and 2,400 men in the United States each year, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. About 42,000 women and 500 men die from it yearly.

The United States Preventive Services Task Force recommends women aged 50 to 74 who are at average risk of breast cancer get a mammogram every two years. They also recommend women aged 40 to 49 consult with their healthcare provider about when and how often to get a mammogram.

Mammography is a breast examination using low-energy X-rays for diagnosis and screening. The American Cancer Society notes that when breast cancer is detected early and in a localized stage, the five-year relative survival rate is 99%.

Hilary was 39 at the time of her diagnosis. She said that she had only gotten tested because her mother was diagnosed with breast cancer the year before.

“I was lucky enough to catch it early and I didn’t cancel my appointment, even

Continued on Page 42

Notre Dame Parish gets tax bill of $677,000

BY BRANDON DUFFY

Notre Dame Parish in New Hyde Park was wrongly sent a bill for $676,634 in school taxes last month, according to county records.

The Nassau Assessment

Department error led to a $16.7 million assessment on the tax-exempt property.

The Diocese of Rockville Centre, which owns the property, received the bill. State law exempts houses of worship, which are nonprofits, from

Continued on Page 43

The Rotary Club of Great Neck in Memory of Sal Berritto

PHOTO COURTESY OF MAX LAVINE

Max Levine, the founder of Max Out For Pink, pictured alongside his Roslyn Bulldog sticker he sold. Since last year, he has raised over $5,000 for breast cancer awareness.

PHOTO COURTESY OF GOOGLE MAPS

Notre Dame Parish on 45 Mayfair Rd. In New Hyde Park.

Nassau boosts Zeldin in losing effort

Suffolk congressman’s victory in county not enough to offset votes for Hochul, Dems statewide

BY STEVEN KEEHNER

Gov. Kathy Hochul’s reelection as state governor after defeating Lee Zeldin (RShirley) was one of several Democratic statewide victories Tuesday despite Nassau County voting Republican in those contests.

With her victory, Hochul is the state’s first female to be elected governor. She will serve a four-year term.

With 93.23% of the districts reporting, Hochul captured 52.2% of the 5,652,386 total votes cast, according to the state Board of Elections, while Zeldin received 47%.

But in Nassau, Hochul drew 44.6% of the 507,421 total votes cast and Zeldin claimed the larger share at 55.4% of the vote. All the county’s 1,076 election districts have been reported.

Hochul was promoted from lieutenant governor after Andrew Cuomo’s resignation last August. Before becoming lieutenant gover-

nor, she served as a representative in the state’s 26th Congressional District from 2011-2013.

“Yes, the glass ceiling, like the one that’s above us here today, has finally been shattered in the State of New York,” Hochul said in her victory speech. “The lesson of tonight’s victory is that given the choice, New Yorkers refuse to go backward on our long march toward progress.”

Hochul won her party’s nomination in June by defeating U.S. Rep Tom Suozzi (D-Glen Cove) and New York City Public Advocate Jumaane Williams.

Former U.S. Rep. Antonio Delgado was Hochul’s running mate for lieutenant governor, a position he is serving in currently.

Zeldin did not concede. He said that as uncounted votes are tallied, the results will become closer.

While Democrats won every statewide election, their Republican opponents

received more votes in Nassau County.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, a Democrat who has served in the U.S. Senate since 1999, defeated Republican Joe Pinion and Independent Diane Sare, taking 55.1% of the state vote. He received 48.2% of the vote in Nassau.

Letitia James, a Democrat running for re-election as state attorney general, prevailed over Michael Henry, a Republican. James won 52.7% of the state vote compared to Henry’s 44.8%. In Nassau, she received 45.6% of the vote.

Democrat Thomas DiNapoli beat Republican Paul Rodriguez to serve as state comptroller, receiving 55% of the vote but just 49.5% of the vote in Nassau.

The Clean Water, Clean Air and Green Jobs Environmental Bond Act of 2022 was approved with 59% of the vote statewide. It received 51.87% approval from Nassau voters.

PHOTO COURTESY OF WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

Gov. Kathy Hochul. Her re-election highlighted several Democratic victories at the statewide level Tuesday.

Good neighbors don’t dump neighbors’ votes

Since last week’s library board election, my friends and neighbors and I have been eagerly—anxiously—awaiting the results. The deadline for proxy (absentee) ballots was Oct. 28; the in-person vote was on the 31st. By now, the ballots should have been counted.

Instead, a pair of the candidates—Jessica Hughes and Christina Rusu—have done everything in their power to delay or even halt the process.

Last week, when they first stopped the count, Ms. Hughes released a statement saying she is “fighting against voter fraud”—a shocking allegation for a local election, where the voters are our neighbors and friends. Days later, she and Ms. Rusu would drag the library into court, filing a lawsuit that is a chaotic mix of irrelevant complaints and wild, unfounded accusations.

According to the lawsuit, at least 78 ballots have not been counted to date.

Of these, the largest group are 26 late-arriving ballots that may be disqualified due to when they were received.

The lawsuit notes, however, that several of these have postmarks “from October 26–28”— that is, they were mailed by the Oct. 28 deadline. What if your mother cast a ballot on time, but it happened to arrive late? Is that her fault? Should her vote be thrown away?

The next largest group are 24 ballots described in the lawsuit as having a “Handwritten time stamp.” This timestamp has nothing to do with the voter. It’s just a rubber stamp the library uses when processing the ballots upon receipt.

If the library wrote the date on my father’s ballot using a pen instead of a rubber stamp, should his vote go in the trash? Should literally dozens of our neighbors be disenfranchised for this reason?

Then there’s a group of ballots with various defects. One voter wrote the wrong date. Another voter forgot to sign the envelope. Yet another, perhaps unsure of how to print the ballot request (a PDF), printed it out as a screenshot.

If your grandmother used the wrong file format when she printed her proxy application—this is voter fraud?

These are simple, understandable errors made by our brothers, sisters, neighbors and friends. If we were talking about thousands and thousands of ballots, perhaps it would be too much to expect that all these ballots could be cured.

But we know these people. They live in our neighborhoods; their children go to school with our children. Wouldn’t it be the decent, neighborly thing to do, simply to call these people up and make sure we’ve got their votes right?

I’ll tell you what is neither decent nor neighborly: to insist that votes belonging to our loved ones, our friends and family, should be tossed in the trash because someone forgot to sign an envelope.

To darkly allege that liars and thieves walk among us, that our local library board election was tainted with “voter fraud,” because someone accidentally wrote the wrong date. To take the local library to court, accusing anyone and everyone of ineptitude and malfeasance, rather than trusting in our community library’s normal, customary vote-counting procedures.

Just count the votes. All of them. There is currently a 28-vote gap between Ms. Hughes and her opponent, with dozens of ballots still unopened. We don’t know yet who won this race, but regardless of the outcome, Ms. Hughes’ opponent is prepared to accept the community’s decision. It’s what any good neighbor would do.

Daniel Pitt Stoller Great Neck

HYPERBARIC

THERAPY

OZON THERAPY

CELL THERAPY

Nassau approves Blakeman’s proposed $3.9B budget

BY ROBERT PELAEZ

The Nassau County Legislature unanimously approved the proposed $3.88 billion budget proposed by County Executive Bruce Blakeman Oct. 28.

The Republican-controlled Legislature voted 19-0 on the budget, which marks more than a $3 million increase from Nassau’s $3.5 billion 2022 budget. The county plans on spending almost $990 million on its salaries, wages and fees, the largest expense in the proposal.

Out of the $3.5 billion major operating funds in the budget, the county’s proposed general fund is more than $2 billion, making up 61% of the overall fund expenses. Over $960 million, or 28.8% of the operating funds’ expense, is allocated to police services, according to the budget.

Democrats attempted to add an amendment to hire more than 100 new police officers. Blakeman’s proposed budget included the hiring of 36 new police officers, according to the documents.

Minority Leader Kevan Abrahams (DFreeport) urged Blakeman to support the plan to hire more officers and establish a hate crimes division within the Nassau County Police Department. The Democrats’ $6.3 million public safety plan, he said, would have been funded from the county’s projected 2023 surplus, ranging from $52.9 to $60.4 million.

“While County Executive Blakeman has paid lip service to crucial issues of public

safety, taxes, and assessment during the last 10 months, his administration has consistently fallen short on solutions – like how he has proposed adding just 36 officers for the entirety of our county,” Abrahams said in a statement.

Sales tax accounts for 45.9%, or $1.527 billion, of the county’s anticipated total revenue, the highest percentage among the overall revenue. The anticipated growth would be 1.8% from the prior 2022 projection of $1.375 billion.

“Economic conditions create new challenges for the government each year, as we continue to rebuild our local economy postCOVID-19 pandemic; I am pleased to say that

Nassau is back,” Blakeman said in a letter attached with the proposal.

Property taxes make up more than 22% of the anticipated revenue, the second-highest percentage, according to the budget. The county anticipates collecting $755.3 million, the same as in the 2022 budget, Blakeman said.

Nassau also expects to receive $261.4 million in state aid and $161.1 million in federal aid, increases from $226 million and $156.7 million, respectively, from the 2022 budget. The federal funds outlined in the budget, according to the proposal, are not from the American Rescue Plan. The plan has provided Nassau with $385 million, according to the proposal.

Blakeman was required to submit the budget proposal for legislative review by Sept. 15, according to the county charter. The Nassau Interim Finance Authority, a state-appointed board that has oversight on the county’s finances, makes the final determinations and approval of the budget. Lauding his team’s work on the budget, Blakeman said he hopes that NIFA will soon relinquish its power over the county’s finances.

A NIFA analysis released prior to the legislature’s approval of the budget showed that the proposed spending plan for the 2023 fiscal year could result in nearly $40 million in budget deficits. NIFA Chairman Adam Barsky told Newsday that the risks included in the budget were “manageable.”

Sillitti blasts Jha for ‘hateful’ talk in tweets

BY STEVEN KEEHNER

The Nassau Republican Party and incumbent Democratic Assemblywoman Gina Sillitti both condemned Vib-

huti Jha, her Republican opponent in Nassau County’s 16th Assembly District, for what they are calling hateful tweets.

Jha, 70, of Port Washington, is a first-time candidate for the Republican and Conservative parties. A specialist in business turnaround and a former banker, he hopes to flip District 16.

Democratic officials obtained copies of his tweets and sent them to Newsday. They included remarks about Muslims, Christians and Sikhs between 2019 and February 2022. Among his claims were that Islam has no concept of reciprocity or respect for others and that Christianity and Islam are not inclusive religions.

“Islam might consider fighting its own definition of who they are!” Jha tweeted Feb. 16. “That will help the rest of humanity!!”

Vibhuti Jha. The Nassau Republican Party and incumbent Democratic Gina Sillitti both condemned the Republican candidate in Nassau County’s 16th Assembly District for what they are calling hateful tweets. Continued on Page 37

PHOTO COURTESY OF THE COUNTY EXECUTIVE

The Nassau County Legislature approved County Executive Bruce Blakeman’s $3.9 billion budget on Oct. 28.

PHOTO COURTESY OF VIBHUTI JHA

OUR VIEWS Editorial Cartoon

DeSena goes rogue on town projects

North Hempstead Town Supervisor Jennifer DeSena held a press conference Wednesday to announce that $9 million will be allocated toward five different infrastructure projects in the town using funds from the American Rescue Plan Act.

The projects included $3.1 million to connect Plandome Road businesses in Manhasset to a public sewer system – a long-needed project for both environmental and economic reasons.

“These projects will help repair, maintain and expand critical infrastructure throughout our town and significantly improve the quality of life of our residents,” DeSena said.

We strongly agree with DeSena — at least about the Plandome Road project — on the need for infrastructure work.

But there were two problems with DeSena’s announcement.

The first is that the projects have not been approved by the North Hempstead Town Board, which means they were not authorized.

As a town supervisor, DeSena has no authority under the law to allocate money without board approval. She is just one of seven members of the town board with Democrats holding four of the seven seats.

The Democrats were not happy.

“The supervisor cannot unilaterally determine what projects we spend that money on. The Town of North Hempstead is not a dictatorship,” Town Councilwoman Veronica Lurvey said in a statement to Blank Slate Media. “These decisions must be decided by board resolution, and all seven of us have one equal vote. It is disappointing that Supervisor DeSena called a secret press conference announcing her wish list instead of communicating with her colleagues to ensure she would have the necessary support.”

Lurvey said she had submitted a resolution for use of the funds on Oct. 25 to be discussed at the board’s Nov. 17 meeting.

Then with no notice DeSena, she said, “held a press conference saying she put something on the agenda. She never talked to me about it and we didn’t have any formal discussions regarding the use

of these funds.”

DeSena said that “as the CEO of the town,” she was responsible for applying to the U.S. Treasury Department with proposed plans for use of the funds.

She said she based her submission on her identifying a number of long-delayed projects that “represented tangible benefits to our residents town-wide.”

“There was no stipulation dictating board involvement prior to submission,” she said. “As with any spending item, the board weighs in when it comes before them.”

In other words, just months into not only her first year in town government but in any government job, DeSena decided she would be the sole judge in selecting which projects to fund.

And the board could later exercise its legal authority but at the risk of running into issues with the Treasury Department.

The second problem with the press conference can beexplained by who was and who was not in attendance.

Standing beside her were Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman and Nassau County Legislator Laura Schaefer. Both are Republicans.

DeSena was a registered Democrat when she ran on the Republican line for town supervisor in 2021.

But her current sympathies became very apparent when she endorsed George Santos, an extreme Make America Great Again Republican, in the race for the 3rd Congressional District, with whom she also campaigned.

DeSena’s announcement, with her two Republican colleagues, came less than a week before Election Day. Just a coincidence?

The two Republicans’ presence could be explained by the county’s plan to fund a roadway project on Westbury Avenue in Carle Place where DeSena said the town would provide $2 million to replace sidewalks. Schaefer is the county representative for that stretch of Westbury Avenue.

But that doesn’t explain the absence of Democrats — other than the fact that DeSena had gone behind their backs to announce projects she had not been authorized to award.

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Steven Blank

OFFICE MANAGER Holly Blank

There is another reason that can best be explained by an adage — hypocrisy is the tribute that vice pays to virtue.

The funding for the town projects is provided by the American Rescue Plan, a $1.9 trillion economic stimulus program passed by Congress and signed into law by President Joe Biden on March 11, 2021.

The plan was intended to speed up the country’s recovery from the economic and health effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.and has included direct stimulus payments, extending unemployment, moratoriums on evictions and foreclosures, and child tax credits.

But the legislation was passed in Congress by Democrats on a straight party-line vote. The bill received not a single Republican vote in either the House or the Senate. Not one.

