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Port Times Record

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Members of the Setauket Harbor Task Force. Photo from George Hoffman

Save the Sound’s most recent report card states that inner and outer Port Jefferson Harbor, as well as middle Port Jefferson Harbor (Setauket Harbor), are among Long Island Sound’s top five waterways, boasting strong water chemistry. Water chemistry ratings indicate that a body of water has healthy chemical conditions that support aquatic life and overall ecosystem health.

This is something to celebrate, as stormwater systems have steadily reduced our harbors’ nitrogen levels over the past 30 years.

However, despite our improved knowledge of waste disposal and our diligent efforts to test our water’s chemical and bacterial levels, more work remains to be done.

August’s devastating storm served as a stark reminder that Mother Nature is a powerful force. Despite our area’s best efforts, advanced technologies, and state-of-the-art flood safeguards, millions of dollars in damage proved that even our best preventive efforts can be in vain.

That is why we must not remain stagnant in our efforts to protect our island. Worsening weather conditions can easily overshadow even our most cautious endeavors. Following the recent storm, bacteria levels in Stony Brook Harbor and neighboring waterways spiked, creating an unsuitable environment for aquatic life—not to mention the dozens of fish that washed up on our streets.

So, TBR implores you: Please continue your efforts to keep our environment clean and safe. Properly dispose of household chemicals and waste, minimize fertilizer and pesticide use, and maintain your car to prevent leaks.

Don’t forget to pick up litter you see in the streets and be mindful of your own waste. Community cleanups are frequently held in our coverage areas, providing not only a great way to keep our environment pristine but also an opportunity to connect with fellow community members. Water conservation is crucial, as well. It helps maintain healthy water levels in rivers, lakes, and estuaries, preventing excessive pollution concentration, protecting our aquatic ecosystems, and ensuring sufficient water for recreation and wildlife survival.

Bask in the success of our environmental consciousness, but don’t rest on your laurels. Together, we can make Long Island cleaner and safer for our ecosystems than ever before!

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File photo by Raymond Janis

Saving our resources

Thank you, county Legislator Steve Englebright [D-Setauket] for your marvelous Port Jefferson Civic Association meeting presentation this past Monday, Oct. 14, regarding the natural geological forces that continue to reshape our North Shore.

The lecture explained why the North Shore harbors east of Mount Sinai have been washed away over the millennia, and why Mount Sinai is the next of six remaining harbors in nature’s destructive pathway. In the 1930s, Mount Sinai harbor entrance jetties were constructed to prevent the natural eastward drift of Port Jefferson beach sediment from occluding its entrance.

Not only did this help preserve the harbor’s spawning grounds for fish and its riparian habitat for wildlife. It also provided storm flood protection and preserved its wonderful recreational resources for boating, fishing, swimming and other outdoor activities. Its sediment drift prevention stabilized the foot of our bluff and permitted its millennially denuded surface to develop a lush vegetative cover over a span of eight-decades.

These benefits ceased by 2017 when the unmaintained western jetty succumbed to three decades of storm destruction. Its loss produced accelerated sand drift and foot erosion that led to the collapse of the bluff’s vegetated surface by 2019. Reconstruction of the jetty in 2020 is again preventing eastern beach drift, and the section with seawall construction is no longer experiencing toe erosion.

It appears that we will be able to piecemeal recover from this tragedy after expediting the experts’ plans for controlling drainage from above by: (a) removing all cliffside courts; (b) building an effective storm drainage system and berm; (c) establishing absorptive crest vegetation; (d) repairing the breakthrough areas of bluff erosion; and (e) moving new tennis and pickleball courts far from areas with drainage issues — perhaps to the lower parking lot with use of East Beach for overflow venue parking.

The sophisticated engineering and ongoing maintenance efforts of seawall “dikes” in the Netherlands is considered a global model for highly successful coastal flood defense, and proper maintenance of a seawall provides protection for high-rise buildings 20 feet from the sea in Miami. With proper maintenance, man can battle natures erosive forces. Although changes in our Phase II project would be bureaucratically inconvenient, perhaps we should consider saving taxpayers the burden of the expensive upland steel-wall component with the understanding that clubhouse relocation may be needed in the future.

