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Queens Comes Back: QDEC hosts block party

glendaleregstg on October 14, 2021

 

By Evan Triantafilidis

 

Over 40 vendors and 1,000 people gathered in an outdoor backlot of Kaufman Astoria Studios for the Queens Comes Back event this past weekend. The event was hosted by the Queens Economic Development Corporation.

QEDC executive director Seth Bornstein said it was gratifying to see people come together and support local businesses, especially after the last 18 months.

“When I look at this crowd, it represents the borough,” he said. “The vendors, the people here, there’s no majority and no minority.”

Bornstein said he wanted to give back, both to local businesses and to the public, resulting in the event not charging vendors a fee and no charge to the public to enter.

From plant-based and vegan cakes by Pudding Pan Desserts to Romanian sweets from Twister Cake Bakery, sweet tooths were left satisfied as lines formed outside each vendor booth throughout the day. Spanish cuisine from Sala Astoria was served and washed down with cocktails by QNSY Sparkling Cocktails.

“As an entrepreneur, it was an exciting and energizing networking opportunity,” said Tara Merdjanoff, co-founder of QNSY Sparkling Cocktails.

Performances were held throughout the day featuring Gotham Dance Theater, Chieh Hsiung, Manhatitlan Mexican Folkloric Dance Group and Greek American Folklore Society.

The original Queens Taste event is usually held annually on the first Monday of May, said Rob MacKay, director of public relations for QEDC. In past years, places like the New York’s Hall of Science and Citi Field hosted the indoor event.

MacKay said this year’s outdoor event exceeded his expectations.

“We’ve been through a lot as an agency that helps small businesses and they’ve been through a lot, but I feel like a lot of people have stabilized and found out ways to work around stuff,” said MacKay. “It’s a morale booster to show we’re going to make it.”

Grey Jones, Sightseer/Historian

glendaleregstg on October 14, 2021

Grey Jones is a self-described sight-seeing guy. However, he is hoping to do more than take pictures of New York’s most famous landmarks.
Jones moved to Brooklyn nine years ago after growing up in Louisiana and Texas. Back in the Lone Star State, he became involved with organizing an annual Juneteenth festival, long before it was a recognized federal holiday.
Now in Brooklyn, Jones aims to continue finding ways to celebrate and recognize the African-American experience.
“I started walking around in the neighborhood and wanted to do some research,” Jones explained of his many walks around Flatbush, Prospect Heights, and Lefferts Garden.
In his travels Jones encountered the Flatbush African Burial Ground, the last remaining burial site for enslaved African Americans in the city. Many of the people buried at the site are unidentified, so he set out trying to uncover their names and what he could about their lives.
“It was really hard to do that research and find those people,” Jones explained. “Some of the names are redundant and you are not sure if they are a unique person or the same person. It’s a challenge to get records and access information that might be useful.”
Jones not only wanted to recognize these people, but to also celebrate them. He hopes to eventually organize a 17 day freedom festival, which would mark the 17 days between Juneteenth and July 5, the day many African Americans in New York celebrated independence in 1776 when they heard the news.
“I tried to discover 17 insulated people who may have been buried at the Flatbush burial site,” Jones said. “I just found so much history around the life and culture of these people, and it was completely different from what I presumed. Our culture has such a great tradition of celebration, so we should celebrate these people.”

