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New Hyde Park Road from Garden City South complicates any type of recommendations for a traffic control. “The last thing you’d want to do is have kids crossing the street thinking they are safe and all of a sudden cars come flying through,” he said at the meeting. Vallely reminds residents considering the change for New Hyde Park Road that it is a Nassau County Road so any installation would need to go through at the county level, not within village government. Also at the CPOA meeting on May 8, DiMattia said that there is no news yet for the controversial issues impacting Village Lot 7N behind Key Food and Dunkin Donuts, involving residents of
the Hilton Hall apartments not being able to find spaces during day as LIRR commuters fill the lot, and unregulated commercial parking to boot. She said the Traffic Commission awaits its consultants report related to the downtown Garden City Streetscape, which was to be done at the request of the village’s Planning Commission as a survey of the parking potential downtown by Manhattan-based firm BFJ Planning. Any changes in regulations or configuration of the lot are hinged on the parking survey. “I check the village’s website weekly but I find it interesting our Planning Commission has approved minutes from October 2017 as its last posted minutes. Why aren’t discussions and topics from their meetings approved and
posted and made public knowledge. The Planning Commission is the designated group in charge of the survey data of parking field 7N. With the amount of work I have done with that parking field inspecting around and taking pictures, I could have done the survey myself,” DiMattia said. The WPOA liaison to the Traffic Commission, Richard Vallely, relayed his concerns last week at the WPOA meeting with the coming months and construction phasing for the Third Track project indicating the potential for havoc in the west and on northsouth county roads, some of which will be closed for periods of the project, the Long Island Rail Road owes the residents and Village of Garden City a report and more communication on
Friday, May 18, 2018 The Garden City News
Traffic Commission to discuss parking, signage
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what exactly will take place. He was frustrated with the information the village has received from the LIRR to date and he requested that there be more delivered by LIRR officials ahead of the setup of construction, which he anticipated to begin by the fall. Kelly says he hopes to see some form of a traffic plan involving the impacts of the closure of Clinch Avenue near the New Hyde Park station. “I would like Rich (Vallely) as liaison to have his attention devoted to the Clinch situation for the coming weeks as representative of the West and everyone in the POA can contribute -- you are welcome to go out and petition and do the work necessary to get something in front of the village Traffic Commission,” Kelly said last week.
“Lessons for my Daughter” earns nod from Legislator From page1 receive a gratitude journal, a keepsake pocket mirror, samples of an organic bath and body products and an organic “Girl Powered” t-shirt. Parents and caregivers have the option to receive weekly updates on class discussions and ideas through an app “to foster further communication between you and your daughter” Caterina explained in an email to The Garden City News on Monday, May 14. Caterina said the classes offer an overall grounding and calming experience “where girls feel more rooted in their power and better equipped to handle whatever life throws at them.” She says after the school year, students are decompressing from the stresses that come with the academic school year. “One of the huge benefits of our workshop is learning tools for self care and ways to manage stress and anxiety, which is such a great skill set to have before the start of a new school year. Lessons For My Daughters empowers girls to not only see the power they have to affect change in their own individual lives, but in the community and the world at large,” Caterina explained this week. With efforts from Legislator Schaefer in the first few months of 2018, Nassau BOCES schools now have the ability to hire Caterina using the BOCES website as a vendor of the program to bring Lessons for My Daughters into the respective schools. “I read about this program in The Garden City News (December 8, 2017) and right away I felt like it is a great program for young women. Anything we can do to support our children in general, but especially for young women, I like to be involved in. I reached out to Carmen and offered to help in any way, and we met to talk about her program.