Brookhaven Town should also be convinced to develop a comprehensive Water Protection Plan (including Port Jefferson) similar to that developed by Southampton Town. Visit www.southamptontownny.gov and click on “Coastal Res. & Water Prot. Plan.”

                                        Al Cossari

          Member of the Port Jefferson Erosion Commission

Rethinking grades: The return of the ‘Do No Harm’ policy

At the Three Village Board of Education meeting held on Oct. 9, President Susan Rosenzweig reopened a discussion concerning the district’s currently defunct “Do No Harm” Policy.

Last fall the board, in its less than infinite wisdom, made the decision to abolish this policy which had been in place for several years and stated that if a grade on a Regents exam would lower a student’s final grade it would not be counted as part of that grade. If the score enhanced the final grade, it would indeed count.

After the Grading Committee led by Brian Biscari, assistant superintendent for educational services, made a determination to rescind this option and count Regents grades as 10% of a student’s final grade, the board voted to instate the new policy. A large majority of parents were appalled by this decision and made their feelings known, but to no avail. Now, seemingly under the radar, this policy was brought to the forefront with no notice, at a board meeting with little-to-no attendance.

Rosenzweig introduced the discussion with the assertion that after the June 2024 Regents season it was necessary to reconsider the decision that was made last fall. Her point was such that several school districts of our caliber (Jericho and Syosset) do not count the exams in students’ GPAs and our students could be put at a disadvantage by doing so. The scores in Three Village had not moved when the “Do No Harm” option was available and since New York State does not recommend factoring their exams into a GPA, it is simply not necessary. Karen Roughley, vice president, was in strong support of Rosenzweig’s argument as other trustees remained as wishy-washy as expected: Vinny Vizzo refused to articulate a solid opinion, claiming to see both sides, and Shaorui Li repeated her ridiculous attestation that the board “should not override a decision made by a committee of 35 educators.”

Trustee David McKinnon, the voice of consistency and specificity, strongly supported keeping our students on par with other districts by allowing them the advantage of not being penalized by state exams that do not necessarily embody the proper assessment of children’s knowledge and skills. His strongest point was that the state doesn’t stand behind their own tests so why should Three Village students have their grades affected by them?

In the end, after Biscari restated his belief that Regents exams have “value” and are “important for data collection” and Scanlon reiterated that the state is not doing away with the tests — they are simply instituting new pathways to graduation — the board took a vote. In what seemed like a unanimous decision, the board voted to reinstate the “Do No Harm” Policy in regards to the New York State Regents Examinations.

It was not clear, but I would hope for the sake of our kids that “Do No Harm” will be in effect for the January 2025 Regents exams and that parents and students will be made aware of the policy’s restoration. Since this discussion was not part of the Oct. 9 meeting agenda it is highly unlikely that anyone who did not watch and/or take part in the meeting is cognizant that this change was made.

As an informed parent I encourage those with students who are enrolled in courses culminating in a Regents exam to pay attention to the changes that are apparently coming with no notification. Thankfully the unplanned discussion led to a positive development, one that can only help our children. Granted, it’s no 30-minute start time adjustment, but at least our kids will have some relief from Regents anxiety. If only last year’s final grades could be recalculated to undo any harm that may have been done.

    Stefanie Werner

   East Setauket

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Earl L. Vandermulen High School. File photo

By Peter Sloniewsky

The Port Jefferson Board of Education held its regular meeting on Oct. 8 to discuss a number of matters. The agenda included various actions and reports, including a variety of personnel decisions, policy updates and financial resolutions.

Among the important personnel actions, the board reapproved a student-teaching affiliation agreement with St. Joseph’s University for the upcoming school year. Several instructional substitute personnel were also appointed and rescinded, alongside teachers assistants. Concluding the board’s personnel actions, teachers Victoria Damm and Jeanette Garofola were appointed as advisers for the high school’s Gay-Straight Alliance and freshman class respectively.

On the financial side, the board ratified tax levies in the sum of approximately $39.8 million for the district alongside $3.4 million for the library in this upcoming school year. The district budget was also increased by $200,000 to cover damages from recent flooding. This portion of the meeting concluded with approval for a number of financial reports from the month of June.

