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Proposed apartment complex to get new one-bedroom units

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Kevin Walsh represented Kevin Lalezarian and Frank Lalezarian in proposing several modifications to their approved apartment complexes. (Photo by Ben Fiebert)

In a vote of 4-1, the Mineola Village Board approved several amendments, allocating additional parking spots and one-bedroom units to two approved apartment complexes at 109 Front St. and 114 Old Country Road.

The board approved the complexes on Oct. 18, 2023, with 200 residential units at 120 Third St. and 240 at 125 Third St. The property’s address will change to 120 Third St., North building, and 125 Third St., South building.

Kevin Walsh, a founding partner of Walsh Markus McDougal and DeBellis, represented Kevin Lalezarian and Frank Lalezarian in proposing the modifications. Lalezarian Properties LLC requested additional parking, the conversion of two-bedroom units into one-bedroom units and the expansion of the complex’s courtyard.

Walsh said the Lalezarians believe there is a strong market for one-bedroom units near the train station, which is why they proposed these amendments.

“There is going to be virtually no change — it is certainly not a distinguishable change,” Walsh said about the project.

The Lalezarians proposed to donate a lot to the village they acquired from the office building at 114 Old Country Road. for recreational use.

They also requested to transform the parking lot on the corner of Third Street and Willis Avenue into a park owned by the village. The estimated budget for this project is about $1 million.

“I think this is adding another element to our community, for both the building as well as the residents, because you’re doing something different and proposing things like a putting green and just an open space, so I appreciate that,” said Janine Sartori, deputy mayor of Mineola. “It’s not only going to be open space for the park, but it’s the fact that you are going to have open space on each side of the building.”

The approved project would reserve 31 of the two-bedroom units and the ancillary space around them and transform them into one-bedroom apartments. Ten rooms will be placed in the south building and 40 will be placed in the north building.

Walsh said one way to look at these changes is that they are requesting 29 bedrooms for the entire property and, in turn, will give the village some amenities.

“They’re not looking for smaller units. They’re not trying to cram anything in. They have the room to make those one-bedroom units that are part of the original allocation,” Walsh said.

They are also proposing increasing the size of the courtyards to accommodate the new one-bedroom units.

Walsh said that when this project was approved last year, community members were concerned about taxpayer money increasing with more students being added to the schools. However, he said that the amendment to the 50 two-bedroom units would have a “positive influence on the schools.”

Last year, 630 parking spaces were approved. They proposed an amendment to add 753 spaces and an extra floor for parking below the North building.

“The traffic report indicates that the traffic changes or impact will be negligible here,” Walsh said. “But you know, logically, if I have fewer two bedrooms than I had before, it’s less likely you’re going to have more cars.”

Walsh said these amendments would also have less impact on the water and sewage systems because with fewer two-bedroom units, less people would use the bathroom.

“We have been in the drawing stage on the approved buildings and that does take a while,” Walsh said when asked what the timeline is for this project.

Walsh said that the building at 114 Old Country Road. will be torn down by the end of the year. The start date of the project is unclear, but Walsh said it will take about two years to complete.

Great Neck Library’s Annual Great Give Back Event: Vegetable Planting at the Parkville Branch

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Local teens helped build planters at the Parkville Branch in the Great Neck Library's Great Give Back event (Photo by Joseph Weisbecker)

On Oct. 15, a group of teens and their parents gathered at the Parkville Branch of the Great Neck Library in order to participate in this year’s Great Give Back event.

Three new planters were placed in the yard adjacent to the building, and the teens worked to fill these with soil and plant seeds for vegetables such as broccoli, cabbage, beets and more. The process took about an hour from start to finish and included the help of various staff members as well.

The Library will collaborate with the Parkville School to expand this project further in the future. The children will help decorate the planters, keep track of the progress the plants make throughout the growing process and learn how to make salads and other dishes with the food being grown.

We thank our volunteers and look forward to our continued work with the school!

GoFundMe raises $80K for Saddle Rock synagogue destroyed by fire

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Great Neck Alert Fire Chief John Purcell said the fire devastated the Torah study center (Photo courtesy of the Great Neck Alert Fire Company)

Within a week after a fire devastated a Saddle Rock Torah study center, more than $80,000 has been fundraised to help rebuild the synagogue.

