Danielle Stenzel and David Delligatti Jr. rang in the new year with a bundle of joy when the mama delivered baby boy Jaxon Abel Delligatti at 6:20 a.m. on Jan. 1, the first baby born at St. Charles Hospital in 2016.
The Port Jefferson hospital presented Stenzel and Delligatti with a gift basket to celebrate the birth.
The couple is from Lake Grove and they are first-time parents.
Tom Meehan is the kind of principal who would give a child the clothes off his back — literally.
When he saw an Edna Louise Spear Elementary School student was not wearing a jacket, the Port Jefferson principal took off the one he had on and gave it to the boy to wear home.
“He understands that it’s about the kids — that they’re the priority,” school board President Kathleen Brennan said, adding that Meehan goes “above the call of duty to make sure kids get what they need.”
For his dedication to Port Jefferson’s kids and the greater community, Tom Meehan is a Times Beacon Record Newspapers Person of the Year.
Meehan was hired for the 2011-12 school year, originally on an interim basis. District officials expected to hire a permanent elementary principal, but soon found the best choice was right under their noses.
Tony Butera, a longtime kindergarten teacher at Edna Louise Spear, has worked under a bunch of principals in his time there, but said Meehan has “a nice sense of what Port Jeff is supposed to be about.”
“He just sees it as, these are his kids,” Butera said.
Early on in Meehan’s time in Port Jefferson, there was an issue with one of the bus routes and it was running late. Brennan said the principal “got on the bus, rode the bus around the route and reassured the parents at every stop about why they were late and what happened.”
That leadership instinct is not something that can be taught, Brennan said.
“Tom has … what I call ‘horse sense’ about what school administration is about.”
One initiative Meehan started in the elementary school is a safety patrol for the fifth-graders to teach them responsibility. Among their activities, they help with dismissal, making sure younger kids get onto the school buses.
School board member Ellen Boehm, a former district employee, said it gives the kids a sense that “what they did was important.” And for the less outgoing kids, she added, “He built them up during their time as a safety leader.”
Meehan, a longtime volunteer for the Port Jefferson Fire Department, was also responsible for starting the tradition of elementary school kids singing at the fire department’s annual 9/11 remembrance ceremony. Brennan said the experience is significant for the kids who attend, and they’ve been able to see Meehan in uniform a few times.
It’s “important to see adults have other roles in the community,” she said.
Christian Neubert has worked alongside Meehan both in the school district, where he is a music teacher, and as a volunteer for the Port Jefferson Fire Department. He said the 9/11 ceremony is not the only way Meehan bridges the school and the department — he also gets firefighters involved in the school’s evacuation drills, and some high school kids now in the junior firefighter program had Meehan as a principal and look up to him at the firehouse.
Neubert, a lieutenant, noted Meehan is still qualified to fight fires inside buildings, despite being older than most guys who do that, since the physical requirements are high.
As a testament to his fitness, Meehan can be seen walking to school every morning, Neubert said, and students and teachers can sometimes catch a glimpse of him walking the school halls “in his suit and hiking boots.”
That’s not the only place they can see him. He’s at his students’ sports games and all around the village. During the Charles Dickens Festival earlier this month, Superintendent Ken Bossert said, he watched his students perform and then roasted marshmallows with them.
“He is just everywhere at all times,” Bossert said. “All the kids know him and love him.”
Well, almost everywhere: “Mr. Meehan is rarely in his office,” Neubert said, because he frequently drops into classrooms around the school.
Meehan has joined Neubert’s class a few times to share musical facts he knows, which the kids loved.
“In their minds, Mr. Meehan knows everything,” Neubert said.
That goes for sports too. A physical education teacher was once absent and a swimming class at the end of the day needed a qualified teacher or it would have been canceled. Meehan, a certified lifeguard, didn’t want to disappoint the kids, Bossert said, so he went home to get his swimsuit and taught the class.
Bossert said he was the “first principal that they ever saw in the water.”
