Dear Richard Solomon and, by indirection, Mayor Kreitzman:
It was so sad to read poor Mr. Solomon’s letter in the Sept. 21 issue of this paper. This fellow is obviously unaccustomed to being put in his place, which clearly belongs in Kings Point and not in our “blight(ed)” and “abandoned” village of Great Neck. His letter generally referred to the site of the former Mobil gas station at the southwest corner of Middle Neck and Steamboat roads.
As a sensitive and civic-minded soul, Village of Kings Point resident Solomon has obviously been traumatized by having to “pass the Village of Great Neck eyesore location on the way home from the train station.” Wow: that’s enough to give any self-respecting 1-percenter angina.
And although sufficient to cause heartburn in anyone zipping past us from Village of Kings Point, if he had not been so rattled by his terrible experience perhaps Mr. Solomon would be capable of a fairer, more objective appraisal of Village of Great Neck’s board meetings and officials; perhaps he’d even give a thought to the peasants who have to live here.
As it happened, I was present at the same Village of Great Neck meeting, or at least I think I was. Mr. Solomon’s impressions of that meeting have so little in common with my own that I’m not really sure! Residents who actually know something about Village of Great Neck know that Mr. Habib is one of the most consistently thoughtful and hard-working members of any of our boards.
However, no board member has, or should have endless patience for the irrelevant and inappropriate. The hour was late, past 11 p.m., and the chairman wanted to adjourn public comment until the next meeting.
Village of Great Neck residents who had packed the hall to speak, largely against, the 7-Eleven proposal, raised noisy objection to being shooed out of the hall before they had a chance to be heard. These are people who will be directly and negatively affected by board approval of a 7-Eleven in their quiet residential midst.
We are horrified by the very real possibility of a 24-hour cheap deli, unwelcome and inappropriate, with ugly architecture, intrusive lights, a grotty dumpster in front (how are you going to like that, Mr. Solomon?), constant garbage to attract rats and other pests, a certain crime magnet for the beer and cigarette crowd, will be forced on us against our will.
In response to our residents’ outcry, the zoning chairman wearily agreed to hear from three members of the public.
When I say “public,” I think everyone expected Village of Great Neck residents to speak, not aesthetically annoyed Village of Kings Point passersby. But despite the lateness of the hour, and ignoring the fact that people with serious, demonstrable interests in the outcome were trying to express their concerns, Mr. Solomon jumped to his feet and rushed to the front of the room past Village of Great Neck neighbors waiting in the aisle to speak.
He wasn’t recognized by the chairman; perhaps he assumed that what he had to say was more important than anyone else’s comments. And despite the strict policy of the board, Mr. Solomon did not even give his name or address before he began speaking.
Indeed, audience members had to call out for these revealing tidbits of information before Mr. Solomon finally let us know that he wasn’t even a Village of Great Neck resident. He was listened to with as much patience and courtesy as demanded by his subject, the hour and the orator, a person who had crashed our very important village discussion and pushed his way ahead of people with far more pressing interests in the matter.
As I recall, when the board had heard enough to get the drift of Mr. Solomon’s remarks, the chairman politely thanked him for his opinion and called on a Village of Great Neck resident to speak.
I honestly can’t recall any actions or remarks of Mr. Habib that rationally could have prompted Mr. Solomon’s retaliatory screed. If (I repeat, if ) Mr. Habib waved his hand toward Mr. Solomon in a motion later interpreted by sensitive natures as dismissive, it was no more than any weary civic official would have done under similar circumstances.
Not being directly affected by any eventual outcome (I trust), the urgency of Mr. Solomon’s interruption would be hard for anyone to understand. (But perhaps Mr. Solomon is friends with other Village of Kings Point residents who have more at stake in this matter than he does.)
Whatever the outcome of the 7-Eleven proposal, Mr. Solomon certainly will not have to endure, for the rest of life in his village, a sleazy, noisy, brightly lit, dumpster-filled hang-out for people who don’t want to go home (assuming they have a legal habitation anywhere in the vicinity).
Village of Great Neck residents know all too well the dangers of attracting the transitory dwellers of illegal housing. I doubt if any resident of Village of Kings Point feels this omnipresent danger as do we who would be in the literal firing line of this 7-Eleven . Therefore Mr. Solomon, please accept the idea that Village of Great Neck residents know a great deal more about this 7-Eleven proposal than you do.
Do you think we like living next to a toxic brownfield? Do you think we are mindlessly opposing an otherwise welcome addition to our neighborhood? No. Our quality of life will be disrupted and even directly threatened by this odious “business opportunity” – which means that someone who lives miles away will make lots of money for themselves and leave our neighborhood to deteriorate and decay.
While you’re at it, please also refrain from further hyper-sensitive personal attacks on Village of Great Neck officials. I know they’re not much and some of them are really quite awful, but Mr. Habib is not one of those. But for your own civic edification, try going to a Village of Kings Point meeting. That’s the real epitome of an etiquette-free zone for non-residents.
Elizabeth Allen,
Great Neck