The board also moved to approve policy changes to the district’s nondiscrimination policy for a first reading. These preliminary changes, entitled Policy 0100, would enable the district to follow the New York State Department of Education’s guidelines on creating a “safe, supportive and affirming school environment for transgender and gender-expansive students.”

During the reports portion of the meeting, Edna Louise Elementary Principal Amy Laverty gave a brief presentation on the school. Additionally, the board opened the meeting with resolutions recognizing recipients of the President’s Volunteer Service Award, as well as recognition for some administrative staff in the district.

The meeting concluded with a review of surplus items and welcoming of public comment. The board will reconvene for a work session on Oct. 22 and then again for a regular business meeting on Nov. 12.

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From left, magicians Jim Vines and Mike Maione will be at Theatre Three on Halloween night.

By Melissa Arnold

Journalism is exciting for many reasons, but for me, getting to have new experiences tops the list. Last week, I had my mind read over Zoom. That’s a first!

Magicians Jim Vines and Michael Maione were eager to share some of their gifts with me at the end of my interview about their upcoming shows. 

Vines is an absolute believer in the supernatural, and he said that a spirit could carry information over the many miles between his home and mine.

To demonstrate, Vines scribbled a three-digit number on a mini chalkboard without showing me. He set down his chalk and smiled. “Well, I’m committed now. Open your heart, and ask the spirit to tell you what I’ve written here.”

I played along, but I was nervous about ruining the trick — there are 900 possible three-digit numbers, after all. The odds of guessing correctly were miniscule. I shrugged and said, “I don’t know about this, Jim, but my number is 781.”

He grinned and showed me what he’d written — 781. Stunned, I screamed. 

Maione shook his head. “That was creepy, Jim. I don’t want any spirits around here. Let’s send them away.”

He made a table appear out of thin air, lit a candle with a snap of his fingers, and then wrote the words “Spirit, go home!” on a piece of paper. He held the paper up to the flame, and the words vanished as the candle flickered out.

Spooky? Yes. Fun? Absolutely. 

On Halloween night, Vines and Maione will invite the daring into a 70-minute experience of magic, mystery and history with Haunted Encounters: A Halloween Experience at Theatre Three.

The show is the first of its kind at the Port Jefferson theater. Following the success of their kid-friendly “Silly Sorcery Showcase” over the summer, Director of Development Douglas Quattrock said they hoped to produce a magic show geared more toward adults.

Add in the intimate, close-up setting of their downstairs second stage, the building’s lengthy history and ongoing rumors of hauntings at the theater, and you have the recipe for the perfect Halloween outing.

“A lot of people that work with us here are really of the belief that there are a couple of ghosts that hang around at the theater, including Fred Griswold, who used to run the machine shop,” Quattrock explained. 

As he began to search for magicians to bring in, Mike Maione reached out in hopes of beginning a long-term partnership with Theatre Three.

Maione is both a skilled illusionist and producer of the Parlor of Mystery magic shows that were previously based in Lindenhurst. With Quattrock looking for magicians and Maione seeking a new venue for the Parlor, it was a win-win situation for everyone. They’re now planning to host magic shows several times a year. 

Vines and Maione have very different magical backgrounds, but they share the same earnestness and curiosity about their craft. There’s always something new to learn, they said, and they’re constantly experimenting with new ways to push boundaries and impress a crowd. They became friends about 10 years ago, with Vines making frequent appearances in Parlor of Mystery shows.

Vines became “completely enamored” with the art of illusion at 12 years old when a classmate made an object disappear. Young Jim was gobsmacked, and immediately dove into reading everything the school library offered on magic and the supernatural. He went on to win national competitions, performing on television, off-Broadway and around the world.

For Maione, magic came along in his 40s. His wife had a friend who always brought a little pocket trick with him whenever he would come over for dinner and would show Maione how it worked. After several dinners, Maione had a whole collection of magic tricks, and his wife suggested he do a show for his daughter and her friends when they were young. Maione now focuses on comedic magic and has performed throughout the northeastern U.S. and as a member of the prestigious Magic Circle in London. He’s also a well-known magic lecturer and Youtuber. 

