_______________ east meadow ______________
COMMUNITY UPDATE Infections as of April 30
4,902
Infections as of April 25 4,879
$1.00
HERALD
Winner of poster contest
Historical figures celebrated
Runner wins county championship
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VOL. 21 NO. 19
MAY 6 - 12, 2021
An Earth Day contest brings student honors opportunity to express themselves without using pen and paper. And they were allowed to Juliette Markesano and Pavly work on the project with another Zaky placed in the top 10 among student if they chose to, which 207 videos submitted by fifthwasn’t possible at through eighththe height of the grade students in coronavirus panPSEG’s Earth Day demic. Video PSA Contest “The for mat, a on April 22. The video, helped me to public service motivate them and announcement projget them excited,” ect was a win for she said. “The PSA their Woodland Midgave them an oppordle School science tunity to do somet e a c h e r, K a r e n thing different and Alonge, too, who creative.” described herself as Allison Fullam, a an environmental Wo o d l a n d s i x t h advocate. grade science teach“I love everyer, introduced the thing about Earth PSEG program to Day and am a big the school for conadvocate of protectsideration. “I ing the environment brought it to the any way we can,” ALLISON FULLAM chair of the departAlonge said. “This Woodland ment in person, program allowed me science teacher because it gives chilto show my students dren ownership to t h at l i t t l e d a i ly be aware of environchanges … can make a positive mental issues,” Fullam said. “It impact. I am very proud of the was an opportunity to be part of time and amazing effort both something bigger than ourselves Pavly and Juliette put into their and [to be] taught how to use our videos.” renewable resources better. The Alonge attributed some of the children were surprised that students’ enthusiasm to the CONTINUED ON PAGE 3
By LAURA LANE llane@liherald.com
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Christina Daly/Herald
TOWN OF HEMPSTEAD Supervisor Don Clavin and Clerk Kate Murray announced the return of the “Do Not Knock” program at the Vardakis residence.
Town announces return of ‘Do Not Knock’ program By JENNIFER CORR jcorr@liherald.com
After a long day, the Vardakises’ East Meadow residence is finally quiet. Their youngest, a 2-year-old, is asleep, and parents Allison and Andrew are getting their other children, ages 8 and 5, ready for bed. Then the doorbell rings. A salesperson waits outside. The family dog begins to bark, the baby starts to cry and, Allison says, “It’s very hard to calm everyone down.” Since the Vardakis family lives on a busy street, with no shortage of solicitors at all hours, they were delighted
when the Town of Hempstead announced that it would be bringing back the “Do Not Knock” program, in which residents place stickers on their door sporting that message to protect them from unwanted interruptions. Andrew Vardakis said he was glad to see the program return, because, he explained succinctly, if he and Allison aren’t at a store, they’re “not in the mood for buying.” “We get enough spam calls, we get enough robo-calls, we get enough mass-phishing emails,” Andrew said. “I’m just glad the Town of Hempstead is taking a step to at
least leave a little bit of that in the past.” Town officials gathered at the Vardakis home on April 29 to announce the return of the pro g ram, originally launched in 2015 under then Supervisor Kate Murray, who is now the town clerk. “The idea is, when husbands and wives are both working, you want quality time with your kids,” Supervisor Don Clavin said. “You want to enjoy yourself. You don’t want to be bothered. What happens is you have individuals knocking on your door, and some of them are CONTINUED ON PAGE 12
t was an opportunity to be part of something bigger than ourselves and [to be] taught how to use our renewable resources better.