Readers Write: High praise for Vigilant, none for Bral

The Island Now

I’d like to publicly thank the entire Vigilant team for answering my phone call and quickly getting me to the E.R. last Friday June 9, when I was home alone and overtaken with a sudden and debilitating ailment.

The responsiveness, attentiveness, and acumen of Vigilant’s volunteers were far superior to the professional medical treatment I received once at the E.R., where my condition was misdiagnosed, and I was forced to return just 12 hours after I was discharged.

John B. Gilliar gave $100 to start the Vigilant Fire Company in 1904.

His son Frank J. Gilliar, fire chief, spearheaded the fundraiser in 1937 to purchase an ambulance and thereby give rise to the Vigilant volunteer ambulance service.

For 80 years the Vigilants have served our community well.

Suddenly, in this election cycle in the Village of Great Neck in 2017, Mayor Bral is implying, both directly and through intermediaries, that he is the godsend of this 80-year-old institution.

Some things you can get away with lying about. This is not one of them.

Mr. Bral has had absolutely nothing to do with the service our fire department and ambulances provide.

Those of us supporting Rebecca Gilliar to become the mayor of the Village of Great Neck find it difficult to imagine why anyone would vote for the other guy, the current mayor.

He takes credit for the idea of LED street lights, but this was an idea that originated with the previous mayor.

He says he gets the potholes filled, but this is done on a schedule by the Department of Public Works.

He says he invented the idea of adding a medic to the midnight to 7:00 a.m. ambulance shift, but this came from the Vigilant Fire Department itself.

There are other things for which he takes undeserved credit. One is transparency.

The mayor kept secrets for two years, yet he tells us he is a master of transparency.

He hid the million-dollar deficit. He hid his meetings with developers.

When he has to appoint board members, he does not do outreach. He is disconnected from most of the community.

Mayor Bral has been a divisive force here, and if we let him stay in power he will continue to undermine the public institutions that make this a community.

Matt Ruzz

Great Neck

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