Both men set performing aside for a time to focus on their families and careers, with Vines working in marketing and Maione as a hospital administrator.

“My wife thought the magic thing was just a phase,” Maione joked. “But once you get bit by the bug, it really stays with you.”

Haunted Encounters represents a departure from their usual material.

“We’re trying to bring together some of the spirits floating around Long Island. We’re going to have a good amount of audience participation, and some wonderful stories to tell. The theater is 150 years old and a lot of interesting, sometimes spooky things are said to have happened there,” Maione said.

Vines is hoping for a truly supernatural experience, and urges people to come to the show with an open mind. Anything can happen on Halloween, he said.

“The elements that we’re bringing into this experience are things we don’t do every day,” he added. “We’ll be experimenting with pendulum magic, a little bit of Tarot and all sorts of other fun surprises. Maybe some spirits will come to join us, too.”

Haunted Encounters: A Halloween Magic Experience will be held at Theatre Three, 412 Main Street, Port Jefferson on Thursday, Oct. 31 at 6 p.m. and again 8 p.m. Please note, this show may be frightening for children and is not recommended for those under the age of 13. Parental guidance is encouraged. Tickets are $40. To order, visit www.theatrethree.com or call the Box Office at 631-928-9100. 

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Bert Conover and George Hoffman, water monitoring volunteers, hold a sign highlighting the five best and worst scoring bay segments, for New York water chemistry. Courtesy George Hoffman

By Mallie Jane Kim

The water chemistry in Port Jefferson Harbor rates as some of the best among bays in Long Island Sound, according to a new report by bistate environmental organization Save the Sound.

The biannual report card released Oct. 10 was based on data collected in 2023 and showed middle Port Jefferson Harbor, the area near Strong’s Neck and Old Field, tied for top marks with Oyster Bay and Mill Neck Creek, which is also in Oyster Bay. Those three areas earned an “A-” in water chemistry quality.

Inner Port Jefferson Harbor, also known as Setauket Harbor, and outer Port Jefferson Harbor, adjacent to Port Jefferson Village, both received a “B+” to round out the top five. The inner port score is up from a “C” in the report card released in 2022, and the outer harbor is down from “A-.”

“We’re pretty happy about it,” said George Hoffman of the Setauket Harbor Task Force, which has been taking water chemistry measurements at set locations within Port Jefferson Harbor twice a month from May through October since 2018. “We’re seeing small evidence of the improvement that we have advocated for.”

According to Hoffman, the harbors have seen a 50% reduction in nitrogen in the harbor over the last 30 years due to structural improvements in stormwater catchment systems and tightened regulations on nitrogen levels in treated sewage that is piped out into area bays.

The task force was part of securing a grant that paid for a storm water collection system on 25A near Setauket Pond Park, and they regularly educate boaters about a free pump-out service to prevent them from dumping human waste into the harbors.

“We’re like guardians of the harbor,” Hoffman said.

The task force is one of 27 harbor groups in Connecticut and on Long Island that participate in the Save the Sound program. Citizen scientists wake up at early hours to bring scientific equipment to specific locations and take measurements at predetermined depths, together monitoring 57 bay segments in the Sound. They measure things like dissolved oxygen, water clarity, chlorophyll, salinity and temperature. They also look at seaweed accumulation.

To note, area counties are responsible for testing for bacteria and other direct water-quality markers, but the water chemistry factors are also indicative of water health. For example, high chlorophyll levels tend to predict algae blooms.

More than 98% of Long Island’s open waters earned a grade “B” or higher, though several areas close to New York City, in the “Western Narrows,” earned an “F.”

“It’s clear that past investment in nitrogen pollution reduction from wastewater infrastructure is linked to improving the open waters of Long Island Sound,” said Save the Sound’s vice president for water protection, David Ansel, at the report card release “Now, our challenge is to find the political will to extend and expand this investment.”

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SBU's Elizabeth Watson, second from right, and her team coring.

By Daniel Dunaief

Daniel Dunaief

I used to liken the process to sitting on a highway divider where the speed limit was 70 miles per hour, holding a notebook and trying to read and record as many license plates as I could, sometimes in the pouring rain, under a bright sun, or in thick fog.