Shortly after midnight on Oct. 11, Yom Kippur, the Saddle Rock Minyan located in a house on Greenleaf Hill caught fire.

The fire was fueled by unattended candles left out for the religious holiday near the front windowsill.

A GoFundMe campaign was created to help the synagogue after the devastating fire.

As of Monday morning, 10 days after the fire and six days after the GoFundMe was created, $82,532 was raised. This was split over 329 donations in total.

The largest donation amounted to $5,000 from an anonymous individual.

The fire was determined to be caused by unattended candles (Photo courtesy of the Great Neck Alert Fire Company)

The synagogue’s GoFundMe effort has set a goal of $200,000.

Saddle Rock Minyan was the meeting spot for more than 100 families in the community. The fire left them without their synagogue during the Jewish High Holidays.

Rabbi Ben Kaniel described the synagogue as a “cornerstone” of the community on the GoFundMe page.

“This synagogue has been a gathering place for all our families, where we’ve celebrated many happy occasions, offered support during tough times, and built deep, lasting connections,” Kaniel wrote in the GoFundMe page. “It’s a place where people of all ages come to find comfort, community, and spirituality.”

Great Neck Alert Fire Chief John Purcell said one man was sleeping in the home at the time of the fire but was able to escape once fire alarms woke him up before the Great Neck Alert arrived. No injuries were reported.

“The situation was very bad on a holy day, but thank God there was nobody in there,” Purcell said.

Purcell said the fire caused the building to experience “extensive damage.” The GoFundMe page also includes a video showing the building after it was destroyed by the fire, with many congregants calling to help them rebuild “their home.”

Purcell said all religious items, including seven Torahs, were removed from the home.

Efforts to reach the Saddle Rock Minyan for comment were unavailing.

Editorial: Immigrants a solution, not the problem

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Controversy over immigration is nothing new in the United States.

Then-Mayor Joseph Shakespeare told reporters that Italians in his city lacked “honor, truth, pride, religion, or any quality that goes to make a good citizen,” as Richard Gambino chronicled in his book “Vendetta.”

“Except for the Poles, we know of no other nationality which is [as] objectionable as a people,” the mayor continued.

The year was 1890, the city was New Orleans and the mayor’s sentiments would result in the creation of Columbus Day – at a terrible price.

Italians who arrived after the Civil War had already stirred resentment by their eagerness to work even at low wages and their close cultural cohesion that included family, faith, and language at a time of rising crime.

And then on Oct. 15, 1890, New Orleans Police Chief David Hennessy was gunned down in a volley of shotgun fire.

Mortally wounded, Hennessy was asked for the identity of his assailants. His reply was a racial slur for Italian Americans.

Police fanned out under orders to “arrest every Italian you come across.”

Subsequent mistrials and acquittals of apprehended suspects prompted thousands of frustrated citizens to break into the city jail on March 14, 1891, and kill every Italian they could find.

The onslaught ended with what historians called the largest lynching in American history with many Italians hanging from lamp posts in the French Quarter.

The assault was widely supported nationwide but not by the Italian government.

President Benjamin Harrison responded forcefully to the attack and in a move to repair relations with Italy made Columbus Day a national holiday.

The treatment of Italians in New Orleans in the 1890s offers two important lessons for Americans in 2024.

First, new groups arriving in America are inevitably subject to hostile treatment upon journeying to a new land that includes unjustified smears.

Second, those badly treated groups make major contributions to the United States economy.

This is a point frequently overlooked in the discussion of immigration by the Republican nominee for president and his supporters.

But it has important implications for New York and the rest of the country.

Recent immigrants, like previous immigrants, have helped drive the strongest economy in the world. This is reflected in record-low unemployment, highest growth in GDP among advanced nations and the stock market’s record highs. .

In February, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released an updated 10-year
economic and budget forecast whose numbers look significantly better than they did a year earlier. A key reason: immigration

CBO Director Phill Swagel estimated that the infusion of immigrants from 2023 to 2034 would add $7 trillion to the country’s gross domestic product and increase government revenue by $1 trillion.

