Bethpage-Tribune_1976-02-05

              BETHIPGE
i'X %& . » i A
ISLAND TREES
OLD BETHPAGE
also serving
PLA1NVIEW PLAINEDGE SEAFORD
VOL. 10 NO. 11 Thursday, February S, 1976 wmm tl Ifl 11BRARY 10 cents per copy
St. Martin's Celebrates Tobay Board Considering
Catholic School Month Refuse Schedule To Hold Costs
STUDENT COUNCIL OFFICERS: <L. to R.) - John De Zeryos,
president, Wioirred Donaghue, treasurer?, Noreen Hughes,
secretary Maureen O'Connell, vice president.
February is Catholic school
Month, and St. Martin of Tours
will open this most important
event on February 8 with a
Children's Mass a 10 a.m. The
Liturgy lor this Mass was
prepared by the children of our
school. Readings will be done by
the following students - 5th grade
Sean O'Mara, 6th Grade Barbara
Wanamaker, 7th Grade John
Sweeney, 8th grade Cathy
Collins, and a special music
program has been planned for
this Mass by Sister Daria and
Mary Frances.
The public is invited to visit St.
Martin's school after the 10,11:15
and 12:30 masses on Sunday Feb.
8. "Please feel free to come ,
stated a school Administrator,
"our students are very proud of
their school and would like you to
share their pride. Members of the
faculty, student council and
Advisory Board will be present to
welcome you. You are also, in­vited
to visit our classrooms
while in session from 9:30 to 11
A.M. on Feb. 9 and 10th," he
continued.
Students will also present a
bicentennial Song Fest on
Wednesday Feb. 11 at 1.00 p.m.,
in commemoration of the
Bicentennial.
Concern Grows Over Proposed Dezoning
Of Plainview Shopping Center
Community concern over the
forthcoming February 10 Hippo
Enterprises Discoteque hearing
continued to grow last week, as it
was revealed that Hippo's
petition to the Oyster Bay Town
Board calls for downzoning the
entire Plainview Shopping Center
from a "Neighborhood" Business
District to a "General" Business
District.
The Plainview Shopping
Center, located at the northeast
corner of the intersection of South
Oyster Bay Road and Woodbury
Road, is comprised of six
separate building lots. Local
residents and civic groups had
been led to believe that the Hippo
petition would request don-wzoning
of only the one lot on
which the Hippo Discotheque
would be located. This in itself
was enough to generate
tremendous local opposition.
Until last week, however, there
was never any hint that more
than the Discoteque was at issue.
The news that the shopping
center landlord has joined with
Hippo in a petition to downzone
the entire Shopping Center can be
expected to intensify local op­position
to an unprecedented
degree. j
"This only serves to prove what
we've been saying all along,"
observed Clearview Village Civic
Association President Roy Entin.
"Once you begin the process of
downzoning a neighborhood
shopping center, there's no
earthly way of stopping it. It's got
to be stopped before it starts."
, Entin has been joined : by
Greater Plainview Community
Association President Paul
Eisenstein in urging all area
residents to attend the Town
Board Hearing on the Hippo
petition. "It's up to all of us to let
the Board know how vital it is
that this petition be denied,"
noted Eisenstein.
Due to the widespread public
interest in this matter, the Town
Board has scheduled an evening
hearing, commencing at 8:00
p.m. on Tuesday, February 10, at
Town Hall East on Audrey
Avenue in Oyster Bay. Buses will
be available to transport local
residents to the hearing, leaving
from the Baylis School on
Woodbury Road in Syosset at 7:15
p.m.
For more information, call
Clearview Village's Roy Entin at
822-2930 or GPCA's Paul
Eisenstein at 822-4086.
A new garbage collection
schedule currently being con­sidered
by the Town Board will
be aimed at holding down the
costs of this service to prevent
tax increases in the special
collection districts, it was an­nounced
by Town Supervisor
John W. Burke.
"The proposal under con­sideration
is aimed at reducing
the operating and maintenance
costs of collection services by
reducing the amount of overtime
and personnel required under the
current schedule," Burke said.
In the two collection districts
administered by the town, gar­bage
now is collected three times
a week with rubbish collection
scheduled on one of these days.