Final passage of the bill required Vice President Kamala Harris to cast her first tie-breaking vote in the Senate. Every Democrat in the House and the Senate voted for the act.

This has not stopped Republican officials across the country from trying to take credit for the type of capital projects that DeSena announced last week.

We are just happy that DeSena has not cited concerns with inflation and turned down the money.

In addition to the sewer system project in Manhasset and the sidewalks in Carle Place, DeSena’s list included $1 million for rehabilitation of the 8th and Asbury Ballfields in Carle Place, $1.76 million for improvements on Sunset Park in Port Washington, and $1.2 million for Fuschillo Park improvements in Carle Place.

Just over $1 million has already been used by the town to offset lost revenue in the Port Washington Parking District, town officials said.

We strongly urge the rest of the town board to approve the $3.1 million allocated for Plandome Road in Manhasset for the sewer project.

As Matthew Donno, co-president of the Manhasset Chamber of Commerce, told Newsday: “This $3 million will help pay for the completion of the project along with pump systems for all of the stores.”

Donno said businesses along Plandome Road, especially restaurants, can pay as much as $50,000 to $70,000 annually to pump their septic tanks.

“Having a sewer system would help alleviate that part of the equation,” he said.

But we would like to hear what Town Democrats think would be the best use of the money not covered by the work in Manhasset.

Approving three projects totaling $4.4 million in Carle Place seems questionable in a town with many infrastructure needs.

We hope the town’s plan includes using some of the money for aiding downtown business districts other than Manhasset with a project that would provide additional parking.

Increased parking would result in increased sales tax revenue that could help later pay for parks and sidewalks while assisting ailing business districts hurt by the pandemic and the move to online shopping.

As DeSena said, the money provided by the American Rescue Plan Act can help the town address critical infrastructure needs.

This should be done in an open manner that ensures that the town gets the best bang for the buck. Not the greatest political advantage.

REPORTERS

Robert Pelaez, Brandon Duffy, Steven Keehner COLUMNIST Karen Rubin

ACCOUNT EXECUTIVES

Stacy Shaughnessy, Melissa Spitalnick, Wendy Kates, Barbara Kaplan

ART DIRECTOR Yvonne Farley

It’s about to rain on Donald Trump’s parade

There is no one who I know who is waiting with baited breath for former President Donald Trump to announce that he is going to seek a second term. There are hard-core supporters who will go into a swoon when he announces, but the Republican political world would rather watch a watermelon rot than have to deal with Donald. Like it or not, he will be announcing and the party will have to deal with a wounded warrior who will be an obstacle for the new group that is waiting in the wings to succeed him.

Mr. Trump will spend the next two weeks taking credit for all of the party’s victories, many of which he had nothing to do with. The real problem for the party is how do you deal with a candidate who may be under indictment and facing a host of other civil claims? It is a pretty safe bet that sometime around Dec. 1, Attorney General Merrick Garland will be holding a press conference to state

that President Trump will be charged with various federal crimes dealing with his retention of highly classified documents at the Mara Lago estate property.

It is one thing to be impeached by the House twice, but it is just as serious to be charged with violations of the Espionage Act. The partisans will call the indictment further evidence of a “witch hunt,” but the mishandling of sensitive documents has gotten a number of prominent politicians in legal trouble and there is no way that the former president will be given a free pass. A few months ago, Mr. Trump could have claimed that his retention of the documents was an oversight and begged for compassion. But since August, Mr. Trump has admitted to keeping the various papers and has even claimed that they belong to him.

The Justice Department action is enough of a headache, but on top of that there are two ongoing cases that

JERRY KREMER Kremer’s Corner

could further soil the Trump image. The grand jury in Fulton County, Ga., is expected to take some formal action against a whole group of Trump attorneys as well as a group of Georgia politicians who swore that they

were electors for Trump. There may be other people in trouble and all have direct ties to Trump.

Not to be forgotten is the criminal tax fraud case currently on trial in New York involving the Trump organization. While President Trump is not named personally, his name comes up at every trial session and some of the evidence is embarrassing. The Trump Organization lawyers claim that Mr. Trump never knew anything about checks paid to his employees and their families, except that all of the checks are signed by ”Donald J. Trump.” If the tax fraud case results in a conviction, it could have serious consequences for the organization that one man built. It is also possible that the Trump children will get a major black eye from any verdict and have a hard time getting bank financing.

And last and by far not the least is the Jan 6 grand jury sitting in Washington, D.C., which could decide that

A LOOK ON THE LIGHTER SIDE

Mr. Trump had a direct role in planning the attempt to overthrow the U.S. government and keep Trump in power. Any criminal charges stemming from that case could include sedition, which is punishable by 20 years in prison. There haven’t been any criminal convictions for sedition in over 100 years so a new one against Trump supporters or Donald Trump would not sit well with the voters.

Knowing Donald Trump as well as I do, I have no doubt that nothing will stop him from declaring his candidacy very soon and all of those charges will be ignored as he moves forward pursuing his dream to get back into the Lincoln bedroom. There is a possibility that people such as Sen. Ted Cruz, Gov. Ron De Santis, Sen. Rick Scott, Nikki Haley and Mike Pompeo will step forward and call for President Trump to give up his crusade to save the party. Since Mr. Trump thinks he is the party, it will be a useless effort.

The look, the taste, the smell…of autumn

As I write this, the mid-term election results are in the future. By the time you read this, you may already know them. Or perhaps not; nothing works the way it used to, anymore.

The first time I ever worked at a polling place on Election Day, I was in college. As extra credit for a Poli Sci course, I had contacted one of New Haven’s alderwomen and volunteered to work in her office. I liked her politics, so I soon found myself canvassing downtown neighborhoods, and eventually serving as a poll-watcher on Election Day.

As I recall them, my duties involved nothing more complicated than getting to the location before 6 a.m., then sitting quietly and watching other people do all the work as voters came and went. It was dark when I went into the room — a windowless box — and dark when I left. The whole experience was better suited for extra credit in my English class, which at the time was on Existentialist literature. It would have compared well with Jean-Paul Sartre’s “No Exit,” or Samuel Beckett’s “Waiting for Godot.”

My next experience with work at

a polling place came after my husband and I had moved to Port Washington. I hadn’t yet gathered up the nerve to actually “man” the tables all day, but I did sign up to be an observer at one location toward the end of the night, and telephone the results to the party chair of my choice.

Something very odd happened that year. At the point in time at which I left my house, for the short drive to my assigned location, Florida was blue, and TV reporters had already projected the Democrat to be the winner.

By the time I got home, just an hour or so later, Florida was red, and the country had entered a period of uproar never to be equaled until 2020… for this was the infamous Gore versus Bush Election, of 2000, and a nation that had grown accustomed to having results announced on Election Night would still be in limbo by Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving! It was unthinkable.

And when the Supreme Court weighed in, in mid-December, and arbitrarily stopped a recount that candidate Gore had had every legal right to demand …well, let’s just say we are still living with the consequences of

JUDY EPSTEIN A Look on the Lighter Side

that.

That was the first time I, for one, had ever heard that the Electoral College (whatever they were) had to actually hold a final vote, by a “date certain” in December, for the election to be official. That was the excuse given by the Supreme Court for intervening — that the date was looming. I’m not saying I still hold a grudge, but, rather than interfere with an election

result, I don’t know why the court or the Electoral College didn’t just extend the deadline, like every other college in the world seems able to do (thanking you now, Yale).

There was another consequence, as well. I know it seems like we’ve talked about Red and Blue America since the beginning of time, but it really all dates back to that 2000 switcheroo; I never heard those terms used in that specific way, until then.

And why those two colors? I think some network executive must have said, “No, we’re NOT using red for the Democrats, too many people wrongly call them “Commies” and “Reds” as it is. We’re going to use blue for them, and red for the Republicans.” And so it has been ever since…but sometimes I wonder, how might our lives now be different if the networks had used green and orange, instead?

I finally got enough nerve, and training, to work several elections after that. The more I heard politicians blather about “election fraud,” the more determined I grew that there would be no cheating on my watch. I even got “promoted” to captain of my own table. I was proud of how well we

all got along, Democrats and Republicans working together to get through a long day and night. And I was very proud of a nation that peacefully contained so many ethnicities, as reflected by the huge variety of last names in my big book.

2016 is the last time I worked a big national election; by 2020, I was sequestered inside my own house.

Now that I can come out again, I no longer recognize the country I once knew. Bamboo ballots? Dead Venezuelan dictators changing votes? Space lasers? I have trouble believing that the newscasters haven’t changed places with the writers of the Simpsons.

It has actually driven me to prayer. I pray that America recovers from this fever dream, and wakes up into a world where we can once again be civil — if not actually kind — to each other.

That makes it more essential than ever, for me, to leave my desk and go in search of news from The Lighter Side. I will be doing that, both in and out of this column… and writing up what I find, intermittently, when I find it. See you soon, I hope, on the other side … the Lighter one!

LETTERS POLICY

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‘A gift of safety, from our family to yours’

We are rapidly approaching another somber American milestone, the 10th anniversary of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shootings (Dec 14), that left 20 children and 6 adults dead.

Thinking back, I have no memory of any school shootings when I was an elementary school student in the 1950s.

Back in the day, to administer routine doses of fear, we were compelled to participate in “duck and cover” drills, in which we were implicitly advised that hiding under a wooden desk would save us if an atomic bomb was dropped.

I don’t recall feeling anxious during those drills. But, the occasional test pattern and piercing tone that showed up, unannounced, on our black-and-white TV screen scared the hell out me, especially if I was watching alone.

I did get in trouble more than once for laughing uncontrollably during duck and cover drills, when the teacher told us to sit on the floor and put our heads between our legs. I can only speculate why I thought that was so funny at the time.

At that time, I was unable to conjure an image of the impact of a nuclear explosion. This is despite the fact that it happened twice in Japan a little more than one decade earlier. Photos of mushroom clouds had pierced our collective consciousness, as well as black shadows of humans and other objects, that were found strewn across the sidewalks and building façades of Hiroshima and Na-

gasaki.

Maybe I was in denial, which would have been a healthy defense mechanism under the circumstances, especially at such a tender age.

I cannot recall my parents bringing up the atomic bomb or nuclear war in conversation. Although I had a vague recollection that the Soviet Union was America’s enemy, I never contemplated mutually assured destruction.

Had I been subject to live shooter drills in grade school, like today’s kids are, I’m sure I would have been crystal clear about the purpose of the drills — to keep me from being blown away by intruding strangers brandishing militarygrade weapons.

I do believe I would have been living in fear every day, above or below the surface of my awareness.

Today’s children, teens and parents are drowning in unfiltered information and horrific images, advanced by social and conventional media, that are the result of an endless succession of school shootings — mass murders of the nation’s children, from sea to shining sea. And, there is no end in sight.

Despite the reality of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki on August 6 and 9, 1945, nuclear annihilation was, at best, an abstraction to me and my schoolmates. I couldn’t really comprehend it then, as I can now. But a classroom of slaughtered children, that is a different story. My childhood mind’s eye could have imagined such a horror. Ex-

ANDREW MALEKOFF The Back Road

cept for today’s children, no imagination is necessary.

For too many of today’s children, the mass shooting and murder of their contemporaries is far from abstract. Their fear and anxiety are grounded in stark reality. The tyranny of imagination need not apply. Parental anxiety and hypervigilance, even terror, have become pervasive, and for good reason.

Yet, despite the ever-increasing incidence of school shootings, the nation remains torn, divided. Many recommendations for sensible gun laws are widely supported, including by gun owners, and do not affect people’s second amendment rights to bear arms, affording them the ability to defend themselves and their property.

Nevertheless, there remains opposition to even the most bipartisan solutions, such as implementing universal background checks for gun purchases and instituting a ban on assault weapons.

Apparently, Texas schools think they have found the answer — DNA.

Jennifer Hassan, reporting for the Washington Post on Oct. 20, wrote: “Texas schools are encouraging parents to store their children’s DNA and fingerprint records in case they need to provide them to law enforcement if kids go missing.”

One middle school teacher in Texas noted that the word ‘missing’, “means a lot of different things.”

After the Robb Elementary School shooting (May 24) in Uvalde Texas, one of the deadliest mass shootings in U.S. history, “families of children who were unaccounted for lined up to provide DNA samples to help identify bodies torn apart by bullets,” Hassan reported.

Although Texas law does not say that DNA kits are for the identification of children’s bodies after a school shooting, parents have drawn a link between the two, reported Arianna Prothero for Education Week.

The 18-year-old Uvalde assailant legally bought two semiautomatic rifles and close to 400 rounds of ammunition, in order to slaughter 19 innocent children in a setting charged with ensuring their safety. Two teachers who tried to protect them were murdered as well.

Ten years ago, some thought we had seen the end of it with Sandy Hook.

The message on the fingerprint and DNA test kits reads: “A gift of safety, from our family to yours.”

Prothero cited Shannon Watts, founder of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, who tweeted: “Texas Gov Greg Abbott is choosing to send DNA kits to schools that parents can use to identify their children’s bodies AFTER they’ve been murdered rather than pass gun safety laws to proactively protect their lives.”

Providing parents with DNA kits to preempt a school shooting was met with disbelief by a number of Texas parents, reported Nikki McCann Ramirez for Rolling Stone.

“It’s like wiping your [rear-end] before you [use the bathroom],” Brett Cross, whose son Uziyah Garcia was killed in Uvalde, sardonically tweeted. “Let’s identify kids after they’ve been murdered instead of fixing issues that could ultimately prevent them from being murdered,” he added.

Hassan concluded with one teacher’s sentiments: “I love my job. I love being a teacher. My students perform well,” she said. “And yet this threat of gun violence is the one thing that would make me leave. No job is worth the risk when the tradeoff is leaving my kids without a mother.”

Ten years later and some, in apparent surrender, believe DNA kits are the answer.

VIEW POINT

‘Choose life’ means fight for reproductive rights

I’m wondering if the Christo Fascists have fully thought out the consequences of forced birth and imposing Sharia-law like proscriptions on secular life. I wonder if they have fully comprehended the impact of effectively ending the concept of public health by allowing soulless corporations that people depend upon for health insurance to opt out of paying for preventive care like vaccinations, HIV medication, contraception. Indeed, have they contemplated the impact of banning contraception altogether on top of ending sex education in public schools and replacing it with religion-based “abstinence”? (Good luck with that).

They might diabolically imagine that forcing every woman and child to give birth might result in more subjects for their flock and more voters for their “team”, and lots and lots of cheap labor, but the opposite could unfold.

Or they may salivate at the prospect of these baby factories producing inventory for adoption. There are presently 407,000 children in foster care, 9,100 in orphanages but only 135,000 children are adopted each year. And there is a cost to society in maintaining them.