Numerous studies show that immigrants are, among other things, more entrepreneurial than native-born Americans.

They also keep down costs. Dairy farmers across the country who rely on immigrants for more than half their workforce say a mass deportation of immigrants would result in the loss of businesses and large increase in the price of milk, yogurt and cheese.

On Long Island, it would raise the cost of construction, restaurant prices and health-care services.

Legal and illegal immigrants are also far less likely to commit crimes – notwithstanding all the talk of “migrant” crime from the Republican candidate – than native-born Americans. Stirring fears about newcomers may be good politics, but it is not supported by the facts.

Yes, some immigrants – like any other group – will commit crimes. But they will do so at a lower rate than native-born Americans, who have less to lose.

Does that mean people should be allowed to enter the United States illegally? No.

All countries must be able to control their borders. Ours is no different.

Illegal crossings are lower now than they were at the end of the Trump administration, but the Biden administration was too slow to stem an influx that at times overwhelmed communities from the southern border to New York City.

Congress should pass the tough immigration reforms worked out by a bipartisan group of senators earlier this year that were scuttled at Trump’s behest.

The Trump campaign has targeted legal Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, saying they were illegal, ate residents’ dogs and cats and put a strain on government services.

All of which is untrue.

Ohio’s Republican governor, mayor, and business owners said Haitians were encouraged to move to Springfield, to help revitalize a struggling local economy with their strong work ethic. Which, they said, the Haitians have done.

Immigrants could do the same for Long Island and the rest of New York State.

Upstate New York cities have seen massive declines in population and economic productivity in the past 60 years. Buffalo, for examples has gone from a population of 580,000 in 1950 to 278,000 to 2020.

New York officials should ignored the fear-mongering and harness the economic power of new Americans like the Italians in New Orleans in the 1890s.

 

 

 

In-person Social Security Seminar presented by Christian LaPeter

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The Great Neck Library will host a Social Security seminar on Nov. 6 (Photo courtesy of the Great Neck Library)

Can you maximize your Social Security benefits in retirement? Join Christian LaPeter for this interactive educational seminar and find out what the best possible choices are for deciding when to take Social Security.

Christian LaPeter Is a registered representative and investment adviser representative of Equity Services, Inc. Securities and investment advisory services are offered solely by Equity Services, Inc., Member FlNRA/SIPC, 410 Motor Parkway, Second Floor, Hauppauge, NY 11788, 631-582-6400. LaPeter Financial Concepts is independent of Equity Services, Inc., in CO, MO, NH and WI, Equity Services Inc. operates as Vermont Equity Services, Inc. TC143623(0824)

This Seminar will be at the Great Neck Library located at 159 Bayview Ave., Great Neck, NY on Wednesday, Nov. 6 at 6:30 p.m.

Register online, in-person or via phone beginning Oct. 29 at 10 am for Great Neck cardholders and residents. Non-residents are welcome as walk-ins as space allows.

For more information, please contact Great Neck Library at (516) 466-8055 or email adultprogramming@greatnecklibrary.org.

Readers Write: The Bishop, the Cardinal and the Catholic vote

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In less than two weeks, we will vote in the most consequential election of our lifetime.

Every four years, the Diocese of Rockville Centre sends out a letter around presidential election time with a veiled endorsement for the Right-To-Life candidate.

This year was no exception with Bishop John Barres also telling Catholics they “must vote NO against Proposal One,” also known as the Equal Rights Amendment.

The letter contained falsehoods and was a mechanism to spread fear and hate about the already vulnerable LGBTQ+ community.

Should Catholics take voting advice from a bishop who has fired a beloved schoolteacher for his sexual orientation, presided over two dioceses’ coverup of clergy’s sexual abuse of children, and is soon to hand over $323 million, partially funded by individual parishes, to pay for these abuses?

Respectfully, Bishop Barres should let Catholic voters decide for themselves instead of imposing a short-sighted and unwelcome view.

About half the Catholics, including Barres and Cardinal Timothy Dolan, arguably the most prominent Catholic in the nation, oppose abortion with no exceptions such as rape, incest, or harm to the mother.

