The-Leader_1985-10-03

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Ollicial •
ttlewspapei •
Village of
Fteepoft
•
- FreepofI
School District
•
. Baldwin -
Sctiool District
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This Issue :^
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FREEPORT. NE\V YdRK.
SlstYEAR, No. 24 .
OCTOBER 3,1985
FREErORT UEUoniAL LIBRARY
« MERRICK. ROAD " "
FREEPQRT H Y i u go 29
PRICE 25* PER COPY
'Gloria^ Punch Blocked locally
Hurricane Na Match For Court Orders Freeporters Uhfazed
Baldwin Fire Deparfmenf i^^y^ Primary As Most Lights Stay On
BALDWIN r Starting eariy in the week of Septembier 23,-as the
National Weather Bureau.tracked Hurridme Gloria on her northward
path, the Baldwin Fire Siepartment began to prepare for wHat was
being billed as "the storm<j the cetUuty." V
Thursday morning, Gloria made'lis turn and headed up the east
coast and landfall was predicted
to be Friday morning, September .
27, with Long- Island her new
potential target.'
' Baldwin Fire Department Chief
Robert Leigh called a' meeting
for Thursday evening,-at 7 pro.
The meeting was attended, by
all the department's, chief of­ficers,
the Fire District Super­visor
and his staff.. Plans were
formulated' to include a storm
watch to continue until all danger
was passed, notification to.all
store: owners. to tape all plate .
glass windows, opening of a shel­ter
(o house evacuees, and to alert
and later evacuate residents that
would be effected by the then pre­dicted
tidal surge of 8-lS-feeL.
Further plans were also formu­lated
by the. Fire Department to
set up a fleet of s n ^ boats to
remove residents trapped in
flooded areas. .Crews were
formed to cut up trees and to
open up streets for emergency
operations ani^.' emergency
vehicles.
Ez-Caplains Joseph Argenzio,
Thomas' Gruber > and Rodnqr-
Cools, assisted by the Baldwin-
Junior, Fire Department, were
given the task of opening and
operaUng a shelter at the Senior
High-School. Ex-Chief Robert
Noble's assignment was to as-
' semble boats and devise a plan
to remove residents trapped in
high water.
The captains of the seven fire
companies were. instructed to
contact all their ' members and
ascertjun who would be avail­able
for stand-by duty, who.
had a boat or chainsaw, etc.
All oSicets worked late into the
night. The Baldwin Fire Depart­ment's
storm watch .continued
throughout Thursday i^ghl, with
a meeting planned-for 4 am Fri­day.
-, ' . ' : .
TMs early morning - meeting
was also attended-by Robert
Noble, General -Supervisor, of
Sanitation District ffly and:
. arrangements were made to send
out all sanitation tru^s as eariy
as possible to &ee employees,
ihany of whom are also volunteer
firefighters from Baldwin, Roose­velt,
and South Heinpsteaid.
. It became apparent at that tinie
that there would be little or no
outsideiielp available to Baldwin
during'the storm and that the bur­den
and responsibility of the
safety and protection of the town
would fall solely on the shoulders,
of the Baldwin Fire Department.
By S am, three additional dis­patchers
went on duty in the
Baldwin Fire Department Alarm
Bureau. Department • Chief
Mechanic Dom Famularo double-checked
all fire apparatus and
emergency generators for full
readiness.
. A t 6 am, Baldwin School
(Cent, on Page 5>
r^a-i-iiir- •j^'i^^^Hit
rif'.l&lSS^ateaEwi
STORM DAMAGE. This house on Baldwin Avenue is Just one of the
Baldwin homes to experience heavy damage from th; high winds of
Hurricane Glcria.
(Photoby Baldwin Fire Depl.)
MINEOLA - Registered * Re­publicans
in the 67th Election
District of the 18tli Assembly -
District in Freeport will have yet
another opportunity to go to the.
polls in a primary election to be
held in the near future.
The results of the September
10, village-wide Republipan
primary were ruled invalid this
week after Georgia Once, who
had tied for second place in that
election, brought an action
against the results.
State Supreme Court Justice
Stanley Harwood in his decision -
Wednesday, October 2;also ruled
that there would have to be a re-
_vole^ . .. — .,
According - to ' Justice Haf- •
wood's decision, "20 of the 119
voters in that GOP primary itere
registered Democrats 'and thus
ineligible. The results .were so
close (Edward ' Monroe, .56;
. Jerome Lewis, 53; Georgia Grice,-
53; and Archie Chisholm, SI)
that the meligible' votes could
have substantially inade a
difference and there is no way. to
determine.how they actually cast
their ballots.