And since Americans seem to be obsessed with “economic” issues – inflation in the cost of eggs and gas –more than their fundamental rights,

well, abortion is an economic issue, a genuine kitchen-table issue.

Who will pay for the neonatal care, the delivery, the post-natal care, or will people just be forced to fend for themselves? Giving birth costs $18,865 on average, including pregnancy, delivery and postpartum care, according to the Peterson-Kaiser Family Foundation Health System Tracker. And what of a difficult pregnancy, when too many of these women don’t even have the cash to travel out of state to obtain a legal abortion?

How many mothers will die in childbirth, leaving their living children motherless? How many teenagers will be forever harmed, perhaps rendered infertile or permanently disabled? How many women, forced to undergo pregnancy until they are at death’s door, may survive but suffer permanently? How many single mothers will fall into poverty – the image in “Les Mis” comes to mind.

And how many women will see their lifetime earnings, their Social Security (if the Republicans don’t take that away altogether), their pensions suffer, the lack of resources the family has to provide for their children – to go to college, for example.

The Institute for Women’s Policy Research found in 2021 (before the fall of women’s constitutional reproductive

KAREN RUBIN View Point

rights) that restrictive abortion laws cost state and local economies $105 billion annually by reducing labor force participation and earnings while also increasing time off and turnover among women ages 15 to 44 years old. Now multiply that for federal taxes and the GDP . Now multiply over a lifetime.

Society will be deprived of the productivity, creativity, innovation of those who are forced to give birth, whose ability to fulfill their own life’s goals are curtailed (no different than when women were barred from voting and jobs). Their progeny, so many of whom will not have the resources or loving attention, may well go on to become burdens

on society – not just in health care costs, but may well become the mass murderers and criminals that gun activists insist are the product of bad parenting rather than the easy access to weapons. How many of these unwanted children will be abandoned (there are more of those century-old baby boxes being put at churches and firehouses)?

It is not a coincidence that the (red) states where abortion bans are most extreme also have the highest rates of maternal and infant mortality, poorest health care, poorest public education, poorest everything. Most have even refused to adopt Obamacare and expanded Medicaid. Because their interest is simple: punish the vulnerable, because they can. The Republicans are even out, yet again, to repeal the Affordable Care Act which. enabled tens of millions to access health insurance. Cruelty and control is the feature, not the bug.

Young women now have to take into account what states they will apply to college or pursue jobs, what employers they can work for – in effect, cutting off opportunity.

What about the cost of prosecuting these new crimes? “Concerns about women’s liberty during a pregnancy aren’t theoretical. Already, between 2006 and 2020, more than 1,300 women have been prosecuted for their actions during pregnancy, according

to the data from NAPW,” Sophia Bush writes in Glamour, Why the Right to an Abortion Matters. States including Texas have even proposed a death penalty for women who obtain abortion. (Not even the Parkland mass murderer got the death penalty.)

“Our right to reproductive choice is fundamental to our democracy, so much so that one of the societal changes that signifies a backsliding democracy, one of the surefire things that happens anywhere when equality is being chipped away, is the rollback of the rights of women, and particularly those relating to bodily autonomy. Without reproductive choice, we have no autonomy,” Bush says.

But if you want to insist someone else’s religious “freedom” has more validity that yours or your own civil rights, Jews are standing up for woman’s right to life as a religious tenet.

“On this Yom Kippur we challenge this assault to our rights and our faith by heeding the call at the core of this sacred day. ‘I have set before you life and death, choose life, that you may live’. Yes we challenge this ruling by choosing life — that phrase so closely associated with antiabortion activists does not belong to them,’” Rabbi Sara Y. Sapadin declared in her gripping Yom Kippur sermon at Temple Emanuel in New York City.

Edward Hoppper: master of the Quotidian

The current Edward Hopper retrospective at the Whitney Museum of American is entitled “Edward Hopper’s New York” and it’s worth the effort to leave the safety of Nassau County and brave the traffic of the LIE to experience the show. Hopper is widely known as one of America’s greatest painters and his “Early Sunday Morning,” “House by the Railroad,” and “Nighthawks” are recognized and cherished by most Americans.

Hopper is widely known for his realistic, austere paintings of scarylooking Gothic houses, his voyeuristic paintings of New York apartments occupied by lonely inhabitants and his paintings of desolate New York streets bordered by low-lying, three-story brick tenements. But after having seen these painting up close and personal, I have come to conclude that the art critics who have written about him have missed the most obvious point of these works. They uniformly describe his work as simple, austere, figurative, bleak, nostalgic, and Americanlike along the vein of Grant Wood or Thomas Hart Benton as opposed to Andy Warhol or Jackson Pollock.

All that may be true, but if one looks closely at his paintings, you can

see an abiding conflict between what is stationary and what is moving. His “House by the Railroad” is so unsettling that Alfred Hitchcock used it as a model for the Bates Hotel in “Psycho.”

The house is so uncanny, foreboding and isolated that it’s easy to overlook the fact that in the foreground is a railroad track as a means of escape.

He has painted many a naked woman sitting passively on a bed or standing alone in a room (“Morning in a City”) that it’s easy to overlook the fact that she is looking longingly out the window in hope that she will escape. He is noted for his paintings of hotel rooms, but again in “Hotel by a Railroad” this painting includes a man who is standing at a window looking out at the railroad tracks.

In the painting “Room in New York,” we peer into an apartment in Manhattan and get to see a bored man reading a newspaper and his wife on the far side of the room tinkering listlessly on a piano. In “New York Movie” we witness a bored-looking usherette standing with arms folded and not bothering to watch a movie she has probably seen 20 times already.

These images serve as clues to his central message that the quotidian life we lead can be wearing, tedious, mun-

DR. TOM FERRARO Our Town

dane and claustrophobic. Thus, like all great artists, he provides us with a way to escape this tedium by incorporating images of escape, including railroads, hotels, motels and bridges. His work has been compared to a secular annunciation but without theology or hope or promise of rebirth.

His painting “Soir Bleu” with its sad-looking clown painted in white face reminds me of the bleak, impersonal and tragicomic work of Samuel Beckett whose “Waiting for Godot” is considered by some to be the most important play of the 20th century.

Edward Hopper’s work also re-

EARTH MATTERS

minds me of the work of Jean-Paul Sartre, the father of existentialism and author of “Nausea,” whose philosophy revealed that we are all “condemned to be free.” Except that in Hopper’s case, his characters would rather stay stuck rather than catch the next train out of town. Perhaps their nature is the result of Hopper’s Puritan values, which seemed to have produced a depression that he suffered with in his later years. However, I do not mean to criticize

him in any way. His work is invariably transcendent and poignant and profound. He is truly a master painter who devoted his life to the canvas. One of the greatest of American painters. And if you are in any way interested in why we seem to suffer with boredom and despair and how great artists try to deal with this existential dilemma, then get in your car and brave the LIE to see the Edward Hopper show at the Whitney Museum of American Art.

Try, try again with environmental bills

By the time most of you read this, Election Day will have passed, and we’ll know what kind of government will be in place for the next few years.

A reminder of the power of politics recently arrived in my emails. Two bills didn’t make the cut before the state Legislature adjourned and will have to be reintroduced or included by the governor, whomever that will be, in the state 2023-2024 budget. Both of these are important issues. A bill to limit the use of Neonic pesticides was passed in the Assembly but not the Senate, so will have to be reintroduced. Neonics have been completely banned in Europe, due to their implication in honeybee colony collapse.

The Birds and Bees Protection Act will ban neonic-treated corn, soybean, and wheat seeds and non-

agricultural, turf and ornamental use. The primary use in New York is as coatings on the seeds of soybeans and corn. But a report by Cornell University found that the cost of Neonics – harm to pollinators, birds, birth defects in deer, contamination of groundwater — far outweighed the benefits, and that safer alternatives exist. The Better Bottle Bill is aimed at making the now 40-year-old bottle bill more in line with other states and increasing the recycling rates in the state. Enacted in 1983, the ‘Bottle Bill’ requires a nickel refundable deposit on eligible beverage containers to encourage their return for recycling, which reduces litter and waste.

Modernization of the 40-yearold Bottle Bill will further enhance litter control (most notably in underserved lower-income communi-

JENNIFER WILSON-PINES

Earth Matters

ties), stimulate recycling efforts, and encourage the use of refillable containers. States with Bottle Bills have a much higher recycling rate than states without. The enhanced

bill would expand the number of beverage containers covered by the Bottle Bill to include non-carbonated beverages, wine, and liquor. Other states, Maine, California, Oregon, and Connecticut, have already done this with success. Increasing the amount of the deposit to a dime will still be behind inflation over the last 40 years but has been shown to immediately increase redemption rates. While the original bill has been a success, as the DEC estimates it reduced roadside litter by almost 70%, with 5.5 billion containers recycled in 2020 alone, there are more good reasons to expand the Bill. The enhanced bill is expected to increase rates of recycling across all demographics. The bill will also reduce municipalities’ waste burden and their solid waste disposal expenses. Removing bottles from the waste stream

equals tons of debris not going to landfills.

Adding containers and a higher deposit and handling fee will create new jobs in the recycling industry and benefit redemption center workers. The hundreds of organizations that have supported these efforts are expecting to make a major push to get them across the finish line during the next legislative session. And given the time of year, I’d be remiss and not to mention that when you clean up your yard this fall, please Leave the Leaves.

Rake (don’t blow or shred) them under shrubs where they act as natural mulch, while offering protecting cover to overwintering beneficial insects. Blowing and shredding kills insects and larvae, not to mention adding noise and air pollution to the neighborhood.

PHOTO BY TOM FERRARO

Nassau must strengthen cybersecurity

As our neighbors in Suffolk County continue to struggle in the aftermath of a devastating, coordinated cyberattack upon their information technology infrastructure, Nassau County must confront an unsettling truth: It is only a matter of time before cyber attackers take aim at this county and its residents.

In recent years, perpetrators have become more brazen, sophisticated and coordinated in their attempts to shut down administrative systems, steal and exploit highly sensitive personal data, and generally wreak havoc in our society. Faced with adversaries that have no qualms about harming everyday citizens, Nassau County must marshal a strong and proactive

response to protect its residents and interests.

For that reason, I recently filed legislation to strengthen Nassau County’s cybersecurity and cyber resiliency protocols by requiring the County to retain an internal cybersecurity administrator and team within the Nassau County Department of Information Technology

Not only would an in-house team be laser-focused on protecting Nassau’s cybersecurity, creating such an entity would fulfill a recommendation contained within a recent Suffolk County risk assessment report to hire a cybersecurity chief — a recommendation that Newsday reports Suffolk did not follow and Nassau has not yet pursued.

SIELA A. BYNOE Nassau County Legislator

In the event that our county system is breached, a separate legislative

READERS WRITE

proposal would direct the Department of Consumer Affairs to give any future victims resources that they can use to protect their credit and alert the major credit bureaus of the exposure.

I urge County Executive Bruce Blakeman and my colleagues in the Majority Caucus to consider the legislative approach I have set forth. In the private sector, forward-thinking corporations invest significant resources toward “hardening” their own technological systems and creating rapidresponse resiliency protocols so that they can rebound from cyberattacks as quickly as possible. Because municipal entities like Nassau County are entrusted with maintaining extremely sensitive data — the release of which could cause significant harm and in-

voke a sense of permanent vulnerability — we have an obligation to do the same for our residents.

Ramping up our internal investments in cybersecurity will optimally equip us to bolster our staff and capabilities, prevent future attacks, and rapidly rebound in the event of an incident. It is just one way for us to show taxpayers that we are fully engaged with the mission of securely administering the business of Nassau County in this digital age and committed to protecting the welfare of residents and the information they have placed in our care.

Siela A. Bynoe, of Westbury, has represented the Second District in the Nassau County Legislature since 2014.

Residents hurt as Dems obstruct DeSena tax cut

Areader recently wrote a letter highly critical of North Hempstead Town Supervisor Jennifer DeSena to this publication, ending with the maxim “…resign now, or be fired next November.”

While I will not go point for counterpoint with this previous submission and seek to refute its contents, what I will do is argue that this disrespectful and sardonically written submission could not have been more off-target if it tried.

Supervisor DeSena has spent the past 10 months fighting a Democrat Town Board majority that has obstructed and stonewalled each and every one of her proposals, no matter how benefi-

cial they would be to the residents of our Town.

Just take a look at some of her biggest proposals over the last year, and the Democrat majority’s response to them.

DeSena proposed to install an independent and autonomous Ethics Board after finding out the members were serving on year’s expired terms and hadn’t met in nearly a year, prior to her arrival?

Apparently, the Democrat majority doesn’t value a functioning Ethics Board and they’ve blocked the Supervisor’s nominees for 8 months in a row.

Clean up the Town’s Building Department and change its operations to get the influence of Councilmembers

out of it?

The Democrat majority stood in the way of that as well and fought tooth and nail to block it for several months until pressure from the public mounted once the undue influence of Councilmembers became well documented.

Most recently, Supervisor DeSena proposed to amend her tentative budget with an 11% tax cut, paid for by using some of the Town’s reserves she found had been vastly overfunded as a result of repeated tax hikes by the Town Board in the decade prior.

How did Democrats respond? By misdirecting, deflecting, and ultimately blocking her double-digit proposed tax cut not once, but twice, at recent bud-

get hearings. And then, to add insult to injury, Councilmembers Robert Troiano, Peter Zuckerman, Veronica Lurvey, and Mariann Dalimonte went on to mock the financial impact an 11% tax cut would have on taxpayers’ wallets, flippantly equating the savings to “not even enough to buy two pizzas.”

While it may be true that the savings of a double-digit tax cut would not be earth-shattering, by blocking and mocking Supervisor DeSena’s proposal, the Democrat majority have chosen not to lead and instead look only to obstruct, looking to deny DeSena any perceived ‘win.’

DeSena clearly understands that leadership is about the action we

choose to take, and by leading the way with a tax cut instead of hiking taxes as the Democrat-controlled Town Board has done every year for the last decade, DeSena has shown yet again that she will continue to fight for the best interest of the taxpayers, even knowing the Democrat majority will block her every step of the way.

This is the leadership we need in this town, and I urge DeSena to keep fighting; the residents of this town have seen what the Democrats are doing to you, and come next November, we will rally behind you.

Jeffrey Stone Manhasset

Dems bury good work when campaigning

In a recent Newsday column, one of the publication’s prominent Opinion writers verifies what many of us dismayed Democrats have long recognized: For years, and perhaps decades, the Democratic Party seems to lack the “kind of disciplined, consistent, and ferocious opposition ” that the author corrrectly ascribes to Republicans.