This group sadly believes they have control over a woman’s uterus. They fail to see that our moral responsibilities do not stop at the moment of birth, and that Right-to-Life issues must also include supporting sensible gun control, quality of life for the sick, elderly, poor and homeless, and the humane treatment of immigrants.

Do either Barres or Dolan ever consider Catholic values that are also shared with religions of all denominations? These values include charity, compassion, honesty, humility, love, kindness, and respect for others.

Have they not heard the cacophony of contempt that has come out of former President Donald Trump’s mouth, day after day, year after year and decade after decade?

Do they think about the fear spread through the Haitian communities because of Trump’s recent “eating the dogs” refrain?  Or do they think calling Haiti a sh*thole appropriate? Do they chuckle with his crude comments about Arnold Palmer’s genitalia?

The questions could go on ad infinitum.

Yet Barres and Dolan have unwavering support for the former president.  I get it.

Clergy measure success by the number of seats in the pews. Sadly, it is dollars and cents rather than following the tenets of Catholicism.

At the recent Al Smith dinner, Trump was flanked by the Cardinal, who did not even flinch when Trump called Harris “stupid, nasty and mentally impaired,” none of which is true as evidenced during the recent Harris-Trump debate.

A couple of questions come to mind when thinking of the WWJD cliché.  Would Christ be yukking it up with Donald Trump, as did Dolan with Trump at the Al Smith dinner?

Or would Christ be favoring a positive, enthusiastic, Ted Lasso-like Harris/Walz ticket?

I remain positive and believe Harris will win by wider margins than polls predict, allowing us to distance ourselves from negativity and build a more united America.

Jim Hickey

Westbury

William Cullen Bryant Culture Series at The Bryant Library

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Berman Does Broaway

The Bryant Library is bringing Broadway lights to Roslyn with the upcoming performance, Berman Does Broadway on Sunday, October 27 at 2:00 pm.

Berman Does Broadway is a can’t-miss musical program featuring vocalist Lisa Berman, narrator Ruthe McKeown and pianist/musical director Stephen Goldstein. Come on a musical journey through 100 years of Broadway, featuring the music of some of Broadway’s greatest ladies — including Fanny Brice, Ethel Merman and Mary Martin. Audience members are encouraged to sing along and tap their toes to their favorite Broadway hits!

The performance is part of the Friends of the Bryant Library’s William Cullen Bryant Culture Series, an annual event in honor of the Library’s namesake.

Next in the series is Classical Masterworks for Piano: Featuring Shauna Shang on Sunday, December 15 at 2:00 pm. Shang, a pianist and Steinway Top Teacher Award recipient for 2022 and 2023, presents an afternoon of classical piano masterpieces. This recital highlights the beauty and emotional depth of classical music in a captivating performance, featuring works by Bach, Schubert, Chopin, Tchaikovsky, and Rachmaninov.

Both performances will offer opportunities for attendees to support The Bryant Library and to take part in a 50/50 raffle.

Register for both events by calling 516-621-2240 ext. 240 or emailing reg@bryantlibrary.org.

 

Nassau County Office of the Aging senior ID event at the Great Neck Library

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The Great Neck Library will be hosting an event for seniors to connect with the Nassau County Office of the Aging (Photo courtesy of the Great Neck Library)

The Nassau County Office of the Aging is responsible for advising the County Executive and government officials on the problems and needs of the county’s 300,000 residents age 60 and over.

Being the first county government in the nation to establish a county agency dedicated to providing programs and services for the over 60 population, Nassau County’s Office for the Aging empowers older persons to live more independently community wide.

Learn about the Office of the Aging in this presentation, their resources available for seniors and services such as NY Connects. Senior IDs will also be provided at the event.

The event will take place at the Great Neck Library located at 159 Bayview Ave., Great Neck, on Monday, Nov. 4 from 12 to 2 p.m.

Registration is not required.

For more information, please contact Great Neck Library at (516) 466-8055 or email adultprogramming@greatnecklibrary.org.

Westbury CEO helps sponsor annual race with $5K check

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Glen Wolther, left, donated $5,000 to St. Brigid Our Lady of Hope Regional School to help sponsor their annual 5k. (Photo by Ben Fiebert)

For the third year in a row, runner Glen Wolther donated $5,000 for St. Brigid’s 7th annual 5K Run/Walk and Kids Fun Run.

