Friday, November 11, 2016
Vol. 93, No.9
FOUNDED 1923
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LOCALLY OWNED AND EDITED
Friendship Luncheon PAGES 48-49 n New Bull on 7th St. PAGE 3
Raises for eight employees approved by Village Board
COUNTY CHAMPS, AGAIN
BY RIKKI N. MASSAND Pending approval from the Civil Service Employees’ Association (CSEA) labor union, with which the Village of Garden City has been unable to reach a new labor contract for over three and a half years, eight municipal employees will be receiving significant “step increases” as approved last Thursday. The Village Board of Trustees took a most unusual step with its published meeting agenda for November 3, as items involving personnel are regularly discussed in an executive session given consideration of confidentiality. But with action to approve the raises as part of their civil service pay schedule “grades” at last Thursday night’s meeting, step adjustments plus longevity and bonus payments are now in play. Employees with raises approved last week include three in supervisory roles and five personnel under the rank and file designation. Supervisory positions approved for raises are Senior Groundskeeper Timothy Messner, Recreation Supervisor (Pool Director) Steve Espey and Sandra Young, recreation program development supervisor. The rank and file employees set for step increases are the tree pruner, Robert O’Kane, Sam Simone, a maintenance supervisor, and three recSee page 43
The Girls Varsity Swimming and Diving team took top honors this weekend defeating rivals Long Beach, Bellmore-Merrick, and Manhasset to claim their 18th consecutive County Championship. See page 64.
Village explains raises, Ring Road hotel hearing continues Nov. 17 CSEA has more questions BY RIKKI N. MASSAND Early November brought quiet and minor clarifications to one public hearing at Village Hall, after an October 20 meeting where Garden City residents and other Long Islanders raised challenges to the looming application for a Marriott Residence Inn hotel. Before that comes up to the municipal processes of approval, zoning changes at the local level are required to permit hotel use in the commercial-residential (CR) district of the village.
The next round of statements at the hearing’s continuation on November 17 figures to be more substantial, as the period for local input from municipalities closest to Garden City, including Hempstead and Uniondale, is set to expire. Next Thursday, residents are going to have another chance to listen to environmental and strategic planning for the Roosevelt Field area Superfund site, as well as a chance to tell the governing body (the Village Board of Trustees) what they think about the proposed 163-
room hotel and its potential impact, including quality of life issues. Management from OTO Development, which will operate the new Residence Inn, spoke at the October 20 trustees’ meeting and touched upon some preliminary concerns residents had brought up. Last Thursday, Margaret “Margie” Rydzewski of Linden Street questioned the timetable of the public hearings on the permit for hotel use in the CR district zone, seeking clarifications on what See page 42
BY RIKKI N. MASSAND How and why the village decided to put forth raises for eight employees at the Thursday, November 3 meeting continues to be a topic this week, as the CSEA did not see the move as positively as the village has presented it. Midway through Board of Trustees’ review of the consent calendar, Deputy Mayor Richard Silver, who has been involved in the CSEA bargaining discussions, took time to elaborate on the employee raises as proposed and “provide more explanation on what we are doing and why we are doing it.” He said over the last eight years the village employee population has been reduced by roughly 20 percent. Total numbers for village employees went from approximately 320 in 2008 to 250 employees now. “Most of those reductions have been achieved through attrition. In some cases we have handled the resulting work by outsourcing it, which for example we did with the cleaning services for Village Hall See page 43
Girls Varsity Soccer wins Long Island championship PAGE 55 Everett Vilander celebrates 100 years of life PAGE38