She mentioned bringing it into schools which is hard due to the funding, but there was a way to offer it through Nassau BOCES. I reached out to BOCES’ deputy superintendent and she contacted Ms. Caterina. As a result BOCES accepted Lessons for My Daughters into their program, which now enables them to get this into area schools much easier,” Legislator Schaefer explained in an interview on Tuesday, May 15. Meeting and motivating young women is one of Legislator Schaefer’s favorite parts of being in office, from attending Girl Scouts of Nassau County events and recently, participating in a women’s panel at NYCB Live featuring women leaders in sports and entertainment, including former WNBA player Allison Feaster. Schaefer said she’s also enjoyed speaking to groups of adult women about government and politics, including presentations for Ellevate New York. Caterina’s program and its focus on social emotional learning draws her attention for a variety of reasons as educators and government officials alike look closer at influences in each community. “I saw someone (Caterina) who took an idea and has made it work for the benefit of children and the growth of young women, and this is a very important topic to be involved in. It is about self-esteem and having been a young woman, I recall what it’s like to feel a bit insecure. It can be a difficult time and helping young women through this needs to be focused on more in our families and in our communities. Any effort to make sure we’re supporting and encouraging tweens and teens is a worthy cause to support,” Legislator Schaefer explained. She recognizes programs that are designed to encourage youth collaboration and personal enrichment as a frontline step to combating the opioid epidemic. “Often times, problems with sub-
stance abuse start in early adulthood or teenage years when kids feel they want to fit in and peer pressure leads to smoking or other self-destructive behaviors. If they are not feeling confident and supported kids can easily fall prey to picking up bad habits...That is so pervasive in our society and it needs to be focused on more: our children getting the support they need to grow up into young, confident adults,” the legislator said. 1In Garden City midway through calendar year 2018, there are and will be many prominent women in leadership positions visible to residents and families, including prospective teens and tweens for the Lessons for My Daughters program. Aside from Legislator Schaefer, Garden City is home to U.S. Congresswoman Kathleen Rice. In November 2017 Nassau County saw the election of Laura Curran and county executive and Laura Gillen become the Town of Hempstead Supervisor in a historic upset. On the local level, the president of the Garden City Board of Education is Angela Heineman, and she took over two years ago from another woman board president, Barbara Trapasso. The next Superintendent of Schools for Garden City will be another lady in leadership, Dr. Kusum Sinha, who officially takes her post on July 1 and will be sworn in at the school board’s reorganization meeting on July 10. In the village government after being re-elected as a trustee from the CPOA in March the current Deputy Mayor of Garden City, Theresa Trouvé, is poised to succeed Brian Daughney as mayor in 2019. Also the second woman member of the Board of Trustees, another former Garden City Board of Education president, Colleen Foley, was sworn in on April 12. Women in business are certainly part of the fabric of Garden City as well. At the home of Lessons for My
Daughters on New Hyde Park Road, co-founders of Samudra Yoga Sylvia Ehrhart and Melissa Deraval teach classes and encourage health, well-being and balance among regulars and visitors alike. Samudra translates into “ocean” in Sanskrit. On the same block as the yoga studio is the well-known Broadway Bound Dance Studio at 66 New Hyde Park Road and owned by a village resident and legendary choreographer, Debbie Tavernese. Across the street, the Well-Seasoned Chef is run by dynamic Chef Sophia Brivio, a Garden City resident and mom of three daughters who helps girls in their tweens and teens learn new culinary skills while building confidence. Caterina is happy so many real-life examples around Garden City and the country promote the many ways women both young and old take on leadership. Legislator Schaefer concurs and adds Carmin Caterina as an entrepreneur, with ‘what she is promoting’ in Garden City and greater New York, to the ever-growing list of positive female role models. Caterina tells the News her organization has hired its first social media manager and Facebook advertising has shown great potential in greater New York City and Long Island. She says with an increase to media coverage since her initial Garden City News article last December, her program is popping up more and more in Google searches and “new inquiries come from both moms and schools contacting us every day.” Last week Caterina emailed the News with comments on the recognition her program has recently experienced: “What a huge win for girls everywhere! The world is watching and we are here to stay and to make BIG changes. It means that people are beginning to see the need for social emotional learning, especially for girls,” she wrote.