Wolther, CEO of All Round Foods in Westbury, is the main sponsor for about two dozen races on Long Island, including the Great Cow Harbor 10K Run, the Santa’s Toy Trot 5K Run/Walk, the 6 Hour 60th Birthday Celebration Run and Relay and more.

Wolther also donated $10,000 to the Westbury Senior Center in July. In a Patch report about this donation, Town of North Hempstead Council Member Robert Troiano said Wolther has “quietly been contributing and supporting our community for years,” which has been evident in his latest donation.

“My business is located here in Westbury, so I thought I should support the Westbury Village and community,” Wolther said. “Also, I’m a runner myself.”

Wolther said his sister convinced him to run the Long Island Marathon when he was 34 over 30 years ago. After finishing at 5 hours, he trained to get a better time at the New York Marathon.

“I trained a little bit smarter and I ran 3:59:59,” Wolther said. “I broke four hours and I got hooked.”

After more training, Wolther got his best recorded time of 3 hours and 35 minutes.

“I do a lot in the racing community,” Wolther said. “I’m one of the major sponsors of events on Long Island.”

The upcoming race that Wolther helped sponsor, which is hosted by the school’s PTA, will take place at St. Brigid Our Lady of Hope Regional School on Nov. 30. The fun run will begin at 8:30 a.m. and the run/walk will start at 9 a.m. EliteFeats will time each runner and the results will be posted on Events.EliteFeats.com/24stbrigid.

“It’s just amazing that our St. Brigid’s 5K is going to be the 7th annual this November,” Michiko Clarke, event chair, said. “All Round Foods owner Glen Wolther has been our Race Title Sponsor since 2022 and we are beyond grateful for his continuous support for our little Westbury community race.”

The event started in 2018, as a centennial celebration for the school. Clarke said she picked late November to host the race because that’s when a lot of the young alumni come back home for Thanksgiving.

“The race went well and it raised a lot of money for the school so we tried to keep this a tradition,” Clarke said.

In 2018, about $9,000 was raised at the event. In recent years, Clarke said that number increased to about $15,000 to $20,000. The money goes directly to the PTA where they have used it to help update the computers at the schools, host events and overall upgrade parts of the school.

Clarke said her favorite part about the race is when she sees familiar faces. She said the event is a “little reunion” for the alumni and staff members.

“Current students and teachers come volunteer so we try to have this event unite the community,” Clarke said. “It can be an event where people can come back to the school once a year to see what’s going on.”

Last year about 300 people ran. Clarke said she is aiming for 400 this year.

Student wins silver medal at World Wushu Championship

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Herricks Middle School eighth grader Ethan Yip earned a silver medal at the 9th World Junior Wushu Championship, which was held from Sept. 25 to 29 in Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei. (Photo courtesy of the Yip Family)

Ethan Yip, an eighth-grader from Herricks Middle School, earned a silver medal at the 9th World Junior Wushu Championship in Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei.

The term “wushu” is Chinese for “martial technique.” It comes from the Beijing dialect, where “wu” means “marital” or “military” and “shú” means “art.”

This competition, which was organized by the International Wushu Federation, is the highest-level wushu event for youths in the world with 498 athletes participating, representing over 50 countries spanning five continents.

“I really did not know what to expect,” Yip said. “I’ve never been to a competition of this size and importance and I was a little bit overwhelmed when I thought about it before I even left.”

Yip said qualifying for the 9th World Wushu Championship was a dream come true. He was part of a team of 20 athletes traveling from the United States to Brunei and was thrilled to be a part of the global event, with countless cultures and backgrounds represented.

Yip said his coaches, Lynn Lin and Chen Sitan, weren’t able to go to the competition with him. However, he Face Timed them during his training when it was 2 a.m. back at home.

“They would tell me what was great, what was OK, what I needed to work on,” Yip said. “I remember my coach just told me not to have any expectations, which helped me a lot. My mom also told me that ‘just being here, you’re already winning’ and that also really helped.”

