Vol. 76, No. 27
What’s inside?
Thursday, July 2, 2026
ELLIS alums reflect on U.S. arrivals By Olivia Young oyoung@riverdalepress.com
Dual identities Ukrainian immigrant shares story Page A3
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For many Americans, building a life in the United States was not a given, but a hard-fought achievement. While the nation geared up for Independence Day celebrations commemorating 250 years of American sovereignty, two alumni from Marble Hill’s English Language Learners and International Support Preparatory Academy, or ELLIS, reflected on the goals and journeys that led them to the U.S. Emely Lopez, 27, and Lorens Sanquintin Pena, 22, came to the U.S. as asylum seekers. Both endured years of stalled status with little certainty, but emerged with an education, access to work and an idea
of the U.S. that differed from their expectations. ELLIS is a high school designed for newly arrived immigrants that are overage to enroll in the city’s public schools and are not yet proficient in English. Staff helps develop academic, language and cultural skills to prepare students for college in the U.S. Lopez is a high school tech instructor who left Honduras for the Bronx a decade ago. At the time, her dad worked long hours, and she was often home alone. Lopez said when she was 16, the neighborhood was dominated by MS-13, a transnational criminal gang, and members started harassing her. She recalled one member who was a
neighbor, and started telling her he liked what she was wearing, the way she styled her hair and calling out other unsolicited, suggestive comments that were not appropriate for a young person to hear, Lopez said. Lopez had heard stories of what treatment like that led to. At some point, girls being harassed became victims, forced into a romantic and sexual relationship with gang members, Lopez said. Fear started to build. She felt unsafe in her home — there was no fence outside or protection against an intruder, anyone could break in if they wanted, she said. She worried the force of an older man would easily overpower her own strength. The justice system in Honduras
couldn’t help her, Lopez said. To escape these mounting tensions, she and her family immigrated to the U.S., where some other family members had already been living. She hoped to apply for asylum, a status that once granted, allows a non-U.S. citizen to legally live and work in the U.S. if they have been or will be persecuted in their home country. On her first attempt to make it into the U.S., Lopez said she was detained in Mexico and deported back to Honduras. On the second, she made it to McAllen, Texas. She was held in a processing center there. Lopez said the treatment at the center was inhumane. She recalled sleeping on ELLIS ON PAGE A4
City outlines future of Van Cortlandt Park Stadium By Michelle Mullen mmullen@riverdalepress.com
America 250 celebration Bronx residents enjoy fireworks show Page A5
Courtesy Eytan Saenger
Eytan Saenger, 22, performs the national anthem at baseball games in honor of the United States’ 250th anniversary.
For Riverdale singer, U.S. 250th is celebrated before first pitch By Michelle Mullen mmullen@riverdalepress.com
History through collaboration Residents celebrate U.S. anniversary with tapestry Page A6
As the United States celebrates its 250th anniversary, Riverdale resident Eytan Saenger is marking the milestone one baseball game at a time. The 22-year-old recent Binghamton University graduate is spending the summer traveling to ballparks across the Northeast to sing the national anthem before the first inning begins. The idea took shape in April, shortly before graduation, after Saenger performed the anthem for the Binghamton Rumble Ponies. As the nation’s semiquincentennial approached, he began looking into the history behind one of baseball’s most enduring traditions. “It ties into immediately after World War One at one of the World Series games where veterans who had just come back from the war were at the game, and they decided to play the anthem, and ev-
eryone stood up in celebration,” he said. “And then it was really from there on that the tradition began and got started.” For Saenger, who was born in Boston and moved to Riverdale at 10 years old, the discovery reinforced the significance of the anthem as more than a pregame ritual. In it, he saw the opportunity to combine what he calls his three greatest passions: music, baseball and civic engagement. “I realized it happened to be the approaching of the 250 birthday celebrations that were going to be happening throughout the country,” he said. “For me it felt like a really meaningful opportunity to combine these three things in a way which felt very appropriate.” A graduate of Salanter Akiba Riverdale High School, Saenger has long been involved in civic life. While still a student, he founded a club that organized a City Council town hall and an interfaith mayoral forum for Jewish, Catholic and Muslim
students, hoping to encourage civic participation among his peers. At Binghamton University, where he studied political science, he remained active in student leadership while continuing to sing with Jewish a cappella groups. His anthem tour has since taken him to the Brooklyn Cyclones, Staten Island FerryHawks and Sussex County Miners. Additional performances are planned this summer with the Akron RubberDucks, Hudson Valley Renegades, Wilmington Blue Rocks and New York Boulders. Saenger has also partnered with Civic Spirit, a nonprofit that promotes civic education. At games, he distributes materials promoting the organization, including Tshirts, sunglasses and even pocket Constitutions. He believes baseball offers one of the few venues where Americans from different backgrounds still regularly come ANTHEM ON PAGE A4
Two months after announcing plans to demolish the Van Cortlandt Park Stadium, New York City Department of Parks and Recreation officials are continuing to map out what comes next. In a follow-up meeting with Bronx Community Board 8’s Parks and Recreation Committee, the agency unveiled its first master plan for the stadium, using engineering studies, environmental testing and community feedback to guide the eventual redevelopment of the aging stadium site. Parks department officials acknowledged that, despite identifying demolition as the only viable option, no funding has yet been secured to replace the nearly century-old structure. Opened in 1939 as part of New York City’s Depression-era expansion of public parks, Van Cortlandt Park Stadium became one of the Bronx’s premier public athletic venues, serving as a space for the public and an anchor for high school and college athletics — soccer, track and field and baseball among them. The board’s parks and recreation committee chair Deb Travis said she was relieved to finally hear what the city envisions beyond demolition. “That last meeting was really the first time that the community found out about the condition of the stadium and kind of the intentions of the parks department,” Travis said, explaining why the committee invited officials back for a second presentation. “We asked the parks department to come back ... to explain the rationale for why the stadium would need to be removed, and how they’re approaching the next phases of what will come next.” The presentation offered the city’s most detailed explanation to date of why the stadium cannot be preserved, what investigators uncovered during months of testing and what could eventually replace it. Marlisa Wise, an architect with the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation who helped oversee the master planning study, said the agency’s work unfolded in five phases, beginning with health and safety inspections before expanding into engineering investigations STADIUM ON PAGE A4
South Riverdale Service auto shop to shutter By Michelle Mullen mmullen@riverdalepress.com
For more than three decades, motorists in Riverdale have turned to auto shop South Riverdale Service for everything from routine oil changes to emergency repairs. Those garage doors will close after the property’s owner accepted an offer to sell the site to the neighboring BP gas station. As a result, the longtime auto repair shop will have to vacate, with mechanic and owner Bruce Yudman saying he plans to close the shop on July 20. For Yudman, who has operated the business for more than 35 years, the closure marks the possible end of a shop rooted in
the neighborhood for generations. “My landlord approached me back in December, telling me that the owner of the BP station made him an offer on the property,” Yudman said. The BP location’s owner could not be reached for comment, but store management confirmed the sale to The Press. Greg Shea, managing partner of TK Management LLC, whose group owns the property where the auto shop rests, said the building was never listed for sale and they had no plans to sell it. “It was not on the market,” he said. “Somebody approached us with an offer that was substantial in comparison to the AUTO SHOP ON PAGE A4
GARY JEAN-JUSTE
Bruce Yudman, pictured, has owned South Riverdale Service at 3014 Riverdale Ave. for more than three decades.