Friday, January 7, 2022
Vol. 82, No. 1
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SERVING BETHPAGE, OLD BETHPAGE, AND PLAINVIEW
TOWN BLOOD DRIVE
Running Club pres retires from post after four decades BY GARY SIMEONE
Town Clerk Rich LaMarca, left, and Town Councilman Steve Labriola, right, with staff from New York Blood Center at the blood collection drive. To help hospitals meet the ongoing and pressing need for blood, the Town of Oyster Bay partnered with New York Blood Center to host a Blood Collection Drive at the Hicksville Athletic Center. The donation drive was especially critical, as blood supplies have seriously
dwindled as a result of the pandemic. Town Councilman Steve Labriola and Town Clerk Rich LaMarca also thanked the many residents who donated, as 32 pints of blood were collected, which can potentially save up to 96 lives.
Tax grievance workshops Nassau County Legislator Arnold W. Drucker (D - Woodbury) and the Nassau County Assessment Review Commission (ARC) will be hosting free virtual community tax grievance workshops on Friday, January 21st from 10 a.m. to noon and Thursday, February 10th from 7 to 9 p.m. The workshops will inform
residents about how to challenge their property taxes online. No registration is necessary, and the workshop will be shown at www.NassauCountyNY.gov/LD16. For additional information, please contact Legislator Drucker's office at 516-571-6216 or email adrucker@nassaucountyny.gov.
The Bethpage Newsgram is published every Friday by Litmor Publishing Corp. Periodical Postage paid at Hicksville, N.Y. 11801 Telephone 931-0012 - USPS 3467-68. Postmaster: Send Address Change to: The Bethpage Newsgram, 821 Franklin Ave., Suite 208, Garden City, N.Y. 11530 • Meg Norris Publisher
Plainview resident Mike Polansky has been running pretty much all of his life. The 81-year-old cofounder of the GLIRC (Greater Long Island Running Club) retired last month from his post as Club president after nearly four decades in the position. Jossi Fritz-Mauer, a 37-year-old Old Bethpage resident, took over the role as new president as of January 1st. “It was time that a younger person takes over the reins because the Club can’t have an 81-year-old president,” said Polansky in a joking manner. “Jossi is a bright young energetic young guy and I’m sure he will step into his new role without a hitch.” Polansky said that he was one of the original cofounders of the GLIRC in 1979 and the second president of the club. “In the early 1970s, we had a group of guys who used to run the track over at Plainview Old Bethpage-JFK High School. We all decided that we wanted our group to be more formal, so that is basically how the Club got started. We were running with members of Police Boys Club Unit and they were on board with the idea of forming this bigger club.” Polansky said that in the decades of the 1950s and 1960s, running was not considered a recreational activity and it was only recognized as an elite sport at the time. “There were guys and girls who ran track in high school and if they were good they ran in college, and if they were really good, they did something
at a higher level. In the 1970s the running boom kind of took over and people started to see it as more of a recreational thing to do. A couple of years later after the birth of the GLIRC, recreational races became more well-known. There were women’s races on Long Island and things like the 50-mile relay that started to take place." One of the races that became really popular at the time was the infamous Ocean to Sound Relay, a 50-mile relay from Jones Beach to Oyster Bay. The club grew bigger over the years with a lot more members, and more local events were added to the calendar . “We grew from ten or twelve guys who were running at the track in Plainview to over a thousand members, including men and women from both Nassau and Suffolk Counties,” said Polansky. Some of the more popular races that the club puts together is the “10 Mile Run to the Blue Point Brewery,” which takes place on January 15, the Icebreaker Marathon & Half, which takes place at Eisenhower Park on January 23, and the Mardi Gras Rub to the Great South Brewery, which takes place in February. As for Polansky, he has no plans to hang up his running shoes despite retiring from his head position at the club. “I still plan to run my five miles every day on my usual route down Manorville Road and Up and down Washington Avenue in Plainview.” To find out more information on the club, you can visit their website at www. glirc.org.
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