Hello all! I would like to have been able to report that Comedy Night was a great success, but unfortunately, it was cancelled due to lack of response. Some other scheduling changes: The Adult Halloween Costume Party has also been cancelled due to scheduling conflicts and will be combined with the Kid’s Party and Movie Night on Halloween. We also rescheduled the Meet Your Neighbors Night to Saturday, November 6. Look in your bulletin for further details or call me at (718) 792 7647.
We still plan to hold our New Year’s Eve Gala with music and dancing, hosted by the great local band, Just Nuts (check out JustNutsMusic.com). The evening includes dinner and a champagne toast and is a great alternative to an expensive evening in Manhattan. So instead of battling with NYC traffic, take a walk down to the civic and spend a wonderful evening of great music, dancing and dining. Please call me at (718) 792 7647 or Jerry Landi at (718) 792 2468 for further information and reservations. Seating is limited! Make your reservations now.
In the next two weeks, many of us will be casting our vote for the next U.S. president. While I would not endorse either candidate (we all must make that choice ourselves), I will remind everyone that your participation in democracy does not end on Election Day. We are facing some great challenges and none of us can afford the assumption that our next president can solve all of our problems. It is up to us to make the system work for us and we need to do that by being active in our communities and making better decisions for our families.
We recently saw two local civic groups unite to fight against the DOB permit allowing a known slumlord to build an apartment building on Middletown Road. That’s democracy in action and I wish them the best of luck. If you couldn’t attend the protest on Saturday, October 18, do what I did: call 311 and submit your opposition to this project.
Other things we can do? You can use mass transit. Increased ridership gives the system more capital and while it may be overcrowded and not as comfortable as riding alone in your car…you could just tough it out like a true New Yorker.
You can recycle. Recycling gives the city raw materials that they can reuse or trade on the open market. A few months ago, we had a representative from the Department of Sanitation come to one of our general meetings and he explained that the net cost to haul recyclables was 1/3 of the cost to haul garbage because of the city’s ability to turn aluminum, paper and plastic into a saleable commodity.
You can shop local. Tremont Avenue merchants need our business and we need them. Empty storefronts and a lack of access to the services we require will pull down our home values and decrease our quality of life. What you buy, or as I like to call it, the power of the purse, is also important. The industrial food system is a huge contributor to the greenhouse gases that are causing global warming. Spend your money on food that nourishes you and try to buy locally grown or organic. Yes, it costs more, but that’s how the power of the purse works. We have local merchants who would love to provide us with these items, but they cost more and stocking that kind of merchandise is a risk none of them can afford to make right now.
You can become active in your local community organizations. The LPCA has a terrific relationship with the offices of our councilman, our assemblyman and our state senator. Congress and the Senate recently voted on a $700 billion Bail Out bill. Isn’t it important that we know how our elected officials voted on this issue? Congressman Crowley voted for the bill and I’m sure we all would love to know how that bill is going to help our community, how it’s going to help our local businesses stay afloat?
There is referendum on term limits and I think we would love to know what our councilman thinks about this and how this decision will affect us. Or does he need to know how we the people fee
