Voters in the Roslyn area remain satisfied with the performance of their local board of trustees. On Tuesday, March 18, the villages of Roslyn, Roslyn Estates and East Hills will hold elections. There are no challengers to the incumbents, even though some board members and one judge are retiring.
In the Village of Roslyn, Mayor John Durkin and board members Sarah Oral and Marta Genovese are all running for re-election. Durkin has been mayor since 2001 and is running for his seventh term.
In the Village of Roslyn Estates, Mayor Jeffrey Schwartzberg is also running uncontested for another term. He will be joined on the ballot by Deputy Mayor Jeff Lindenbaum and Rodney Kazam, who is running for the other trustee seat as the current trustee Eyal Isaac is stepping down after one term.
The same is true in the Village of East Hills. Michael Koblenz, now in his 20th year as mayor, is running unopposed. However, longtime Trustee Gary Leventhal will not run for re-election.
Stacey Siegel will run on the Unity Party ticket for Leventhal’s seat, while Mitchell Studley, the acting village justice, will run for a full term. Siegel, according to Unity Party officials, developed the Kids in the Park Committee and has planned, implemented and supervised programs for the families of East Hills over the past four years.
Studley, who has been acting village justice for the past eight years, is running for a full term. Prior to serving as acting justice, Studley was a village prosecutor for 17 years. Another integral part of the team is Trustee Brian Meyerson who is currently a Trustee on the Board, and prior to holding this office was a Village Prosecutor for three years.
Meyerson is the third trustee running unopposed on the Unity ticket. Meyerson replaced Peter Zuckerman on the board when Zuckerman was appointed to the Town of North Hempstead board in March 2014. Prior to his years as a trustee, Meyerson was a village prosecutor for three years.
Despite the lack of opposition, Unity Party members are taking no chances. Koblenz said he is “delighted” to be running with his new team.
“Mitchell Studley will dispense justice fairly and judiciously,” Koblenz said. “Brian Meyerson will continue to help oversee the Building Department and review village codes. Stacey Siegel will lend her background in economics, together with her MBA, to ensure an added perspective on finances and budgeting, while continuing to be an advocate for our families. Together, my exceptional running mates will help us face head-on, and solve, the major issues that our village now faces and will face in the future. We need to keep taxes down and contain our expenses, whether through shared services programs or any other means. While many other communities are passing laws, which allow them to exceed the two percent cap placed by Albany legislators, taxes in East Hills will not be increased for yet another year.
“I will continue to vigorously oppose excessive airline noise and pollution,” the mayor added. “We will make every effort to stop commercial projects, whether in East Hills or elsewhere, that will lead to over congestion from traffic caused by deliveries and shipments. I want to embrace new ideas, such as our recently installed generator to power Village Hall and Theatre during electrical outages. I want to implement new concepts like our Instant Access Program on our state-of-the-art website that invites questions or suggestions and provides answers and responses around the clock.
Then too, I want to adopt further reforms to our laws so long as they do not unfairly infringe on the rights of our residents. I will also continue to ardently support our committees that are holding outstanding events for kids and seniors. At the same time I will ensure that our pool, our park and our services remain the finest to keep our home values at record levels. I want to continue to infuse excitement and innovation in East Hills, so that our residents remain proud of the fine reputation our community enjoys, along with it the facilities and programs.”