Yip said he enjoyed meeting new people, discussing the similarities and differences in their backgrounds and felt that everyone was very friendly. But once the competition started, it was time to focus on his routine.

Yip recalled the intense beating of his heart as he prepared to begin and his performance being “a complete blur,” but he was “beyond excited” when it was announced that he earned a silver medal for his broadsword routine.

His training in martial arts began at age 5 in Queens with taekwondo lessons when he felt the connection to his ancestral heritage through his practice.

“Then when we moved to the Herricks district, there happened to be a White Tiger Taekwondo like a minute from my house so I thought ‘might as well do that’,” Yip said. “And I did that for two years and it was really fun, but I felt like I could do more and I wanted more of a challenge.”

Yip said he found a wushu school in Syosset, about 30 minutes away from where he lives. After taking a trial class there, he was instantly hooked. He said he was immediately drawn to the performance and gymnastic aspects of wushu, enjoying the jumps, flips and theatrical floor routines rather than sparring with an opponent.

“I just thought, ‘wow, if I could do that some day, I’d be really happy’,” Yip said. “And that’s when I started in the summer of going into third grade.”

Yip said he was super excited to start these classes and he never felt like stopping.

Yip currently trains in Huntington on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Sundays from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. During class, he spends most of the time on kicks, straight kicks, sidekicks, balances, back sweeps and jumps.

“If your legs aren’t strong enough, you can hurt your knees or ankles,” Yip said. “It’s a lot of conditioning.”

His first competitive experience was a mock event in Phoenix when he was 11. An older teammate acted as a mentor and helped him focus and prepare for his routine. The support helped and Yip was awarded 3rd place in his category.

In 2022, Yip competed in his first major tournament — the Pan American Wushu Championship in Brazil. He said he was nervous prior to his performance and was concerned that he wasn’t prepared, but his coaches and teammates once again provided the confidence he needed to succeed. He came in 5th place for his Changquan performance, which is a routine featuring fully extended kicks and striking techniques.

Yip said participating in these international competitions has given him a new outlook on many aspects of his life, including school, extracurricular activities and his wushu training. He acknowledges being in awe of the focus and discipline of other competitors, especially those from China and Singapore, and recalls that during their warmups, “there was zero discussion. You could hear a pin drop. They were completely focused on their practice and were 100 percent present without distractions. It was amazing to watch.”

Yip discussed with his teammates techniques they witnessed at the competitions, such as  “mental focus” and the “act of being present,” which he said he will incorporate into his schoolwork, homework and cello practice. He said mindfulness is “essential if you want to achieve success in anything you do.”

Yip said he looks forward to continuing his training for the US Team Trials, which will determine his next competition. He said he hopes to join the junior team for the 2026 World Wushu Championships in Tianjin, China, but he also has his eye on the ultimate prize: a spot in the 2026 Youth Olympics in Dakar, Senegal.

Kindertransport: the remarkable rescue of 10,000 children in the Holocaust presented by Linda Burghardt at the Great Neck Library

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Linda Burghardt will present on the history of Kindertransport, a rescue mission of Jewish children during the Holocaust, at the Great Neck Library (Photo courtesy of the Great Neck Library)

Because Jewish children were targeted for annihilation by the Nazis just like their parents, an emergency rescue operation was set up right after Kristallnacht in 1938 to send them to England, where foster homes throughout Britain promised to shelter them throughout the war.

Often, they were the only members of their families to survive the Holocaust.

How this program came to be founded, how it managed to operate and the way the children experienced it form the miraculous story of the world-renowned Kindertransport.

Linda Burghardt is the scholar-in-residence at the Holocaust Memorial & Tolerance Center in Glen Cove and a journalist and author from Great Neck.

She worked as a freelance reporter for The New York Times for twenty years and is the author of three non-fiction books.

Her articles and essays have appeared in newspapers across the U.S.,\ and she has lectured to both national and international audiences on a variety of topics.

She holds a Ph.D. from LIU Post and is the daughter of Holocaust survivors from Vienna.

This lecture will be at the Great Neck Library located at 159 Bayview Ave., Great Neck, NY, on Thursday, Nov. 7 at 2 p.m.

Registration is not required.

For more information, please contact Great Neck Library at (516) 466-8055 or email adultprogramming@greatnecklibrary.org.