Working for a wire service, with its 24-hour news feed and its endless space for stories, was exhilarating and exhausting. My editors sometimes called me at 4 a.m. to tell me about an important story that was breaking and to encourage me to come into the office to get to work.

Oh, and every three months, when the companies I covered reported earnings, I’d arrive at work for at least a week around 7 in the morning, wait for the numbers to come out, and then spend the day reading the reports, talking with analysts and investors, getting on media conference calls with top executives and watching the stock price of the company rise and fall.

My job was to search through all that information to anticipate how people would react to piles of electronic news.

It was a great opportunity to write on deadline and to experience the absurd. One day, I helped write a few headlines and then had to use the bathroom. As I pushed the door open, my editor, following uncomfortably closely behind me, hovered.

“Can I help you?” I asked, as I stopped and turned around.

“Yeah, how long are you going to be in here?” he asked in his usual staccato, urgent tone.

“As long as it takes,” I shrugged.

“Yeah, well, there’s a headline out there and you need to send out the first version of the story within 15 minutes,” he reminded me, as if I didn’t know our rules.

“I know,” I said, “and I’m sure my system will comply with the requirements.”

Those were tough days at the office.

I’m sure everyone has difficult days at work, whether it’s a police officer dealing with someone who is in an altered, drug-induced state who may be a danger to himself or others, a teacher helping a high-stress student prepare for a standardized test, a truck driver taking a long detour around a crash site, or any of the many other possible strains or obstacles between the start of the day and the workload.

Recently, I spoke with several climate scientists who are a part of the Science on Stage free celebration at Stony Brook University’s Staller Center, which is coming up on October 28th at 4 p.m. (see related story in the Arts & Lifestyles section).

These scientists endure everything from creature discomforts, to resistance to the work they’re doing, to their own deadlines and the need to conduct their studies, publish their results and apply for funding.

Indeed, Elizabeth Watson, Associate Professor in the Department of Ecology & Evolution at Stony Brook University, shared several challenging moments.

“I’ve gotten stuck in the mud, covered with ticks, I’ve gotten Lyme, crawled across mudflats, pushed boats across mudflats, had to row our power boat back to the launch ramp more than once, [and] got forgotten about on a raft in a lagoon,” Watson wrote in an email.

Each of those challenges could have become the focal point of action for a biopic about a scientist.

Heather Lynch, Professor in the Department of Ecology & Evolution, explained that her research on penguins in Antarctica requires considerable advanced planning.

“The main challenge of working in Antarctica is really the uncertainty imposed by the weather and logistics,” she explained in an email. “It’s not enough to have Plan B, it’s more like Plan B through Plan F and then some. Covid and now avian flu have made an already difficult situation even harder.”

Still, at their most challenging moments, waiting for the weather to change, hoping someone will remember to pick them up, or living without creature comforts, these researchers find joy and derive satisfaction in doing valuable and constructive work.

“I’m like a bricklayer, adding more bricks to an enormous wall of knowledge that was started long before I started working on penguins and will continue to be built long after,” Lynch wrote.

Or, to put it another way, Watson wrote that “I love my job! No regrets.”

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METROCREATIVE CONNCETION

By Leah Dunaief

Leah Dunaief,
Publisher

My college class is hosting a forum on friendship and how to define it. During this time, when loneliness seems to be a problem for many, what role should friendship play, especially in our later years?

I read someplace, not too long ago, that most people claim to have five or six good friends, and that is ideal, according to the professionals who study this subject. It made me think about how many good friends I have, and whether I have the requisite number for a happy life.

What makes people become friends?

Perhaps friends play a different role in one’s life at different stages. I tried to remember the friends I had in my earliest years. There was Evelyn in Second Grade. What attracted me to her was her ability to draw. I was enamored with The Lone Ranger at that point, read as many books by Fran Striker (who I later learned was Frances, a woman author) as I could find, and I asked Evelyn to draw scenes from the books for me. I would give her some particulars, and she would follow up and make drawings on looseleaf sheets of paper that illustrated the vignettes I would describe to her. And she did so quickly, as I talked, which was amazing.