During the court hearing,' it
was jioted- that among the 20
• registered Democrats who had
(Cont. on Page 15
Arrests Signal
Crackdown On
Prostitution,
FREEPORT - Sii women-were
arrested on charges of prostitu­tion
late Saturday nig^t Sep­tember
28, and early Simday
morning,'in the central part of
the Village of Freeport.
The arrests were the beginning
of a crackdown ordered by Mayor
Dorothy Storm after a simHar
-move by the Village of Hemp­stead
apparently resulted in
driving the prostitutes into
Freeport.
The arrests were made by
Officer John Kilbride, both
whom were off-duty at the time.
Mayor Storm had authorized
over-time pay to any officer who
makes a prostitution arrest after
being approached while in their
own car and in civilian clothes.
The arrests . look place at
Church Street and Sunrise High­way;
Guy Lombardo and Sunrise
Highway; and in the rear of the
apartment building at UO Brook-
(Conl.onPagelS)
FREEPORT - As Hurricane Gloria bore down pn the Village last Fri­day,
September 27, Freeport was ready. Residents could be seen at
local stores, stocking up on batteries and candles, milk, bread, beet-'
and potato chips. It was hard to find a "D" battery or a flashlight and
lines at stores Thursday night and early Friday morning were long. '
Windows were taped or board­ed
up and welcoming messages to placed on stand-by in antici-
Glona were scrawled on the pation of the storm. Firemen
boards. On the Freeport Recrea­tion
Center's bubble, an unidenti-
, fied wit had scrawled the mes­sage,
"Please Return to the Vil­lage
of FreeporL" -
Evacuation sites had been
selected and, as the winds
roared and the waters surged
higher, more than 900 residents
jsought shelter at Dodd Junior.
High School, the primary site;
Freeport High and ^other l.ocal
schools;:, Uie Nation'al Guard
Armory on Babylon Turnpike;
the. Salvation Army Community
Center; the FreepOTt Recreation.
Center; Village Court; Our Holy
Redeemer Chiuch; and Lydia E.
Hall Hospital, where the sick,
infirmed and aged were offered
beds, food and even television.
Village employees, volunteers
aind .Mayor Dorothy Storm
sought and secured food dona­tions
for the' evacuation sites
from the A & P, Grand Union,
Key Food, Gouz, Glass Oven
Bakery, Dunkin ' Donuts and
Jason's Deli.
Between 7:30 am and 8 pm Fri­day,
Freeport's volunteer fire­fighters-
responded, to 51 calls
for help, -the majority of which
involved problems relating to
downed and/or damaged elec­trical
wires. No serious injuries
were reported &om the fire calls.
The extraordinarily busy day
-for the FreeportTire I>epartment
began at "7^30 am when* it was
manned each firehouse 'and
units were dispatched on a dis­trict-
by-district basis.
At abo.ut 8:30 am, the calk
began to come in and they'were
from'all over the village, mainly
for - wires burning on roofs,
electrical .sparks ^ m basement
panels and trees uprooting wires.
Included in the 51 calls wdre two
fires, resulting in moderate
damage, gne on Rutland Roid,
the other''o'n' Harding -Place." •
. Both invoI\-ed electric panels in
basements and «-ire storm
caused.
In between fire calls, the de­partment
performed a number of
evacuations, which became more
and more frequent as the storm
surge tides moved in after 11 am.
Several calls in the south
section of the Village resulted in
"old fashioned foot- response."
Deep flood waters prevented fire- -
men from reaching calls with -
their apparatus, so the men hiked
two or three blocks on foot,
through several feet of water,
with fire extinguishers on their
backs. Fortunately, none of those
fires were extensive.
The stand-by was discontinued''
' at 7:30 pm, but the department
continuni to respond t^tseveral
calls during the evening. <-•
The department's four-chie&
extend their thanks to the many
- dedicated firemen p who gave up
(Com, on Page 16)
WADIMG DOWN THE STREET as the eye ct Hurricane Gloria tp asse
over nearby, residents of South Freeport are knee-deep in water in the
middle of Guy Loml>ardo Avenue. At some parts of the street, the
water was waist-deep, cars were flooded aljove their seats and gar­ages,
tjasements and playrooms were water-logged.
(Photo byjhe Klarikaitis Family)