Farmingdale School District
The Farmingdale School District budget vote and trustee election will be held on Tuesday, May 21 from 6 a.m. to 9 p.m. in the Howitt East gymnasium at 74 Van Cott Avenue in Farmingdale. Voter parking will be available in the Van Cott Avenue parking lot. All voters should enter through the Howitt building main entrance near the flagpole.
Incumbents Russ Catanzaro and Tina Diamond are seeking re-election. Michael Goldberg seeks election. There are two trustee seats open for election this year.
The Farmingdale Observer was unable to reach Russ Catanzaro before press time. The following was submitted by the candidates:
Tina Diamond
Tina Diamond is a lifelong Farmingdale resident and is a Farmingdale High School alum. She presently serves on the Farmingdale School Board as trustee, but has also served as vice president, for a total of 13 years. She is an executive board member of the Nassau-Suffolk School Board Association, a member of the Farmingdale Legislative Action Committee, and has served as the president, secretary and vice president of the Farmingdale Breakfast Rotary. Diamond has held many positions on the Farmingdale PTA, and serves as development committee chair for the Community Summit, and as vice president of the Concerned Citizens Association of Farmingdale.
Diamond attended Hofstra University and is retired from Corporate Freight as payment manager. She is married to Robert and has one son, who is also a Farmingdale High School graduate, 2003.
For over a decade, her goal as a member of the school board has not wavered or changed. Her duty as an elected member of this board is to be an active member of a body of officials that oversee and support our community’s school system, attempting to give our youth the best environment possible in which to learn and succeed. She seeks re-election to maintain my involvement in the Long Island and New York State School Board Associations, respectively, to bring a strong passion for our district’s students amongst legislature and other school boards.
Michael Goldberg
Michael Goldberg has a BBA in accounting from Hofstra University. Goldberg and his wife Jeannemarie are 17-year residents of Massapequa Park and have three children in the Farmingdale School District: Ryan, 16, is a 10th grader; Rebecca, 13, at Howitt Middle School, and Rachel, 9, is in fourth grade at Albany Avenue School.
Goldberg has over 20 years of corporate accounting and business experience including two successful turnarounds of $75 million-plus companies. Currently, he serves as controller for a national healthcare staffing company headquartered on Long Island. He is also the founder and owner of an event security company.
Goldberg feels that this is a very crucial time for Farmingdale schools, as all schools on Long Island grapple with budget cuts, state testing and common cure requirements, as well as implementing teacher evaluations, and he feels his business and accounting experience can offer district residents common sense solutions in a time of change.
With his background and because he has children in the district, at every level of education, Goldberg feels he’s better equipped to understand the challenges residents face. He stands among them. And, as a board member, he will fight for them.