His remarks referred specifically to Nassau County, but the criticism applies at least equally and perhaps more emphatically to national as well as local levels, up and down the ballot; Democratic campaigns seem to be run in keeping with Marquis of Queensbury rules, while the Republicans play by Fight Club standards. If the party’s campaign leadership really wishes to win elections, rather than focusing on appearing nicer and more civil than their opponents, it seems at least possible that they might obtain better results if, as a national party, they were to focus on the persistent Republican position as obstacles to legislative initiatives

designed to make people’s lives better, safer, and healthier.

Going back as far as FDR’s New Deal, such programs as Social Security, FDIC bank insurance, Medicare and its subsequent expansion, FDIC bank insurance, SEC anti-fraud regulations, civil rights protection, and many others too numerous to mention that are now taken for granted as essential elements in American economic and financial stability were overwhelmingly, if not solely, initiated by Democrats and enacted into law, often over Republican resistance.

As a prime example in that connection, many readers will recall that Senate Republicans, during the Obama administration, repeatedly submitted proposals to revoke Medicare (as I recall, 57 times); it was the courage of a single Republican, Sen. John McCain, with his “thumbs down” gesture on the floor of the Senate in 2018, that blocked the passage of the final effort by Republicans to repeal the Affordable Care Act.

Democrats seem to assume that

what they consider their “better ideas” for national governance will persuade voters and win elections, but they fail at it. They could, though, have more electorally productive material to work with. They could and should make concerted efforts to distinguish the intent and direction of their party’s policies from those of the Republicans. They can point to statistics illustrating clearly that the nation experiences more rapid economic growth, and lower unemployment rates, during Democratic administrations.

They can demonstrate that, although Republicans proclaim their fealty to “conservative budgetary discipline,” Democratic administrations have generally achieved more restrained budgetary results when adjusting for the inescapable lag between policy proposals and actual implementation. And there’s a logical explanation for that: in a more rapidly expanding economy, more employment leads to higher wages, salaries, and corporate profits, hence

higher tax revenue from all sources, while the “entitlement” spending for various forms of income maintenance (e.g., unemployment compensation) diminishes.

Despite that, of course, Republicans repeatedly and hypocritically assert their determination to cut “entitlement” spending (such as Social Security, Medicare, and unemployment compensation) as the preferred means of reducing federal budget deficits, while simultaneously advocating tax cuts that always seem to provide the greatest benefits to the highest income levels.) Perhaps the best illustration of that point is evident in data from the Clinton presidency: with eight years of steady economic growth, the budget deficit declined persistently during his period. in office, culminating in a prospective surplus which actually raised some concern among economists that continued surpluses might so diminish the amount of outstanding Treasury debt that the Federal Reserve might face a future problem conducting

its monetary policies through its usual open market operations.

These points, and perhaps many more with which I’m less familiar, could provide potent ammunition for a Democratic counterattack against fallacious Republican rhetoric. It’s to be hoped that somewhere, somehow, some Party leaders might recognize the potential merit of a more aggressive portrayal of what Democrats have achieved: that concern for the well-being of all American residents does not conflict with sound governance or responsible fiscal management. Democratic candidates for office should not run away from those accomplishments; rather they should emphasize them as fundamental components of their campaigns and stress the contrast with the policies advocated by their opponents.

Robert Adler Port Washington

FROM THE DESK OF SIELA A. BYNOE

UNITED STATES SENATE

Charles Schumer 55.1% 3,115,161 DEM, WFP

Joe Pinion 42.5% 2,405,553

REP, CON

GOVERNOR

Kathy Hochul 52.2% 2,949,425 DEM, WFP

Lee Zeldin 47.0% 2,656,293 REP, CON

LT. GOVERNOR

Antonino DelGado 52.2% 2,949,425 DEM, WFP

Alison Esposito 47.0% 2,656,293

REP, CON

ATTORNEY GENERAL

Letitia James 52.7% 2,977,397 DEM, WFP

Michael Henry 44.8% 2,529,991 REP, CON

STATE COMPTROLLER

Tom DiNapoli 55.0% 3,109,561 DEM, WFP

Paul Rodriguez 41.9% 2,367,827 REP, CON

CONGRESS - 3rd DISTRICT

Robert Zimmerman 44.4% 120,060 DEM, WFP

George DeVolder Santos 52.5% 142,017 REP, CON

CONGRESS - 4th DISTRICT

Laura Gillen 46.9% 127,748

DEM

Anthony D’Esposito 50.6% 137,899

REP, CON

STATE SENATE 7th DISTRICT

Anna Kaplan 45.5% 55,963 DEM, WFP

Jack Martins 52.0% 64,009

REP, CON

STATE ASSEMBLY 13th DISTRICT

Chuck Lavine 52.3%

Santos flips CD3, beats Zimmerman by 22K

He is also quoted as saying he was “at the Ellipse on Jan. 6,” the day of rioting at the U.S. Capitol, and is quoted on video saying he “wrote a nice check for a law firm” to aid the rioters who stormed the building.

Both Zimmerman and Santos are openly gay.

Zimmerman, a Great Neck resident who ran on the Democratic and Working Family Parties lines, received 22,594 votes from Queens voters compared to Santos, a Queens resident who received 21,746 votes. Santos, who ran on the Republican and Conservative lines, received 120,271 votes from Nassau voters while Zimmerman received 97,466 votes as of Wednesday morning.

The state’s 3rd Congressional District includes the entire Town of North Hempstead including parts of Floral Park, New Hyde Park, Garden City, Mineola and Westbury villages. It also stretches to more southern parts of Nassau County such as Hicksville and Massapequa.

D’Esposito, a former NYPD detective and Island Park resident, declared victory in the 4th Congressional District race against Democrat Laura Gillen Tuesday, receiving 137,899, or 51.9% of votes, compared to Gillen’s 127,748, or 48.08%.

D’Esposito ran on the Republican and

Conservative lines while Gillen ran on the Democratic line. He thanked everyone who cast their votes for him to help flip a congressional seat that has been under Democratic control since 1997.

“When we started this race, they said it was impossible,” D’Esposito said at the Baldwin watch party. “They don’t know Nassau County and they certainly don’t know Chairman Joe Cairo. I want to thank each and every one of you in this room. You worked hard, you’ve knocked on doors, you’ve made phone calls, you’ve dug into your pockets to get us across the finish line.”

Gillen, at her watch party in Freeport on Tuesday night, said her team will “wait until every vote is counted,” saying that the race remains “extremely close.”

D’Esposito said he believes in ensuring that individuals with illegal firearms are arrested and establishing task forces on the federal level are the best ways to combat gun violence. He warned that while adding word of cashless bail not retaining offenders quickly passes through the streets to others who feel they can get away with certain criminal activities.

Gillen said that public safety is a paramount concern for her and other mothers throughout the district and state. She said that universal background checks and supporting other legislations to get fire-

arms off the streets are some of the best ways to protect children and other individuals.

The seat is currently held by U.S. Rep. Kathleen Rice (D-Garden City), who announced earlier this year that she would not be running for re-election. She succeeded Democrat Carolun McCarthy, who served the district from 1997-2015.

The 4th Congressional District currently includes the communities of Baldwin, Bellmore, East Rockaway, East Meadow, the Five Towns, Lynbrook, Floral Park, Franklin Square, Garden City, Garden City Park, Hempstead, Atlantic Beach, Long Beach, Malverne, Freeport, Merrick, Mineola, Carle Place, New Hyde Park, Oceanside, Rockville Centre, Roosevelt, Uniondale, Wantagh, West Hempstead, Westbury and parts of Valley Stream.

Steve Kornacki, MSNBC’s national political correspondent, said the Republicans had a 220-215 advantage in Congress, as of Wednesday morning, though races including the 4th District, have yet to be called. Incumbent Democratic U.S. Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney of the state’s 17th Congressional District had 137,633 or 49.4% of votes against Republican challenger Michael Lawler, who had 140,883 or 50.6% of votes with 95% of votes reported as of Wednesday morning. Maloney conceded before noon.

PHOTO BY BRANDON DUFFY

Republican George Santos is congratulated by supporters after securing his win in New York’s 3rd Congressional District.

Martins beats Kaplan, flips 7th Senate district

With all 112 election districts reporting, Blumencranz had 55.5% of the 52,897 total votes cast, according to the state Board of Elections. Democrat Amanda Field secured 40.3%of the vote.

Blumencranz, a 26-year-old Oyster Bay resident, works in insurance and also has an advisory board member role with the Nassau County Police Department Foundation.

The 15th Assembly District includes Bethpage, Brookville, East Norwich, Farmingdale, Glen Cove, Glen Head, Glenwood Landing, Greenvale, Hicksville, Jericho, Lattingtown, Laurel Hollow, Levittown, Locust Valley, Matinecock, Mill Neck, Muttontown, Old Bethpage, Old Brookville, Old Westbury, Oyster Bay, Oyster Bay Cove, Plainedge, Plainview, Salisbury, Syosset, Roslyn Harbor, Upper Brookville and Woodbury.

Chuck Lavine defeated Republican Ruka Anzai in the race for the 13th Assembly District.

Lavine has 52.3% of the 42,317 total votes cast, according to the state Board of Elections. Anzai secured 43.7% of the vote.

Lavine is a longstanding figure in

state politics, having represented District 13 since 2005. Hehas also served on the Glen Cove City Council, as a committee member, chairman and vice chair of the Glen Cove Democratic Committee and as a committee person for the Nassau County Democratic Committee.

The 13th Assembly District includes Glen Cove, Sea Cliff, Plainview, Woodbury, Glenwood Landing, Cove Neck, Centre Island and Jericho as well as residents in parts of Bayville, Oyster Bay, Oyster Bay Cove, Laurel Hollow, Syosset, Old Bethpage, Bethpage, Hicksville, Westbury/New Cassel, Muttontown, Brookville, East Hills, Greenvale, Roslyn, Roslyn Heights and Roslyn Harbor.

Gina Sillitti defeated Republican Vibhuti Jha in the race for the 16th Assembly District.

Sillitti has 49.82% of the 51,854 total votes cast, according to the state Board of Elections. Jha secured 46.75% of the vote. 3.35% of the ballots submitted were blank.

Sillitti has served as the representative for District 16 since Jan. 1, 2021, after defeating Ragini Srivastava in 2020.Her previous positions in the Town of North Hempstead include deputy commissioner of the Department of

Community Services, deputy chief of staff and director of legislative affairs.

The 16th Assembly District includes Great Neck, Manhasset, Port Washington, Herricks, Mineola, Baxter Estates, parts of East Williston, Old Westbury, Roslyn Estates, Roslyn, Albertson, Williston Park and New Hyde Park.

GOP Assemblyman Ed Ra defeated Democrat Sanjeev Jindal in the race for the 19th Assembly District.

Ra has 64% of the 52,213 total votes cast, according to the state Board of Elections. Jindal secured 32.1% of the vote.

Ra, a Mineola native, has been the representative for District 19 since 2010. He is the ranking minority member of the Assembly’s Ways and Means Committee. He previously worked as the Town of Hempstead’s deputy town attorney and as a legal aide in the Office of the New York State Attorney General.

The 19th Assembly District stretches into all three Nassau County townships. It includes Franklin Square, Garden City South, Garden City Park, New Hyde Park, Westbury, Carle Place, Mineola, Williston Park, Old Westbury, Brookville, Old Brookville, Upper Brookville and Glen Head.

ELECTION RESULTS

Percent

Votes

STATE ASSEMBLY 16th DISTRICT

Gina Silliti 49.8% 25,833

DEM, WFP

Vibhuti Jha 46.7% 24,241

REP, CON

STATE ASSEMBLY 19th DISTRICT

Sanjeev Jindal 32.1% 16,764

DEM

Ed Ra 64.0% 33,409

REP, CON

NASSAU COUNTY JUDGE

Teresa Corigan 453,510

DEM, REP, CON

Rhonda Erin Fischer 452,700

DEM, REP, CON

Helene G. Gugerty 454,307

DEM, REP, CON

NASSAU COUNTY FAMILY COURT JUDGE

Sylvia A. Cabana 444,626

DEM, REP, CON

Eileen J. Goggin 449,965

DEM, REP, CON

Colin F. O’Donnell 447,547

DEM, REP, CON

Joy M. Watson 448,674

DEM, REP, CON

NASSAU COUNTY DISTRICT COURT JUDGE, 1st DISTRICT

Jaclene Agazarian 458,169

DEM, REP, CON

NASSAU COUNTY DISTRICT COURT JUDGE, 2nd DISTRICT

Marie F. McCormack 257,230

DEM, REP, CON

Joseph Nocella Jr. 249,786

DEM, REP, CON

Geoffrey N. Prime 247,668

DEM, REP, CON

Norman A Sammut 247,774

DEM, REP, CON

Arieh D. Schulman 246,511

DEM, REP, CON

NASSAU COUNTY DISTRICT COURT JUDGE, 4th DISTRICT

Michael A. Montesano 120,792

DEM, REP, CON

ENVIRONMENTAL BOND MEASURE

YES 59.0% 3,333,589

NO 29.0% 1,630,054

PHOTO BY ROBERT PELAEZ

Republican Jack Martins was leading incumbent state Sen. Anna Kaplan (D-North Hills) in the 7th Senate District race by less than 10,000 votes as of Wednesday morning.

All results listed are at the time of publication and are not final.

IT’S AN HONOR TO SERVE THOSE WHO SERVED

Each year on Veterans Day, our communities pay special tribute to those who served in the armed forces. Their fierce camaraderie is contagious and their experiences inspiring. The Bristal salutes the many men and women among our ranks who dedicated themselves to the cause of freedom. Our thanks should be felt and heard, especially at this time of year.

For a list of all locations in the tri-state area, visit: THEBRISTAL.COM

Licensed by the State Department of Health. Eligible for Most Long Term Care Policies. Equal Housing Opportunity.

AN ENGEL BURMAN COMMUNITY

YOUR GUIDE TO THE ARTS, ENTERTAINMENT AND DINING

CHAMBER MUSIC AT THE GREAT NECK LIBRARY

Join us for an enriching afternoon of soothing classical melody with the Hudson Valley Chamber Musicians. Norman Dee (Flute) is a graduate of The Juilliard School and is on the boards of the Hugo Kauder Society and Music for All Seasons. Ann Churukian (Oboe) has a master of music degree in oboe performance from Southern Methodist University and is the assistant music librarian at Vassar

School and is the principal clarinetist of the Great Neck Symphony, the Great Neck Philharmonics and many prestigious ensembles.