Why did she do that for me? She was terrible in arithmetic, and I would do her homework for her, probably as quickly as she could draw. So we had a mutual attraction as a result of our individual skills. Also she lived down the block from my family’s apartment, and we would walk home together from school. So convenience and mutual needs played a part in encouraging friendship.

It all ended, of course, when the teacher realized I was doing her homework. It was innocent enough. I never meant to abort her learning and hope she caught on to numbers and what one could do with them.

I went to an all-girls junior high school that only one other classmate entered, and she was put into a different section, so I had no friends immediately. But I was attracted to a small group who came from the other side of town and seemed to have a lot of fun with each other.

They were sophisticated. In particular, they would slip out of school 15 minutes before the end of the last class, run down the stairs of the subway outside the school building and ride to the Broadway Theater District, where they would arrive just as the plays would break for intermission.

When the audience members would then walk back in, they would, too, and carefully find empty seats. In that way, they saw the second act of some of the most famous musicals of the 1950s. I wanted desperately to be part of that group, and somehow they accepted me. They were my junior high friends, and I still think of them fondly.

So common interests make for friendships.

In high school and college, my friends were a couple of classmates that I most admired. They brought different ideas to class and had the courage to speak about the subjects in an original way. There were others, too, who were enjoyable companions throughout those early years, and with whom I kept up until we each went our separate ways after we married and moved from New York. But I kept in touch with those original two I most respected. So respect is another factor in deep friendships.

As we had children, our friends most often were the parents of their friends, which was convenient. And we had friends from work. But then, our children grew up, left the nest, and we were again on our own, with the time to rediscover old friends who were witnesses to our earlier years and to make new ones.

Witnesses and shared experiences now make for strong glue in friendship. And mutual admiration, loyalty and empathy for all that has happened and is happening to us as we age, are powerful bonds among friends.

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Fall has arrived! Be sure to check out some of the Town of Brookhaven’s recreation centers’ upcoming fun and educational programs:

Robert E. Reid, Sr. Recreation Center
Defense Hill Road & Route 25A, Shoreham, NY 11786
Call 631-451-5306 for more information or help registering online.

Yoga
This is a slow-flow yoga class for all levels, moving at a slower pace and holding poses a little longer.  Breathing and relaxation exercises are incorporated to help de-stress. Please bring a yoga mat.
Dates: Mondays, October 21, November 4, 18, 25, December 2, 9
Time: 7:00pm – 8:00pm
Fee: $42.00 per 6-week session
To register online, click HERE.

Jump Bunch Jr. (Ages 3-5)
Learn a new sport each week. Includes sports such as soccer, football, lacrosse, volleyball and basketball. No equipment necessary. Just bring water.
Dates: Thursdays, November 7, 14, 21, December 5, 12, 19
Time: 4:00pm – 5:00pm
Fee: $62.00 per 6-week session
To register online, click HERE.

Jump Bunch Kids (Ages 6-9)
Learn a new sport each week. Includes sports such as soccer, football, lacrosse, volleyball and basketball. No equipment necessary. Just bring water.
Dates: Thursdays, November 7, 14, 21, December 5, 12, 19
Time: 5:15pm – 6:00pm
Fee: $62.00 per 6-week session
To register online, click HERE.

Henrietta Acampora Recreation Center
39 Montauk Highway, Blue Point, NY 11715
Call 631-451-6163 for more information or help registering online.

Sprouts & Friends: Babies & Non-Walkers (Ages 6 months – 12 months)
Join Sprouts & Friends for a fun, safe and creative way to learn to move through music and release energy. Our mission is to create joy while helping your little ones grow, learn, develop and explore through playful activities.
Dates: Fridays, November 8, 15, 22, December 6, 13, 20
Time: 1:00pm – 1:45pm
Fee: $42.00 per 6-week session
To register online, click HERE.

Country Line Dancing – Improver
These classes welcome advanced beginners and intermediate dancers.
Dates: Mondays, November 25, December 2, 9, 16, 23, 30
Time: 2:30pm – 4:00pm
Fee: $47.00 per 6-week session
To register online, click HERE.