"With two collection districts, we
have been in a position of having
a six-day collection schedule on a
five-day work week," Burke
explained. "This necessitated
establishment of rotational shifts
for the Sanitation Division but
still required having ap­proximately
15 percent more
personnel than would be needed
for a work week with a matching
work schedule."
OTB Wins Big
In Bethpage
The Bethpage branch of
Nassau Downs-OTB marked its
sixth month of operation this
month with the announcement
that OTB has acquired an ad­ditional
parking area adjacent to
its office. When renovation work
on this debris-ridden lot is
complete an additional 25 to 30
spaces will be available to OTB
customers as well as shoppers
utilizing nearby stores.
Located at 940 Broadway,
across from Grumman's and
adjacent to the Farmer's Market,
this office of the Nassau Regional
Off-Track Betting Corp. (the
official designation of Nassau
OTB) has proven to be an active
branch that has met with im­mediate
bettor- acceptance.
The Bethpage branch has
generated a betting handle of
over $2-1 2 million, representing
approximately 11 per cent of the
total 1975 Nassau OTB wagering
handle of $28,575,109.
"Bethpage's contribution is
rather impressive," stated an
OTB spokesman, "especially in
light of the fact that OTB has
opened four more offices since
Bethpage welcomed its first
bettor last July 9. Notwithstand­ing
the "competition," Bethpage
has continued to grow,"
It's come a long way from the
Opening Day handle of $5,310.
Now, on an average weekday,
Bethpage handles close to an
average of $14,000. Saturdays, the
numbers are considerably higher
... $19,873, $21,180, $24,452. v..
November 22, Bethpage hit its
highwater level with a total
betting figure of $28,134.
Being considered by the Board
is a schedule that would change
garbage collection from three
times a week to twice a week
while continuing once-a-week
refuse collection. Residents who
have Town collection are on a
Monday-Wednesday-Friday or
Tuesday-Thursday-Saturday
schedule. Under the proposal now
being considered, residents will
have either a Monday and
Thursday or a Tuesday, and
Friday collection schedule.
"In addition to cutting per­sonnel
requirements and
necessary overtime from the
costs of sanitation collection, the
new schedule can also help the
Town realize savings in the
maintenenace division," ac­cording
to Burke. "While the six-day
work schedule frequently
forces overtime in our main
tenance division, the proposed
plan would actually give the
maintenance men more time to
work on sanitation trucks within
a five-day work week." The
proposed schedule would affect a
lessening of wear on collection
equipment, thereby further
reducing maintenance expenses
and could possibly result in fuel
savings.
"The savings in maintenance
costs and fuel consumption are
difficult to calculate and
probably cannot be predicted
without initiating the new
schedule," Burke noted, adding,
"however, it seems probable that
elimination of use of the vehicles
two additional days a week will
bring further savings.
•According to Burke, "Cutting
costs in this area is absolutely
essential if we are to prevent an
increase in the collection district
taxes in the 1977 budget. As it
stands now, it would be difficult
for the Town to finish this year in
the black in these districts unless
we adopt some major cost-saving
program. We have long been
reexamining the increasing costs
of this service to find ways of
reducing the expense and we are
beginning to believe that the new
schedule may be the only
alternative open to use.
For some time now, many
departments of this Town have
been managing to keep spending
reduced through compliance with
the job frfeeze provisions 1 was
forced to initiate. By doing
almost as much with fewer
personnel and by re-evaluating
and improving productivity
procedures, the Town Board has
generally been successful in
keeping Town taxes stable
without noticeably reducing the
scope of the many basic services.
In sanitation collection we are at
a point where cost increases
make a reduction in schedules
unavoidable if we are to prevent
increasing the property tax
burden on the homeowner."
While it was with great
reluctance that the Board
(Continued on Page 12)
Two Local Men Promoted
To Grumman Management
Pictured above is Mr. Harold M.
Moss. s
Pictured above is Mr. William J.
Tebo.
Implementing recently stated plans of Grumman Aerospace
Corporation to develop new markets for the company, the Bethpage
firm has included two local men in its recent list of key management
appointees to its newly-established Business Development Depar­tment.
The men are William J. Tab.o of Plainview and Harold M. Moss of
Old Bethpage. Tebo will be director of Proposal Operations, and
Moss director of Operations Analysis.
Reorganization of the company's new-business activities involves
a major consolidation and streamlining effort in this area, the
biggest such move in many years.