Terry Watson (Horn) graduated with a master’s in music therapy from New York University and started the Hudson Valley Chamber Musicians. Donald Venezia (Bassoon) has a bachelor of music and is working on his Master’s at The Manhattan School of Music.

ied repertoire includes duos, trios, quartets and woodwind quintet literature. Learn more about the ensemble at hudsonvalleychambermusicians.com.

The Hudson Valley Chamber Musicians Concert is at Great Neck Library, 159 Bayview Avenue in Great Neck on Sunday, Nov. 13 at 2 p.m. at the Main Library Community Room. For more information, please contact Great Neck Library at (516) 466-8055 or email

Port Library spotlight with Roy Schneider

ning and expressive photos from his book, Roy will discuss many of the locations he frequents and his approach to photographing them. This promises to be a fun and entertaining evening celebrating the beauty of Port Washington and The Gold Coast.

In addition

Books will be available for purchase and signing. Sponsored by the Friends of the Library. Register for this hybrid event at www.pwpl.org/ events

GUIDE TO

How to involve more young people in agriculture

The agricultural industry will undergo exciting changes as it looks to overcome developing challenges in the decades ahead. Technology will continue to play a pivotal role in the agricultural sector, making agriculture an evolving and exciting career path for young professionals.

Much has been made of projections that suggest the world population is increasingly looking to urban areas to call home. Though data from the United Nations indicates urban areas could grow by 2.5 billion people by 2050, more recent UN data indicates that 90 percent of that increase will take place in Asia and Africa. All told, estimates indicate that rural areas will remain home to 3.1 billion people by 2050.

A sizable rural population and the challenges climate change and population growth will present underscores how important the agricultural sector will be in the coming decades. That means there should be plenty of opportunities for young people to make an impact, especially if more efforts are made to encourage them to consider careers in agriculture.

· Encourage agriculture-based curriculum. After recognizing that the majority of Kenyan students had no access to farming training and education, the organization Farm Africa initiated a program to make agriculture more accessible to students. Students who participated learned about everything from keeping livestock to mar-

keting produce for global markets. Similar programs can be encouraged in developed countries where opportunities in the field of agriculture figure to increase in the years to come.

· Emphasize technological advancements in the field. Modern young people are growing up with technology all around them, but few may be aware of the vital role technology plays in the agricultural sector. Young people's ears may perk up upon hearing terms like "robotics" technologies are now a big part of life on the farm. Recognition of that may compel more young people to pursue careers in agriculture.

· Highlight the challenges ahead and how agricultural professionals can help overcome them. UN projections indicate the global population will grow by more than two billion people by 2050. Finding a way to feed all of those people in the face of climate change will be no small task, but it's a task that will require dedicated agricultural professionals. Educators and parents can emphasize these challenges when speaking to young people about a career in the agricultural sector, noting that such careers will present real opportunities to make a difference.

Young people looking for rewarding careers in an exciting, ever-evolving field can be encouraged to consider the agricultural sector.

Factors to consider when setting up a school carpool

Gettingkids to and from school can be a challenge for working parents. School start times do not always coordinate with parents’ work schedules, and school typically lets out before parents’ workdays end.

Carpools are one way parents confront the challenge posed by juggling work and family. With a new school year approaching, parents can take the following factors into consideration as they work to establish carpools.

• Determine your insurance needs. Before planning carpools, parents who plan to participate should contact their auto insurance providers to make sure their policies cover driving others. The organizer of the carpool should make sure every parent does this prior to the school year. Some parents may need to purchase supplemental insurance, and each parent should be willing to provide proof of their insurance as well.

• Reach out to parents in your neighborhood. A carpool that is neighborhood-based as opposed to one that is based more on students’ social circles will likely prove more convenient for parents. A carpool with neighbors means parents won’t have to drive far to pick up and/or drop off other students, saving everyone valuable time each day.

• Don’t go overboard. Even if your minivan or SUV can seat half a dozen children, you may want to limit the carpool to a more manageable number of youngsters. Getting kids up and out the door each morning is a challenge when there’s just one youngster involved, let alone several. By limiting a carpool to between two and four children, parents won’t have to worry about too many hiccups during their morning routines.

• Discuss early closures and other unique days in advance. School schedules tend to be the same throughout the year, but there are various times when early closures can affect carpools. This is especially true for parents with children who attend different schools. When planning a carpool, discuss early closure dates with other parents and develop a plan for how to manage pickup.

School carpools are convenient for working parents. Planning prior to the school year is a great way to ensure carpools are successful.

Sport Psychology

Dr. Tom Ferraro has specialized in sport psychology for 20 years and works in the fields of golf, tennis, soccer, baseball, football, wrestling, lacrosse, figure skating, gymnastics, softball, fencing and more. He has helped professional teams, Olympians and elite young athletes learn how to manage the intense pressure of competitive sports. He appears on both TV and radio and has sport psychology columns in 5 different newspapers and has been featured in The New York Times, Wall street Journal and the London Times. Golf Digest includes him in their list of top mental game gurus in America. For a consultation see below:

Williston Park Professional Center 2 Hillside Ave, Suite E. Williston Park NY 11596 (building parallel to E. Williston railroad station) drtomferraro.com drtferraro@aol.com (516) 248-7189

Education continues to provide a sizable return on investment

A recent report from the Center on Education and the Workforce at Georgetown University revealed just how valuable a college degree continues to be. As tuition costs at many colleges and universities rise and families wonder if investing in a college degree is as wise as it once was, the CEW report can reassure parents and their children that a college degree remains a valuable asset that pays significant financial dividends over the long haul.

According to the CEW report, adults with a bachelor’s degree earn an average of $2.8 million during their careers. By contrast, adults with a high school diploma earn an average of $1.6 million over the course of their careers, while those without a diploma earn $1.2 million in their lifetimes.

One key consideration for individuals concerns when education may not provide the expected financial return. Though people pursue advanced degrees for a variety of reasons, including the potential to earn more money over the course of their careers, the CEW study found that the average person with a master’s degree earns $3.2 million in their careers, or

just $400,000 more than someone with a bachelor’s degree. Though $400,000 is a significant sum of money, given the cost to obtain a master’s degree and the work required to earn it, some individuals, particularly those who would pursue such a degree solely to improve their earning potential, may not deem the investment worth their time or money. That’s a consideration for people given the average cost of a master’s degree, which the Education Data Initiative reports is slightly more than $66,000.

Field of study is another consideration for individuals curious about the return to expect when investing in education. The CEW report found that the median career earnings among individuals with a bachelor’s degree in architecture and engineering is $3.8 million, while individuals with a bachelor’s in education earn slightly more than half that amount ($2 million).

As the cost of higher education continues to rise, parents and students about to enter college should know that obtaining a college degree remains a worthy pathway to earning more money over the course of one’s life.

Exploring a career in occupational therapy

Occupational therapists are important allies for individuals with a chronic illness or those who are trying to live independently after an accident.

According to The Balance: Careers, occupational therapy involves assisting people of various ages build or restore their ability to live daily life by modifying or changing daily activities that a person wants to do.

There are three main types of practitioners

who work in the field of occupational therapy. These include occupational therapists, occupational therapy assistants and occupational therapy aides. Salaries, duties and educational and licensing requirements differ between the three roles.

Individuals who want to become occupational therapists must complete a four-year bachelor’s degree and a two- to three-year master’s degree. Individuals will then have to go through the local

licensing process. Many people begin working in OT in positions of less responsibility to gain relevant experience once they have completed the associate’s level program, and then gain experience and build their résumés from there.

· OT therapy aide: This person has the fewest educational requirements and will earn the lowest salary on an OT team. However, OT therapy aides are essential. The aide sets up treatment

rooms and prepares equipment. He or she also may perform clerical duties.

· OT assistant: This person falls between an occupational therapist and an OT aide on the spectrum of responsibility. This can be a good option for someone who is uncertain about an OT career, but wants to try it on for size. Assistants work under an OT’s supervision and make sure patients are correctly performing exercises spelled out in treatment plans.

· Occupation therapist: OTs oversee the operations and have the most responsibility by setting goals and developing treatment plans. An OT will do a home or work assessment to analyze a patient’s environments and make accommodations. He or she also will suggest equipment to use in a workplace to help that patient do his or her job comfortably. To become an OT, one will need to go through a master’s program accredited by the Accreditation Council for Occupational Therapy Education.

Occupational therapists have many ways to specialize their careers. ExploreHealthCareers.org says OTs may work with premature babies, assist children with cerebral palsy or Down syndrome, work in schools with students who have learning disabilities, or may work with older people in nursing homes or private residences. There are new specialties, too, such as training workers to use the correct ergonomics or helping people with low vision issues maintain their independence.

Occupational therapy is a great carer for individuals who want to help others maintain their independence and live life to the fullest.

New Cassel man charged in stabbing: Police

BY STEVEN KEEHNER

A New Cassel man has been arrested and charged with assault after allegedly stabbing a man in the chest Tuesday afternoon, police said.

The incident occurred in New Cassel at 5:50 p.m, where two men were arguing near 846 Prospect Ave.

Police said Emilio CruzYanes, 59, stabbed the unidentified male victim, 50, in the chest and fled the scene.

Officers arrived and transported the victim to a local hospital for treatment and evaluation.

Cruz-Yanes was arrested without incident and charged with first-degree assault after an investigation. He will be arraigned on Wednesday at First District Court, Hempstead.

Emilio Cruz-Yanes, 59. has been arrested and charged with assault after allegedly stabbing a man in the chest Tuesday afternoon, police announced.

Five charged in Westbury shooting called gang-related

BY STEVEN KEEHNER

Police announced the arrest of five men after an alleged gang-related Westbury shooting in April sent one person to the hospital.

Between June and November, officials identified and arrested five suspects: Nharon Hicks, 33 and Jordan Ayala, 26, both of Long Beach in June; Terrance Little, 25 and Isaish Edwards, 25, both of Hempstead in October; and Wilmer Villata, 20, of Uniondale in November.

The shooting occurred at the Park West Nightclub at 741 Merrick Ave. Police say it was between rival Long Beach and Hempstead gang members.

The groups exchanged multiple rounds, during which an unidentified victim was shot in the shoulder and leg. The victim was taken to a nearby hospital.

Hicks and Ayala each face multiple counts of assault, attempted assault, criminal possession of a weapon and criminal use of a firearm, as well as attempted murder and conspiracy to commit seconddegree murder.

Little, Edwards and Villata face charges of reckless endangerment, criminal possession of a firearm and criminal use of a firearm.

All five suspects await further court dates.

PHOTO COURTESY OF THE NASSAU COUNTY POLICE DEPARTMENT

PHOTOS COURTESY OF THE NASSAU COUNTY POLICE DEPARTMENT

Police announced the arrest of five men following an alleged gang-related Westbury shooting in April that sent one person to the hospital.

READERS WRITE

Support neighborhood eateriesIs Pelosi attack just the start?

Is the MAGA fascist Republican terrorist attack on Paul Pelosi a portent of things to come? So-called ‘Republican Leadership’ only makes jokes and foments phony conspiracy theories! Can we now

expect a MAGA fascist Republican terrorist Kristallnacht?

A MAGA fascist Republican terrorist Tulsa? Is it happening here now?

Eric Cashdan Sands Point

Count all G.N. Library votes now

With this open letter, I present to you the voice of over 1,000 concerned residents within the Great Neck Library community, who demand that all votes cast in the 10/31/2022 election be counted immediately. Our community deserves an answer as to why the election count has been disrupted and not counted for over one week.

We are concerned that ballots which have been vetted and fall within the board policy guidelines are being contested. Any vetted vote disqualified from the count divides us as a community. As stated before, we demand that all vetted ballots be counted immediately.

Sabine Margolis Concerned Parent and Resident of Great Neck

In these difficult inflationary economic times, it is especially important to patronize your local neighborhood restaurant not only during “Long Island Restaurant Week” Nov. 16-13 but all year round. There are so many great restaurants in Albertson, East Williston, Floral Park, Garden City, Greenvale, Great Neck, New Hyde Park, Manhasset, Port Washington, Roslyn, Williston Park and other nearby communities in Nassau County.

My wife and I don’t mind occasionally paying a little more to help our local restaurants survive. Don’t forget your

cook and server. We try to tip 20 percent against the total bill, including taxes. If it is an odd amount, we round up to the next dollar. If we can afford to eat out, we can afford an extra dollar tip. When ordering take out, we always leave a dollar or two for the waiter or cook. It is appreciated.

Remember these people are our neighbors. Our local entrepreneurs have continued to create new employment opportunities without the assistance of federally funded taxpayers’ stimulus dollars. They work long hours, pay taxes and provide local employment. If we

don’t patronize our local restaurants to shop and eat, they don’t eat either.

Please join me and your neighbors in continuing to support all Blank Slate Media newspapers, including the Great Neck News, New Hyde Park Herald Courier, Manhasset Times, Roslyn Times, Williston Times and Port Washington Times. Patronize their restaurant advertisers; they provide the necessary revenues to help keep them in business. Let them know you saw their ad.

Larry Penner Great Neck

Voter suppression ongoing

Nassau County Board of Elections has been violating New York State election laws on an ongoing basis. At least since August 2022, if not earlier.

It has been reported that as recently as Saturday, Nov. 5, at the early voting site at Great Neck House, a voter was asked if she had a “card” to vote. A week earlier on Saturday, Oct. 29, many voters were wrongfully asked their “date of birth.” This practice violates the rights of New Yorkers to cast their vote.

During the Democratic primary in

August, voters were also asked their date of birth. The Nassau County Board of Elections confirmed that poll workers were trained over the last two years to ask voters for their date of birth. This is indeed against New York State law. One voter was even refused a ballot when she would not provide her date of birth.

This type of voter disenfranchisement should not be tolerated. I understand this has been reported to Nassau County Board of Elections and they said they would tell their poll workers that they are not permitted to do this, yet this

practice persists.

There is NO voter I.D. law in New York State and poll workers are NOT permitted to ask for your ID, except in very limited circumstances.

Why is the Nassau County Board of Elections continuing this illegal practice?

When you cast your ballot on Tuesday, Nov. 8, remain vigilant and know your rights.

Carl Schweitzer Great Neck

First they came for our books, now our votes

Like many Great Neck residents, I watched in horror over the past few weeks as our beloved library was defamed and dragged through the mud.

The supporters of Jessica Hughes, Christina Rusu, and Sara Rivka Khodadadian repeatedly shared inflammatory screenshots of books in our library, branding them as pornographic.

These are award-winning books carefully selected by professional, highly trained librarians. They accused the library of showing pornography to children.

Worse yet, they accused the opposing candidates of showing porn to children, calling for these candidates’ arrests and calling them pedophiles.