Parks Administration Building
286 Hawkins Road, Centereach, NY 11720
Call 631-451-6112 for more information or help registering online.

Indoor Bocce
Meet and play with different people each week. 2 games per week.
Individual sign up.
Dates: Tuesdays, November 12, 19, 26, December 3, 10, 17
Time: 10:00am – 12:00pm
Fee: $32.00 per 6-week session
To register online, click HERE.

Centereach Sports Complex
286 Hawkins Road, Centereach, NY 11720
Call 631 451-6131 for more information or help registering online.

Pickleball
Check out our upcoming one day clinics.
Visit www.brookhavenny.gov/reconline under the Sports tab to register.

 

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Photo from St. Charles Hospital

Catholic Health’s St. Charles Hospital in Port Jefferson has been awarded prestigious accreditation from the Surgical Review Corporation (SRC) as a Center of Excellence in Robotic and Hernia Surgery. The two accreditations recognize St. Charles Hospital’s commitment to the delivery of high quality, safe patient care. Achieving the status of an accredited Center of Excellence means that St. Charles Hospital has met both nationally and internationally recognized standards. 

“This distinguished recognition is a true testament to St. Charles’ highly-skilled surgeons trained in both minimally-invasive robotic surgery and laparoscopic hernia repair surgery, allowing for much smaller incisions, shorter hospital stay, minimal blood loss and less need for pain medication,” said St. Charles Hospital President James O’Connor. “Using the da Vinci® and Xi™ systems, we offer robotic-assisted surgeries across various specialties including bariatric, colorectal, general, gynecological, thoracic and urologic surgery. With SRC accreditation, residents of Port Jefferson and surrounding areas can have confidence in receiving top-notch care, enabling them to regain their quality of life.”

Health care facilities and surgeons seeking an SRC accreditation undergo an extensive assessment and inspection process to ensure the applicant meets SRC’s proven standards and requirements. These requirements include surgical volumes, facility equipment, clinical pathways and standardized operating procedures, and an emphasis on patient education and continuous quality assessment. 

“We’re proud to recognize St. Charles Hospital for its commitment to advancing and providing quality care for all patients,” said Gary M. Pratt, CEO of SRC. “This accreditation signals that this facility is among the best in this specialty and is dedicated to delivering the highest level of care possible.”

Pictured from right, Nicolette Fiore Lopez, PhD, RN, CENP, FAAN, St. Charles’ Chief Nursing Officer; Lynne Cassidy, RN, ANCC,  PACU; Jennifer Manuel, RN, ANCC, OR; Jamie Ribaudo, CST, Robotics Coordinator; Jim O’ Connor, President, St. Charles Hospital; Patti Williams, RN, St. Charles’ Director of Perioperative Services; Hesham Atwa, MD, St. Charles’ Chief of Robotic Surgery; Cindi Vanderhoff, SRC Surveyor; Sunil Dhuper, MD, St. Charles’ Chief Medical Officer; Lisa Farrell, OR Systems Coordinator; and Chukwuma Egbuziem, MS, RN, CPHQ, St. Charles’ Vice President, Quality Management. 

For more information about St. Charles’ robotic surgery and hernia repair program, call 631-474-6797.

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The Port Jefferson Documentary Series continues its Fall 2024 season with a screening of Checkpoint Zoo at the First United Methodist Church, 603 Main St., Port Jefferson on Oct. 17 at 7 p.m.

In the early days of the Ukraine-Russian war, the Feldman Ecopark, a beloved animal refuge in Ukraine’s second largest city, found itself caught in the crossfire. With the invading Russian army on one side and the Ukrainian front line on the other, thousands of animals were left trapped with little food and water. Against all odds, a courageous team of zookeepers and volunteers risked their lives to embark on a seemingly impossible mission: bringing these innocent creatures to safety.

Followed by a panel discussion with the director, Joshua Zeman on Zoom, moderated by Juliette Passer, J.D., Lecturer, Political Science Dept., Stony Brook University.

Film Info: https://ghostrobot.com/work/checkpoint-zoo

Tickets are $10 adults, $5 students at the door or at www.portjeffdocumentaryseries.com.

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