Over a dozen residents emailed Bonnie Parente, the mayor of East Williston Village, about the new sign currently under construction.
The village received grant funding to erect a new digital sign that was placed at the intersection of Sagamore Avenue and East Williston Avenue near the train station. The board is now considering relocating the sign after the public raised many questions at the village’s board meeting on Monday, May 12.
“We thought the industrial look of the Long Island Rail Road would be a good place for it,” the mayor said.
Parente said she received 13 emails with what she called “feedback” about the sign and that overall the sentiment was negative.
One resident asked the board why the community had not been made aware of the sign earlier in the construction process.
“What is the point where you ask for the people of the village’s input on something instead of constructing something that now has to be deconstructed?” the resident asked.
Parente had said the board did not want the sign on the village green or facing a building. She said the sign would be mostly used to promote recruitment for the East Williston Fire Department.
Trustee James Iannone said the number of firefighter recruitments has been down throughout the county and that both of his children are volunteers at the fire department.
One person said just because the residents are against the current location of the sign, that does not indicate that they are against the fire department, which was met with a round of applause from both residents and board members.
Multiple residents said the execution of the sign was not what they expected.
Parente said after the meeting that the board’s mistake was unveiling the sign while it was still under construction rather than waiting for it to be finished.
“We don’t want to do something that is negative for the village,” the mayor said.
Although the new location of the sign was not finalized, the board said that directly across the street from the fire department, located further south on Sagamore Ave., would be a likely destination.
The board also announced that trustee Rushi Vaidya was named the 2025 Firefighter of the Year by the local fire department later in the meeting.