These supporters walked through our library, taking photos of books, photos they would use in lurid, creepy videos aimed at scaring the community.

I can only imagine what our librarians were thinking if they witnessed this. Imagine being a librarian and being accused of giving pornography to children.

As a writer myself, I was absolutely horrified. The words I write come from my heart and soul. Some are deeply personal. The work of

writers is to share their truth, and by doing so, make others feel less alone.

The vast majority of the books targeted by these candidates’ supporters dealt with LGBTQ issues and spoke directly to children and teens wrestling with their gender and sexuality. These children deserve to have a voice that speaks to them or for them.

By targeting these books, these candidates’ supporters were targeting these children and the LGBTQ community as a whole. This is completely unacceptable.

When Hughes was asked—repeatedly, by multiple people—to denounce these hateful attacks, she deflected.

She assured the public that she was against book banning, but she had nothing to say about the vile, dangerous, disgusting, hateful accusations against our libraries, our librarians, their fellow candidates, and the LGBTQ community in Great Neck.

That’s where we were on Oct. 31, when the election was held.

Finally, those of us who were shocked and disgusted by these hateful attacks could make our voices heard. That’s what elections are for. Like literature, elections are a chance for people

to speak their truth and have their feelings and opinions heard.

In this case, however, as many of you likely know, the counting has stopped. Our voices have been silenced.

On election night, the in-person votes were counted first, and Hughes, Rusu, and Khodadadian had a slight lead. But that night, it became clear that opening the absentee ballots was not going to be a simple task.

Within days, Hughes halted the counting, insisting that the absentee ballots were tainted with “voter fraud,” and that she needed to obtain expert counsel. Of over 330 absentee ballots, more than 50 still haven’t been opened.

This isn’t about who wins or loses (although one assumes these candidates would only stop the count if they feared they were losing). No: this is about making sure that every vote is counted, that every voice is heard. Do the candidates really believe that many of us in this community are voting fraudulently?

We will not be silenced. We will not be falsely accused. Open the ballots. Don’t tie up our votes in unnecessary litigation. Count our votes. now..

Wisner Great Neck

Wendy

Business

Survey on what’s happening in L.I. market

I am devoting a portion of this week’s column to ascertaining what purchasers, sellers, and investors’ concerns are in our local Long Island market.

The following are choices in determining how you would rate your concerns about the current real estate market and where you might place your money whether you choose to stay put where you are, go into a rental, or consider moving out of the area to a lower priced location or state or lastly to buy an investment property for cash flow. Choose the top 4 in the order of most to least in importance to you:

1.) Interest rates 2.) Lack of inventory to choose from 3.) Rental prices 4.) Staying in place and saving more f or a down payment

5.) Fear of purchasing at the height of the market

6.) What is your biggest concern right now:

A.) Buying your primary home

B.) Buying an investment property for cash flow

C.) Investing in the stock market

I would hope my readers will respond and provide me and other readers with a view of the pulse of our local market in a future column. So please email them back

to me at phil@turnkeyrealestate.com in the order that you feel is most concerning in either buying, selling or investing.

Real estate is considered more of a local event. What happens here on Long Island can be much different compared with Down South, Middle America, and Out West, and can have varying degrees of the strength and weakness of their particular markets. As an example, inventory in San Francisco increased 32% year over year in June as per Realtor.com. Los Angeles Metro Area saw housing inventory slightly accelerate with September price increases of 2.7% year over year, but 2% lower from August 2022. Sales in Los Angeles County contracted 31.7% year over year.

Due to the excessive increases in interest rates, Nevada, Colorado and Texas have seen much slower sales contributing to increased inventory year over year and the slowing of the market for new homes. Moreover, due to higher costs of construction and supply chain issues, developers have also pulled back. Having déjà vu of 2008, they have pulled back due to the fear of getting stuck with unsold homes with looming memories of the past.

In Long Island, however, there aren’t as many areas where land is readily available to build new homes, so inventory is much more restricted and will take many

RAICES

Real Estate Watch

years to reach normal levels of six to seven months. Due to the still fairly strong demand, the median sale price of homes sold on Long Island in the third quarter hit a record of $620,000 as per the Multiple Listing Service. This was a 6% increase year over year.

Available inventory is still at 3.1 months, meaning it would only take that long to sell all the available homes currently on the market. Listing inventory fell 6% compared to 2021 and sales fell 16% compared to the same time period. Those

who had prior lower interest rate commitments were fortunate and lucky with their timing and purchases.

Most important, Suffolk County had established a Land Trust, which was the first in the nation, and New York State has been securing and purchasing more and more farmland to keep as protected nonbuildable spaces; and for the last 40 years up until 2018 Suffolk had acquired or restricted 10,000 acres of farmland from doing any residential construction.

With inventory as tight as it is and the lack of buildable land, many are knocking down homes to build new ones. Prices therefore will not crash but may moderate as interest rates increase again and this may dampen demand in the fourth quarter, especially for investors who are most concerned with the return on investment.

The continued demand from millennials and Gen Zs for those whose incomes have increased and those Baby Boomers who want or need to downsize and are able to stay local may just keep our market going through 2023.

But realistically with all that is occurring, with inflation, energy issues, supplies of goods and services, and the continued war in Ukraine, the results of our midterm elections will determine the future effect on our economy. It is unknown what future domestic and world events might af-

fect and deter buyers and sellers; it’s all a guessing game and prognostication. Some will be right and many will be wrong, but we’ll hope and pray for the best outcome.

Veterans Day is Friday and we should remember their sacrifices and always thank them for the freedom and life that they have allowed us to live in the U.S. Continue to Donate to the Ukrainian Crisis and save a life or 2:

IOM’s Ukraine Response

OR The International Organization for Migration a 501(c) 3 Corporation: OR:http://donate.iom.int

Philip A. Raices is the owner/Broker of Turn Key Real Estate at 3 Grace Ave Suite 180 in Great Neck. He has 40 years of experience in the Real Estate industry and has earned designations as a Graduate of the Realtor Institute (G.R.I.) and also as a Certified International Property Specialist (C.I.P.S) as well as the new “Green Industry” Certification for eco-friendly construction and upgrades. For a “FREE” 15-minute consultation, value analysis of your home, or to answer any of your questions or concerns he can be reached by cell: (516) 647-4289 or by email: Phil@TurnKeyRealEstate.Com or via https://WWW.TurnKeyRealEstate.Com Just email or snail mail (regular mail) him with your ideas or suggestions on future columns with your name, email and cell number and he will call or email you back.

WHAT IS THE DARK WEB?

The Dark Web is an intentionally hidden world where cyber criminals access illegal information, goods and services. Hackers trade in stolen passwords, identities and other exposed vulnerabilities to wreak havoc on the legitimate internet, spreading viruses, ransomware and the like.

Sandwire monitors clients’ domains 24/7/365 with human and machine-powered protection of domains, IP addresses and email addresses. We uncover compromised credentials in Dark Web markets, data dumps and other sources, and sound the alert quickly!

Our clients gain the advantage over the cybercriminals by updating access to passwords and using MFA, multi-factor authentication, to preserve the privacy of sensitive data.

Business&RealEstate

Northwell Health has appointed Dr. Eric Cruzen,to senior vice president and executive director of the Emergency Medicine service line.

As head of the service line, Cruzen will be responsible for operations at the 17 emergency departments within Northwell Health, the system’s extensive ambulance fleet and have medical oversight over Northwell Health-GoHealth Urgent Care’s 51 locations.

Cruzen has held several leadership positions since joining the health system in 2003 as associate director of the South Shore University Hospital Emergency Department.

As founding chair of the Department of Emergency Medicine at Lenox Health Greenwich Village in 2014, he led the development of innovative models of emergency care and oversaw quality and the delivery of critical services.

In 2021, Cruzen moved into a new role as vice president in charge of the newly-formed Integrated Solutions division of Northwell.

In this role, he leads a multidisciplinary team of software archi-

tects, data scientists and medical informaticists to create innovative solutions to complex problems in the space where technology and medicine interest.

He is the primary inventor of the patented software that used real-time data during the first wave

of the COVID-19 pandemic to assist with the urgent transfer of patients between system hospitals to help with the effective management of patient capacity.

“We are delighted that Cruzen will be assuming this leadership position within the Emergency

Medicine service line,” said Dr. Jill Kalman, Northwell’s senior vice president, chief medical officer and deputy physician-in-chief. “Since joining the health system almost 20 years ago, Dr. Cruzen has held several important leadership positions at various locations and has been a leader in developing important new models of emergency care. Dr. Cruzen is a leader in pioneering real time actionable data utilized by our front-line providers and our whole system that allows the highest quality and efficient care of our patients. We are confident that our Emergency Medicine service line will continue to expand under his leadership.”

Cruzen is a graduate of the integrated six-year BA/MD program at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. After completing a residency in Emergency Medicine in Orlando, Fla., he worked all over the United States as a physician in the U.S. Army Reserve before joining Northwell.

A graduate of the Zarb MBA program at Hofstra University, Cruzen also serves as an associate

professor of Emergency Medicine at the Donald and Barbara Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra/ Northwell.

In recognition of his many accomplishments, Cruzen is the recipient of many honors and prizes. In 2017, former Mayor Bill DiBlasio and the New York City Council presented a proclamation honoring Cruzen for the work he performed during the Chelsea bombing attack.

In 2019, he was named Physician of the Year at Lenox Health Greenwich Village; in 2019, he was presented with the President’s Award, Northwell Health’s highest honor.

“It’s a great honor for me to assume this new role within the emergency medicine service line,” said Cruzen. “What we were able to achieve during the COVID pandemic serves to illustrate the strength and courage of our emergency medicine staff. I look forward to continuing my work with all of these dedicated professionals so that together we can advance the quality of care we provide to all the patients we serve.”

Stephen J. Silverberg has announced that the Law Office of Stephen J. Silverberg has been named to the U.S. News — Best Law Firm list for 2023.

This is the eighth year the Roslyn Heights Elder Law firm has been recognized for its professional excellence.

The U.S. News – Best Lawyers® “Best Law Firms” rankings are based on a rigorous evaluation process that includes the collection of client and lawyer evaluations, peer review from leading attorneys and review of additional information provided by law firms as part of the formal submission process. In addition to information from these surveys, the 2023 rankings incorporate 12.2 million evaluations of more than 115,00 individual leading lawyers from more than 22,000 firms.

The 2023 “Best Law Firm” rankings feature law firms that have demonstrated consistently impressive performance ratings by clients and peers. The process addresses expertise, responsiveness, in-depth under-

standing of business, integrity, cost-effectiveness, civility, and positive referrals.

The “Best Law Firm” distinction follows Silverberg’s Best Lawyers 2022 accolade, presented by U. S. News–Best Lawyers of America for his dedication in protecting the rights of seniors and their families and disabled individuals.

Silverberg is a nationally recognized leader in the areas of estate and tax planning, estate and trust administration, asset preservation planning, and Elder Law. He is past president of the prestigious National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys.

In 2003 he was named a NAELA Fellow, the highest honor bestowed by NAELA to “attorneys…. whose careers concentrate on Elder Law, and who have distinguished themselves both by making exceptional contributions to meeting the needs of older Americans and by demonstrating a commitment to the Academy.” Silverberg is also a former President and is a member of the New York State chapter of NAELA.

PHOTO PROVIDED BY NORTHWELL HEALTH

Dr. Eric Cruzen

Sillitti blasts Jha for ‘hateful’ talk in Twitter tweets

Continued from Page 12

Another tweet from Dec. 28, 2020, said: “The ‘asylum’ racket for US immigration by Sikhs is real — it must be exposed. Those fake asylum seeks are ‘required to’ stand and protest ANY thing against India!”

Jha, who is a Hindu from India, has since apologized and deleted the posts.

“My goals and priorities in life are focused on bringing people together and celebrating diversity,” he told Newsday. “What’s more, I am focused on supporting different views and perspectives.”

Nassau GOP spokesman Mike Deery said in a statement that the party strongly opposes hate-fueled language.

“We are united with Muslim and Sikh communities who have been the subject

of disgusting, uninformed and hateful tweets,” he said.

“The Nassau County Republican Committee condemns this ugly display in the strongest possible terms.”

Sillitti also denounced Jha’s tweets in a statement and emphasized that one’s words matter.

“While I appreciate the GOP denouncing hateful rhetoric,” she said. “Just days after what he said was brought to light, they featured my opponent on stage at their rally Monday and proudly announced him. How disappointing.”

Assembly District 16 comprises Great Neck, Manhasset, Port Washington, Herricks, Mineola, Baxter Estates, parts of East Williston, Old Westbury, Roslyn Estates, Roslyn, Albertson, Williston Park and New Hyde Park.

Bethpage Turkey Drive for Island Harvest Food Bank

With Inflation at a 40-year high, grocery store food costs are up over 11%; the average cost of a Thanksgiving dinner for ten is 12.6% higher than last year

Now in its 14th year, the Bethpage Turkey Drive to benefit Island Harvest Food Bank will take place on Friday, Nov. 18, from 7:30 AM to 5:30 PM.

The annual drive, which kicks off the holiday food drive season on Long Island, will include a no-contact donation car drive-through which will enable community residents to remain in their cars while volunteers remove donations from the vehicles.

Long Islanders are asked to donate frozen turkeys, nonperishable food items, supermarket gift cards or monetary donations. These donations will go directly to Island Harvest, which will help supply Thanksgiving meals to the more than 300,000 food-insecure Long Islanders through its distribution network of over 400 food pantries, soup kitchens, and other feeding programs on Long Island. Non-perishable food items needed include canned goods, cereal, pasta, rice, boxed juices, and shelf-stable milk (please, no glass containers).

The Bethpage Turkey Drive will take place at Bethpage Federal Credit Union’s headquarters located at 899 South Oyster Bay Road in Bethpage.

For those unable to make an on-site donation on Nov. 18, most Bethpage branch locations are accepting nonperishable food items from November 1 through Nov. 18 with the exception of the Bay Shore King Kullen and Chelsea, NYC branches.

Or, if you would rather show your support online, Bethpage is accepting online monetary donations at https:// bit.ly/3zDUzyu from November 1 through November 30, 2022. Every gift of $35 will help sup-

port a holiday meal for your Long Island neighbors.

“Bethpage is a proud, longtime partner and supporter of Island Harvest and its mission to help end hunger on Long Island,” said Linda Armyn, chief strategy & marketing officer. “I encourage everyone to join us this year by making a donation in whatever form and amount you can. With your help, we will make a difference.”