Leaving the county for another country

glendaleregstg on October 14, 2021

If you follow the Queens borough president on Facebook, you might have noticed that it was a busy week for Donovan Richards.
There was the installation of electric vehicle charging stations in Laurelton, a visit to Rudy’s Bakery in Ridgewood for the Queens Shops Small series, the unveiling of a statue of Claire Shulman at Crystal Windows, a visit to PS 19 in Corona, extended COVID testing at Borough Hall, and a rally to urge Governor Kathy Hochul to put the proposed AirTrain to LaGuardia on the shelf.
Or rather, the people who work in the Borough President’s Office were busy, because the borough president himself spent the first week of October on a trip to Ukraine.
He was there to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the Babi Yar Massacre, in which 100,000 Jews were killed by the Nazis during World War II. The trip was paid for by the Assembly of Nationalities of Urkraine and facilitated by The Blue Card, the group who invited the guests.
The trip was kept hush-hush, with no mention that Richards would be leaving the country. His office has refused to comment on what expenses were covered for Richards.
The office did state that the official reason for the trip was to show solidarity with the Ukrainian and Jewish populations of Queens. Residents living in the borough who identify as Ukrainian American make up less than 1 percent of the population.
Technically, there is nothing illegal about Richards accepting a paid trip as long as there is ostensibly an official aspect to the visit. (See above paragraph.)
It just seems curious that his office wasn’t more forthcoming about the trip. You would think if the purpose of the trip was to show solidarity with the Ukrainian population in Queens, it might be nice if they knew about it.
Something seems a little off.
But don’t worry, if you live in Queens you were in good hands. The borough president’s purely ceremonial duties were in the capable hands of Franck Joseph, the borough president’s chief of staff, who stood in for Richards at all of the events we mentioned above.

Vaccine realities

glendaleregstg on October 14, 2021

Dear Editor,
Your editorial in the October 7th issue is myopic in claiming that the unvaccinated “now are the last obstacle standing in the way of finally ending this pandemic.”
The scientific evidence shows that a mucosal virus as SARS-CoV-2 is best targeted vaccinologically via intranasal immunization since it induces high levels of neutralizing antibodies.
The pandemic is still spreading since the oro-nasal route of transmission is not blocked by the current intramuscular (IM) route of inoculation of Pfizer, Moderna, and J & J vaccines.
However, intranasal immunization studies show robust systemic and mucosal immunity, thus curtailing and possibly eradicating pandemic spread. Recent Israeli studies show the waning effects of the Pfizer format after two months of the second shot, with efficacy down to 20 percent six months later.
With mucosal immunity, masks would be obsolete. An IM booster treadmill is perpetuating spread and facilitating the proliferation of new viral variants due to natural selection of immune pressure.
Several models, such as an Oral Polio-vectored SAR-CoV-2, would be promising to curtail the spread. The right idea in the wrong hands is the wrong idea.
Joseph N. Manago
Briarwood

The right to go

glendaleregstg on October 14, 2021

Dear Editor,
In June 2021, then-NYC Transit president Sarah Feinberg said she would like to reopen subway station bathrooms as quickly as possible. Three months later, MTA Chairman Janno Lieber said there are no immediate plans to reopen the existing 76 bathrooms inside the city’s 472 subway stations.
How many NJ Transit and PATH station bathrooms are open, closed or never had a bathroom to begin with? I guess when riding the subways, Lieber has never had the urge to go. Perhaps his bladder is stronger than most riders.
Until the early 1960s, subway riders respected authority. There was a ten-cent fee to use station bathrooms. That generation of riders did not litter, spit, or urinate on subway platforms or cars.
Before COVID-19, riders were always reluctant to use subway station bathrooms, even when available. Many stations had no working facilities or were closed. No one wanted to deal with the lack of toilet paper, soap or hot water, unhinged doors to stalls or finding a mess left behind by the previous patron.
Who wanted to find others using it as a safe place for consumption of drugs or sex? Homeless people afraid to go to shelters end up using the bathroom sink to shower in an attempt to maintain hygiene.
Why not assign a matron to each male and female bathroom? Ask any local business, college or hospital to adopt an adjacent station bathroom to help cover the costs of staffing. In exchange, give the sponsor free advertising space at the station.
If necessary, charge a nominal fee to use the facility. Reopening secure, safe subway station bathrooms with adequate supplies of toilet paper, soap and hot water would be one way to attract several million riders who have yet to return.
Sincerely,
Larry Penner
Great Neck

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