From middle school to building a national brand together

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Owners of GOAT USA. Pictured from left to right is Rich Alfaro, Dylan McLaughlin and T.J. Cristina. (Photos courtesy of GOAT USA)

GOAT USA, a homegrown Long Island brand founded by three childhood friends from Carle Place and East Williston, has opened its fifth store in Deer Park.

Exterior of the GOAT USA Deer Park location, which opened earlier this month.

Dylan McLaughlin and Rich Alfaro, both from Carle Place, and T.J. Cristina, from East Williston, hosted a grand opening for their new storefront earlier this month. The store, located at Tanger Outlets, sells fashion wear such as athletic lifestyle apparel, jackets, long sleeves, polos, T-shirts, joggers, shorts, accessories and more.

Other GOAT USA store locations are in Roosevelt Field mall; Riverhead; Paramus, N.J; and King of Prussia, Pa., along with a wholesale presence in 36 states.

“This new location gives us an opportunity to split up Long Island into three sectors to allow our customer base from all over Long Island to reach a store pretty easily,” Alfaro said. “At our grand opening for Roosevelt Field, we had people that showed up from New Jersey and Suffolk County so we thought maybe another store on Long Island would work and that’s how we figured to open a store in Riverhead and at Tanger Outlets.”

McLaughlin and Alfaro met in middle school. When the entered high school, The Wheatley School and Carle Place combined football programs, which is where they both met T.J. Cristina. As freshmen in high school, they played junior varsity football together.

All three were friendly with each other, but it wasn’t until after graduation that they became much closer. They all got into SUNY Cortland without knowing that they would be at the same college until they saw each other on campus. McLaughlin and T.J. Cristina lived two doors next to each other. McLaughlin said every day from freshman year to sophomore year, they all hung out, and during junior and senior year, they lived in the same suite.

“We studied, we partied, we’d hang out, we’d play sports, we’d watch sports and a lot of it (GOAT USA) was rooted in sports,” McLaughlin said.

McLaughlin said when they were graduating from college in 2015, the term “GOAT,” which stands for Greatest of All Time, was “more popular than ever before.” He said people would always refer to superstar athletes as “the GOAT.”

“It became this colloquial expression where you got a 100 on your test, you’re the GOAT, you give your friend a lift to the airport, you’re the GOAT,” McLaughlin said. “And we noticed that there were no clothing brands with the logo as a goat. All these clothing brands have an icon that is an animal and we were like, ‘wow, the best one remains’.”

McLaughlin said they were inspired by other brands to move forward with this business idea in 2016. They then created the brand’s mascot, Chuck the Goat.

“It wasn’t so much that I had a passion for fashion. I think the three of us had more of a good understanding of popular culture, and we heard this term so frequently that we thought if we put together a logo to embody the term ‘GOAT,’ we could put it on T-shirts and make a brand of it and it will sell,” McLaughlin said.

McLaughlin said they built the business by attending live events and setting up pop-up shops. He said people from every neighborhood they traveled to understood the concept and were interested in the business. He said this verified that they were following their dreams.

“So when you’ve never been to Colorado or you keep going down to Maryland and you go to California or you go to Texas, and you find the same energy that is felt by people in these other towns and cities across the country that you do from people in East Williston and Carle Place, we were like ‘we have something where it’s not just people who are proud of us on a local level, but people across the nation recognize the brand concept,’” McLaughlin said.

Alfaro said some of the highlights since starting this business have been opening new stores. He said they did not have a grand opening for the first three store openings, but it was “amazing” to see the long lines at the recent grand openings.

“At the 9 o’clock, 10 o’clock opening, I think at the Riverhead opening, we had a line that was seven storefronts long of people that were just waiting to get in the store,” Alfaro said. “And for me, it kind of just put into perspective the work that we’ve done over the years and the impact that we actually have on people. So that was pretty special to see after all the years we put into building this.”

T.J. Cristina said seeing the company’s growth over the last couple of years has been one of the most exciting things he has experienced with the business.

Alfaro said they are eyeing two more storefronts within the next year. He said they will continue to develop their brand and familiarize people across the country with their products.

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