“So many of our neighbors on Long Island are a paycheck away from disaster, and record inflation and high grocery prices are putting additional burden on families struggling to put food on their tables,” said Randi Shubin Dresner,

president & CEO, Island Harvest. “Fortunately, we have a longtime, valued partner in Bethpage Federal Credit Union helping us provide much-needed supplemental food support to the most vulnerable among us. Their ongoing support and generosity are invaluable in our mission to end hunger and reduce food waste on Long Island.”

Patches will be given to all Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts who make a donation. Troop leaders can make a donation on behalf of troop members, and bring back patches for the entire troop.

Since the first Bethpage Turkey Drive was organized in 2009, hundreds of community volunteers have come out to assist in the collection of more than 42,000 turkeys and over 179,000 pounds of food, which were then given to Long Island families facing hardship in time for the holidays. Island Harvest Food Bank has seen an increase in the requests for food and support services among the 400 community-based agencies it serves.

About 70,000 individuals receive food assistance from the Island Harvest Food Bank network each week.

EAC to host Building Bridges Gala on Nov. 17

November 2022. EAC Network will host the Building Bridging Gala on November 17th, 2022, at the Garden City Hotel from 5:30 to 10:30 p.m.

The Building Bridge Gala raises critically needed dollars to help fund EAC’s 114 programs that help people in Suffolk, Nassau Counties and throughout the NYC area.

The EAC Network and the highly trained and dedicated staff protect children from sexual abuse, feed and care for our seniors, work with NYC DA’s and the problem-solving court system to provide an alternative to incarceration by getting people into substance abuse, mental health treatment instead of losing New Yorkers in the forever revolving door of the criminal justice system.

The Richmond County District Attorney, Michael McMahon, agrees and will be the keynote speaker. Kristin Thorne,

investigative news reporter from WABC-TV New York, will be the Mistress of Ceremony.

The district attorney’s office collaborates with EAC through the Alternative to Incarceration programs (ATI) to keep communities safe. Michael McMahon declared: “To achieve true public safety we must go upstream to address the root causes of criminal behavior. While every facet of our society has a role to play in this mission, we are in a unique position to help these vulner-

able and potentially dangerous individuals before they harm themselves or someone else. This essential and tremendously difficult task would never be possible without EAC, and I am honored to join them at their Building Bridges Gala.”

“I’m proud to lend my voice to an organization that helps so many of my fellow New Yorkers,” stated Kristin Thorne who continues to say: “It seems nearly impossible that EAC helps as many people as they do, but they really do,

and I’m happy to do anything to help them in that mission.”

“Join us at the Building Bridges Gala on Nov. 17, 2022”, said Neela Mukherjee Lockel President and CEO of EAC Network. “We invite you to be one of the pillars of the Bridges bringing stability and strength to the community and helping those going through the challenges of the moment.”

John Bruseleilins, a substance abuse survivor who joined EAC’s treatment program said: “EAC is the place to be, I would recommend it to anyone who needs help.”

The Building Bridges Gala will showcase the impact of our work and bring together supporters and community partners. We are honored and grateful to have a diverse group of sponsors, led by PSEG as our Empower sponsor, and National Grid and Arthur J. Gallagher as our Families sponsors.

Errors fixed, town board OKs budget, 5% tax cut

Democrat Councilwoman Mariann Dalimonte.

The amended budget, known as the prelimi nary budget, did not accurately line up, Dali monte said during the Nov. 3 budget meeting.

One of the line items in the tentative budget included a $25,000 diference in the tax levy for the Harbor Hills tax levy.

Lurvey said in a statement DeSena’s 11% tax cut was “too extreme” and that the adopted bud get allows the Town to be better prepared for uncertain economic conditions.

“I know how hard our residents work and that they deserve the very best services possible. It is our responsibility to deliver quality services

to our residents, and I am proud that this budget does so in an efcient and efective way – while still cutting taxes 5 percent. With this budget, we are now better positioned to weather an un certain economic future,” Lurvey said.

“The supervisor’s plan was too extreme be cause it would have manufactured a future fs cal crisis for the Town. We could not allow her to put the Town in a fnancial hole with her ir responsible proposals. All budget modifcations we made were approved unanimously and were in line with reasonable projections of revenues and expenses — this is a smart, balanced bud get.”

Lurvey said the amendments she put for

ward were voted on unanimously in response to DeSena’s budget statement.

“Lest we forget, we have a supervisor who opposes items for the sake of opposing, yet she voted both in favor of my amendments and the amended budget. As did the entire Town Board — the budget was passed unanimously today, so what are we even debating?” said Lurvey. “Our residents have had enough of the supervisor’s political posturing. Thank goodness we were able to move forward and protect the progress that’s been made at the Town over the past sev eral years.”

This year’s tentative budget was put togeth er without a town comptroller, a position that

has been vacant since at least January.

Paul Wood, director of fnance for the Ofce of the Supervisor, has been the acting comptrol ler. Additional employees on the budget team include deputy Supervisor Joe Scalero, acting Deputy Comptroller Sharon Glassman and Di rector of Governmental Research Steven Pollack.

The Town Board, which votes on person nel resolutions to appoint town employees, has been interviewing candidates for the job. The job was ofered to at least one person, who turned it down, the deputy supervisor said at a previous town board meeting.

A previous version of this article was pub lished. It has since been updated.

Capt. accused of raping cadet surrenders license

chased “a lot of alcohol,” according to Hicks. She said she was pressured to drink alcohol by older men and supervisors on the ship.

Hicks said her male sea partner enjoyed drinking and she felt an additional pressure to ft in, despite not having had any alco hol prior to arriving at the academy. As she continued drinking, the cadet said, her sea partner became sick and was taken back to his room.

Hicks said she blacked out shortly after taking roughly an other eight to 10 shots of alcohol. The next morning, she woke up naked in her bed with a massive hangover and noticed blood on her sheets.

“I knew immediately that I had been raped,” she said. “I was a virgin and had been saving myself, and as soon as I woke up I could feel that I was very sore and knew exactly what had hap pened.”

The second complaint was fled by another female cadet, un der the alias “Midshipman-Y,” who said she was warned by anoth

er female cadet who completed work on the Alliance Fairfax ship that the nearly all-male crew was flled with “creepy” individuals.

The cadet warned Midshipman-Y, who was 18 at the time, that she should not work out in the presence of men, refrain from wearing shorts and engage in any behavior that men could misin terpret as “provocative,” according to the complainant.

Midshipman-Y, in the complaint, said she endured unwanted sexual touching and advances along with sexualized jokes. Her experience was so harmful to her that she said she began to sleep in the bathroom clutching a knife. The bathroom, she said, had the only door that could not be unlocked by other crew members who had master keys.

Midshipman-Y’s direct supervisor, the chief mate, allegedly treated her worse than other male counterparts, constantly belit tling her and made her do tasks outside of her job description, according to the complaint.

The chief mate’s alleged discriminatory behavior became too much for her to deal with, she said, and she feared the harass ment would continue until she was eventually raped. The mid

shipman requested an emergency evacuation. Maersk’s designat ed person ashore allegedly told her “this can’t keep happening,” once she informed them of her evacuation request.

The midshipman said she endured panic attacks and sufered “debilitating emotional distress” as a result of the harassment and ultimately took a leave of absence from the academy in Kings Point. She had not returned to the academy as of Tuesday and said she is unsure if she ever will be able to, according to the complaint.

The allegations from the cadets are not the only ones the academy has faced over the years. In June 2016, former Depart ment of Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx suspended the Sea Year program after allegations of sexual harassment, assault, hazing and bullying.

Four years later, the Department of Justice agreed to a $1.4 million settlement with a former male member of the academy’s soccer team. The man, whose name was not disclosed, alleged he was hazed and sexually assaulted at the academy in 2016.

Lurvey blasts DeSena project press conference

delayed “that would be kickstarted by this infu sion of funds, projects that represented tangible benefts to our residents Town-wide. There was no stipulation dictating Board involvement prior to submission. As with any spending item, the Board weighs in when it comes before them.”

“At this point, to allocate it to something other than what the Treasury Department ap proved would probably require further conver sations with the Treasury,” Devine said in an earlier email to Blank Slate Media.

During the March 31 town board meeting, the board unanimously approved a resolution accepting funding from the American Rescue Plan Act in the amount of $10,114,021.27 to be received in two installments in the summers of 2021 and 2022.

The board also unanimously voted on a transfer of $445,919 in American Rescue Plan Act funding to the Port Washington Public Park ing District after it was found that the district lost revenue in 2021 due to decreased commut er activity from the COVID-19 pandemic during the Oct. 13.

The state Comptroller’s Ofce is tasked with disbursing federal funds to eligible cities, towns and villages within New York.

Of the $10.1 million the town has received thus far, about $1 million has been used, the su pervisor’s ofce said.

Manhasset Chamber of Commerce Co-Presi dent Matt Donno hailed the money allocated to the Plandome Road to convert the private septic tanks of businesses to a public sewer system.

Earlier this year, state ofcials announced $5 million in state funds would be allocated to

the project, which has been championed by the chamber.

“This is a project that has long been over due,” Donno told Newsday. “This $3 million will help pay for the completion of the project along with pump systems for all the stores.”

Donno said businesses along Plandome Road can pay as much as $50,000 to $70,000 annually to pump their septic systems.

Along with the Town’s eforts to replace the sidewalks, the county has also committed to re paving the 100-year-old roadway on Westbury Avenue, essentially giving Carle Place a “brandnew downtown,” DeSena said last week.

“Both my ofce and the Nassau County De partment of Public Works have been working on the revitalization of Westbury Avenue for years. Unfortunately, the prior administration in the Town of North Hempstead refused to rebuild the

sidewalks,” Schaefer said in Carle Place. “Today, I joined Supervisor Jen DeSena and County Ex ecutive Blakeman to announce the Town’s com mitment to providing $2 million of ARPA fund ing towards this project so that the road can be repaved, and the sidewalks can be rebuilt!”

The American Rescue Plan received no votes in favor by Republicans either in the House or the Senate where Vice President Kamala Harris cast her frst tie-breaking vote.

Blakeman and Schaefer are both registered Republicans. DeSena ran on the Republican line when running for North Hempstead town super visor and has since endorsed George DevolderSantos in his run for Congress in the 3rd Con gressional District.

A previous version of this article was pub lished. It has since been updated.

Roslyn boy, 10, raises $3K for cancer awareness

though we had COVID-19, which was the amaz ing thing,” she said. “I almost canceled my ap pointment because I didn’t want to go to the doctor. And thank God I didn’t because I caught it early enough.”

Now, two years in, Max has raised over $5,000. He said he has no reason or plans to stop his work now.

“It’s crazy to think that if I didn’t do it this year, then none of this would have happened,” he said. “But I’ve spread so much more aware ness and raised so much more money than I did last year. And next year, I’ll look forward to doing it again and again and again until I feel like I’m satisfed with my work, which will never happen.”

Max wouldn’t say what he plans to do next year, but he hinted it will have something to do

with cell phones. (He clarifed he will not be sell ing cell phones.)

In the meantime, he encourages donations to any breast cancer charity of one’s choice. He also pleaded with those facing tough challenges to never give up.

“Don’t ever think to yourself that you can’t do something to help others with something that you hated,” he said. “I hated what my mom had to go through. So I wanted to help others so that

it’s easier for them to get through it than it was with us. Because in life that will happen, but you have to conquer it and make it better.”

Max plans to donate a check to Northwell Health this week.

One can make donations to Max Out For Pink to help fund next year’s project by visiting @maxout_for_pink on Instagram, donating to @Maxoutforpink on Venmo or emailing maxout forpink@gmail.com.

property taxes.

The diocese alerted North Hempstead Receiver of Taxes Charles Berman, who said tax rates will be affected after corrections are made. Berman also informed the county of the mistake once he was made aware of it.

“There’s $16.7 million of market value that

was put on the tax rolls that doesn’t belong there,” Berman said in a statement. “That’s going to be taken off, so that impacts all the tax rates.”

Berman said the parish, located at 45 Mayfair Rd., sold a single-family home on its property for $630,000, which is what the county should have removed the tax exemption for

rather than the entire property.

“I’ve never seen an error on a wholly exempt property like this where they just removed the exemption before the tax warrant goes out,” Berman said.

Sean Dolan, spokesman for the diocese, told Newsday they were thankful the county and the town of North Hempstead acted swiftly to rem-

edy the problem.

“The Parish of Notre Dame in New Hyde Park acknowledges this is simply an error and is grateful to the county Assessor and Town of North Hempstead receiver of taxes for their prompt attention to this matter,” Dolan said in a statement.

Hughes, Rusu file election complaint

Continued from Page 2

in Great Neck. They want to block the counting of the perfectly legitimate and well-known process of mail-in ballots.”

“If the legitimate ballots are counted, I’ll win and Mimi and Kim will have made up the difference,” Lancman said.

Hughes and Rusu, in a joint statement, said their opponents have made several false statements regarding the challenges since the election took place and that they want an independent arbiter to verify the mail-in ballots submitted.

They also said none of the challenges made were based on racial or ethnic grounds.

“Both sides have challenged the proxy ballots,” the statement said. “All challenges were applied in a consistent manner that had nothing to do with voter names or personal information. Allegations of racial or ethnic discrimination in the challenges are unseemly at best and defamatory at worst.”

The challenges made by the two included ballots that had non-original signatures or no signature at all, incorrect dates and

handwritten or no time stamps, according to court documents.

“We believe every vote counts,” Hughes and Rusu said. “We also know that the process needs to be vigorously defended so that no voter feels disenfranchised. We will not stand down nor be bullied into silence.”

A petition to immediately count all of the votes has circulated throughout the Great Neck community, receiving more than 1,000 signatures.

Peninsula resident Sabine Margolis started the petition and criticized Hughes and Rusu for launching the legal complaint against the library and other candidates in the election.

“It is sad to see that candidates Hughes and Rusu, who vowed to be stewards of the library and our community, have resorted to bleeding out its funds in an unfounded lawsuit,” the petition reads.

The race has been reflective of the national culture wars, centered on banning or restricting books, primarily related to LGBTQ.

Hu said the placement of certain books is at the discretion of

library professionals, touted the importance of “intellectual freedom” and said she is against banning books.

Hughes said the question did not center around censorship, but rather promoting “divisive and exclusionary” content. Library officials, she said, should respond to parental input so they can best serve their community.

Rusu said coming from a communist country gave her an insight into what censorship is and said she does not believe in banning books.

Lancman, a former state Assemblyman and New York City councilman who said he is running to oppose a national trend to pull books from library shelves for political reasons, also said banning books has “no place” in Great Neck and that no library should be restricting content to individuals because it may make them feel uncomfortable.

The library district stretches from the Great Neck peninsula to North New Hyde Park and is comprised of the Main Library on Bayview Avenue along with the Lakeville, Parkville and Station branches.

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Town hosts senior Halloween dances

Town of North Hempstead Supervisor Jennifer DeSena, along with Council Members Peter Zuckerman, Dennis Walsh, Veronica Lurvey, and Mariann Dalimonte celebrated the spooky holiday at the Town’s annual senior Halloween Dances.

Festivities were held at Fuschillo Park and Clinton G. Martin Park in New Hyde Park on Oct. 21 and 28. Hundreds of senior residents dressed up in costumes and celebrated Halloween with food, music, and games.

Town hosts Howl-O-Ween

Town of North Hempstead Supervisor Jennifer DeSena, along with Council Members Peter Zuckerman, Veronica Lurvey, and Mariann Dalimonte joined residents and their dogs for the Town’s annual Howl-O-Ween event on Saturday, Oct. 22 at the Michael J. Tully Dog Park.

Hundreds of residents from across the Town attended the event and competed to win the title of best dog costume and best dog/owner duo. The event included local vendors, live music, a photobooth, and of course dog treats.

Honor Flight reunion of vets

Long Island Reach donates backpacks

In a continuing effort to support the youth of Long Island communities, Long Island Reach, a multi-service agency providing a broad range of rehabilitative and treatment services to youth and their families, donated 32 backpacks to 32 families in need.

The backpacks, which were filled with various age and grade-appropriate supplies, were delivered directly to families in need in the towns of Long Beach, Franklin Square and Port Washington as well as to Long Island Reach’s teen

pregnancy alternative school program.

Long Island Reach looks to enrich the lives of children across Long Island and strives to make a difference in any way they can.

The contribution efforts coordinated by Long Island Reach’s board members, staff, and community residents occurred in September for the new school year. Each of the recipient families and children were grateful for the help during these difficult and challenging times.

American Airpower Museum will host an Honor Flight Long Island Reunion on Dec. 3, to celebrate one WWII, 22 Korean and 27 Vietnam War veterans who took an early-morning flight to Washington, D.C. on Sept. 23.

The veterans visited their military memorials, commiserated with fellow veterans and exchanged stories. Honor Flight’s mission is to honor fellow Long Islanders who served in the Armed Forces of the United States by providing free, one-day Washington, D.C. trips for veterans.

Thanks to HFLI, these veterans took a free, early-morning Southwest flight to Washington, D.C. They departed from Islip MacArthur Airport at 8:20 a.m., to visit the WWII, Kore-

an and Vietnam War Memorials, plus Arlington National Cemetery and the Changing of the Guard.

They returned to Islip later that evening at 10:50 p.m. for a rousing welcome by the Saffron United Bagpipe Band plus thunderous applause from hundreds of family, friends and supporters!

On Dec. 3 the museum opens at 10:30 a.m. and the reunion is from 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. at AAM’s Hangar 3, 1230 New Highway, Farmingdale.

Admission for the veterans, their guardians and families, is free. The public is also invited to attend free of charge if they arrive between 10:30 a.m. and 12:00 p.m. After 12:00 p.m.,

regular museum admission for adults is $15, seniors and veterans is $12, kids ages 5-12 is $10.

Come and cheer these veterans during our “Ceremony of Honors,” as they receive personalized Tribute Journals full of photos taken during their Washington, D.C. trip. This great patriotic event includes speeches by HFLI President Bill Jones and AAM President and Founder Jeff Clyman.

The U.S. Coast Guard Auxiliary Flotilla Band will play a patriotic medley known as the “Armed Forces Salute,” featuring five official melodies of the U.S. Armed Forces: Army, Marine Corps, Navy, Air Force and Coast Guard. Free refreshments will be provided by HFLI.

BY BRANDON DUFFY

Laura Parker Russo, the Herricks teacher who was charged with illegally giving a COVID-19 vaccine to a 17-year-old friend of her son has been fired.

The termination came after a state-appointed hearing officer found in favor of the district to remove Russo in a statement that does not mention her by name. It was read by Herricks Board of Education President Jim Gounaris during the Oct. 20 meeting.

“During the 2021 – 2022 school year, the Herricks School District received information about an employee engaging in behavior outside of school that put the safety of a minor at risk. The board, in partnership with the district leadership team, took swift action to investigate the allegations,” the statement said.

“Once confirmed, the staff member was removed from the classroom to ensure the safety of our students and the district thereupon took the necessary steps to initiate the Education Law Section 3020 — a process seeking termination of employment. The district was notified earlier this week that the hearing officer found in favor of the district and directed that the employee be terminated The Board will implement the decision of the hearing officer pursuant to a formal board resolution wherein such employee is terminated.”

Russo told Newsday that actions taken against her were unjustified.

“What I did was an egregious lapse of judgment that I deeply regret, but I did it to help a young man not to harm him,” Russo said.

Nassau County detectives said in January after her arrest that they were alerted by the teenager’s mother after he returned home from Russo’s Sea Cliff residence. The youth had allegedly gone to her home and was administered an injection by Russo, to which the mother had not consented.

Russo was charged with the unauthorized prac-

tice of a profession, a class E felony.

In a video obtained by NBC 4 New York, Russo is seen injecting a male with a COVID-19 vaccine. The male’s identity was covered in the video.

After an investigation, it was determined that Russo was neither a medical professional nor authorized to administer vaccines.

Russo was removed from the classroom following the incident.

According to the district’s website, Russo taught biology at Herricks High School in New Hyde Park. Her page was removed from the high school’s teacher directory following the arrest.

PHOTO COURTESY OF HERRICKS PUBLIC SCHOOLS

Nassau County Police charged Herricks High School teacher Laura Parker Russo with giving a 17-year-old male a COVID-19 vaccination shot at he Sea Cliff home.

Sports

Port girls tennis wins L.I., loses state title

The Schreiber girls tennis team had accomplished several of its goals this fall, but came up just one win short of the ultimate accomplishment for any New York team: a state title.

After winning the Nassau County and Long Island championships last week, the Vikings advanced to the state team semifinals Friday at the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in Queens, capturing a semifinal win but falling in the title match.

In only the state team championships’ second year, Schreiber defeated Clarence, from Buffalo, 6-1, in the state semifinal to advance to the championship match against defending champ Scarsdale later Friday afternoon.

But the Vikings ran into a very powerful, undefeated opponent and could not clear the last hurdle, as Scarsdale lost only two sets in seven matches to claim a 7-0 win and the championship.

Still, it was one heck of a fall season for Schreiber.

“They were a little deeper and a little better than us today, but we have our heads up,” said Schreiber head coach Shane Helfner. “We battled, we had some close matches, but we came up just a little short.”

Neither Helfner, nor the team, expected to go this far considering the tough matches this season, including the Vikings losing three of the last four this year.

But Helfner reached back for a classic quote from the movie “A League of Their Own” to describe the joy of this journey.

“We had to fight and we had to grind, much different than in 2019 when we dominated (and won the Long Island championship,” he said. “This was hard, and like in the movie, when Jimmy said it, ‘the hard is what makes it great.’ And this was a great year for us.”

The goal all season, the Schreiber players said, was to win the Nassau ti-

tle. The hurdle that is Syosset had been there for three years, and senior Katie Kors said the team was tired of running into it and having it block the path.

Schreiber had advanced to the Nassau County team finals each of the last two years, and each time fall short against traditional power Syosset.

No matter what happened in the regular season, as the rivals traded wins over each other, at the ultimate pressure stage the Braves would top the Vikings.

“It was something we talked about

from the start of the season, finally beating them,” Kors said this week. “We seniors wanted it really really bad.”

On Oct. 25 at Eisenhower Park, the Vikings broke through.

Trailing 3-1 in the best of seven match, Schreiber came back and won the final three matches, with eighthgrader Evie Loewy providing the winning margin at third singles, scoring a 4-6, 6-1, 6-0 triumph.

“I knew once everyone came over to (my court) and watching, that it must be tied,” Loewy said. “And then when I won, everyone ran on the court and was screaming and hugging me.”

“That was beautiful, what she did and how poised she was,” said senior Dasha Perfiliev. “She doesn’t play like an 8th-grader.”

The screaming and hugging didn’t stop there for Schreiber, which went 12-5 in team matches this season.

Fresh off winning the Nassau crown, the Vikings crushed Suffolk champ Harborfields on Nov. 1, 6-1, to advance to the Division I state team championships that were played Friday at the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center.

It hasn’t been a dominant season for Schreiber, with five losses, but the team has gelled at the right time. With a mix of eight seniors and two eighth graders among 20 players on the roster (Loewy, who was on the team last year

as well, and Christiana Kent, who plays third doubles are the middle-schoolers), Schreiber’s chemistry has been perfect.

Once again this season two outstanding seniors at the top of the lineup have led the way: No. 1 singles player Perfiliev, headed to play college tennis at Stony Brook, and No. 2 Ellie Ross, have set the pace.

Perfiliev and Ross have had quite the wild swing of emotions the past 10 days: After helping win the Nassau title, the two good friends went to Schenectady to try to defend their state doubles championship they won in 2021.

On Oct. 30 Perfiliev and Ross reached the championship match against Byram Hills and snared the first set, but couldn’t quite repeat and lost in a three-set thriller.

“We definitely felt some pressure as defending champs, and it was hard to come so close to winning again and not be able to do it,” Perfiliev said. “It’s tough knowing we’ll never play together again.”

But the seniors, and the rest of the Schreiber squad, made sure this season is one to remember.“I’m so proud of our team and it would be amazing to win states, because we’ve come so far,” senior doubles player Kours said before states. “But I feel like there’s no pressure on us (Friday). We won counties and Long Island and that was our big goal.

8K Championship

The 44th annual LI Division USA Track & Field 8K Championship drew a great group of runners, volunteers, sponsors, and onlookers on Oct. 23. The annual event has been a Long Island staple put on by the members of the New Hyde Park-Mineola Runners Club.

The 8K, which is almost five miles, kicked off at 8:00 a.m. at the Town of North Hempstead Clinton G. Martin Park.

This is a new venue for the event after a two-year hiatus due to the Covid pandemic. With the timely help of the Lakeville Estates Civics Association, and Town of North Hempstead Supervisor Jennifer DeSena, the race got off to a wonderful 8 a.m. start and wound its way through local roads.

The supervisor then joined approximately 200 runners for community, sport, and fitness. The 8K was preceded by a children’s fun run.

“This is exceptional LI and community event,” said Stephen Cipot and Christopher Miceli, both members of the New Hyde Park-Mineola Runners Club. “We host one of the oldest races

on Long Island, and we are one of the oldest LI running clubs. We are all volunteers and really enjoy giving back to our community. We are always striving to improve the event and have already begun planning for next year’s event. With the Town’s help we hope to be able to sponsor the USA T&F Divisional and even National 8K road race.”

The race was preceded by a com-

memoration presented by Running Club President Harold Axelrod. This year’s race was dedicated to longtime New Hyde Park resident George Erkmann who recently passed away.

Erkmann was a dedicated runner who founded the club some 46 years ago and could easily manage a 3-hour marathon. Mr. Erkman was an engineer at Sperry, which at one time was one of

LI’s largest defense contractors located on Union Turnpike and Lakeville Roads. George started a community running club and a running club at Sperry.

Runners recalled George telling a story that because Sperry was owned and overseen by the military, so he had to get permission from the military to form a Sperry running club. Prior

Colonels had said it was not possible because of liability issues and it wasn’t related to defense. As an engineer of course George had a plan and kept at it until he asked a rotating Colonel who was also a runner to cut through all the red tape—“for health and fitness,” George beamed.

George Erkmann’s spouse and four family members were honored before the start of the race.

The local American Legion post provided the color guard and kicked off the 8K race.

The first place award in all divisions was $75, second place was $50 and third place was $25. Larger awards can be offered with additional sponsorships to sweeten the pot, Cipot said. Many runners came from NHP and ad-

jacent communities.

Proceeds from the race support not only the 8K, but also the Mineola and Garden City Park Ambulance Corps, Nassau County Firefighters with the Operation Wounded Warrior Program (NCFF OWW), and local Scouts.

This year a local Girl Scout Troop pitched in as well. Scouts receive community service medals and the Runners Club donates extra proceeds back to the troops.

Over the years, the race has raised more than $35,000 for the Nassau County Firefighters, and thousands of dollars for local organizations. “The NCFF OWW provides benefits and services to wounded LI veterans above and beyond what the VA provides, including veterans living in the greater New Hyde Park, Mineola, Williston Park area,” the Runners said about the nonprofit. “We look forward to hosting the 8k and children’s run in 2023. Health, wellness, and community is what it’s all about.”

Submitted by Stephen Cipot and Christopher Miceli

PHOTO COURTESY OF L.I. TENNIS MAGAZINE

Vigilant Engine Hook, Ladder Co. wetdown

Celebrating Simchat Torah

One of the most joyous holidays in the Hebrew calendar is Simchat Torah (“Rejoicing of the Torah”).At Temple Judea this holiday was celebrated in a most traditional and very exciting, moving and pleasing way. The children of the Temple Judea’s Religious School, along with their parents and other members of the Temple were wide-eyed with delight . This celebration, with all of the joy and excitement of the holiday, contains rituals that date back thousands of years.

The main focus of Simchat Torah is reading the last sentences of Deutoronomy, which is the last book of the Torah, and immediately reading the beginning sentences of the first book, Genesis. The reading of these two portions, as explained by Rabbi Todd Chizner, is to symbolize the continuity of Torah.

A long line of tables had been set up in advance to accommodate the entire length of the Torah scroll from the beginning to the end. Rabbi Chizner came in, holding the Torah and, with the help of Cantor Deborah Jacobson and some of the congregants, began to carefully unroll the Torah along the tables, all the way to

the final words in Deuteronomy, “for all the awesome power that Moses displayed before all Israel.”

After this last portion was read, the first portion in Genesis was then read: “In the Beginning God created the heaven and the earth”.

These rituals are historic and symbolic. Jews around the world are performing this ritual exactly the same way on Simchat Torah.

After the reading of the Torah by Cantor Jacobson, and explanations by Rabbi Chizner, the congregation moved into the Sanctuary.

Everyone received a small paper flag, Torahs were taken from the ark after appropriate blessings and the ritual called “hakafot” began. With Cantor Jacobson leading the singing, the march began around the Sanctuary, with four Torah scrolls on the shoulders of members strong enough to carry them, followed by the children and all others, each holding their little flags and singing. It was truly a joyous and moving ceremony.

As is the custom, a light supper was served afterward in the ballroom.

North Hempstead Supervisor Jennifer DeSena and Council Member Veronica Lurvey attended the Vigilant Engine Hook and Ladder Co.’s wetdown ceremony on Oct. 23. The event was held to celebrate