According to a letter the superintendent wrote, nominating Meehan as a Person of the Year, “He was dry and back in his dress suit in time for dismissal.”
Meehan has helped kids on an individual basis as well. Bossert described a time when Meehan pulled some strings with the Long Island Rail Road on behalf of a special needs student who had “a fascination with trains,” and the child was able to conduct a train between the Port Jefferson to Stony Brook stations. He also brings gifts to kids during the holidays when he knows their families can’t afford them.
Those close to him said he knows every child’s name and if one needs extra attention, Butera said, “he’ll find ways throughout the day of stopping by” to check on that student.
But his subtle approach to offering that extra attention puts the kids at ease, Boehm said. She described it as, “Hey, I’m here, and we’ll take care of this together.”
Around the hallways, Meehan is also known for his sense of humor, cracking jokes with kids and dressing up as Mario for Halloween, making him more approachable.
“He has such a great rapport” with all the parents, the staff and the kids, and everyone in the community knows who he is, said Sean Leister, the assistant superintendent for business. Usually that kind of reverence comes with someone who’s been in his position for 20 years, Leister said, but Meehan’s attained it in five.
Even so, he doesn’t take credit for most of what he does.
“He’s not the kind of guy that likes any limelight or fanfare,” Boehm said. “He would never make a big deal about what he was doing.”
Josephine Lunde never gives up.
More than a decade ago, Lunde started volunteering with the Town of Brookhaven’s annual Toy Drive. Her need to help Brookhaven residents landed her a full-time position at Brookhaven’s Youth Bureau two years ago, and because of her ongoing efforts to helping others, she has been named one of the 2015 Times Beacon Record Newspapers’ People of the Year.
“She was full time anyway,” said Maria Polack, a secretary to the tax assessor. “She does the work of, like, five men — for real.”
Polack met Lunde 15 years ago when Lunde started volunteering at the Town of Brookhaven. When it comes to helping others, Lunde’s work ethic is second to none. On many occasions, Lunde stayed up all hours of the night into the early morning to work on her many fundraising events. Lunde doesn’t only help organize Brookhaven’s Toy Drive, which helps about 7,000 children around the holidays, she also organizes a variety of events, including food drives, school supply drives, clothing drives, volunteer programs for senior citizens and the prom dress program, to name a few.
Lunde has led the prom program for around three years, according to Diana Weir, commissioner of Brookhaven’s Housing and Human Services department. The event allows girls from families in need to select prom attire, from dresses to purses, shoes and more. Schools allow their students to attend the event by appointment. Lunde started staying after hours to accommodate students and their families who couldn’t get a dress during the program’s daytime hours. Weir said Lunde’s dedication and desire to spend as much time as possible makes the Medford resident more special.
“She will never complain,” Weir said. “She never says boo.”
While every child who registers for the prom dress program gets special attention, Polack remembers Lunde going above and beyond for one high school student who thought she was too overweight to attend her prom. Lunde didn’t only get her a dress, she organized for the student to get her nails and hair done.
“The determination in Josie is bigger than both of us when she makes up her mind that she’s going to help somebody,” Polack said.
Brookhaven Town Superintendent of Highways Dan Losquadro (R) said Lunde is one who focuses her attention on those in need in the community, especially those who don’t always want to ask for help.
“A lot of those folks that she works with are people who are very proud, and who might not otherwise seek assistance. These things have gotten really expensive,” Losquadro said about Lunde and buying gifts around the holidays.
Lunde’s son Mike said his mother has always been one to help others but, almost to a fault.
“She doesn’t think of herself,” the son said.
When Mike was a child, his mother was a den mother for his Boy Scout troop, and took on other responsibilities when her kids were getting older.
Regardless of her accomplishments, Lunde likes to stay in the background. But whether she’s in the forefront at an event or working behind the scenes, Brookhaven Town Supervisor Ed Romaine (R) said the Town is happy to have her.
“Someone like her really adds to what it means to be a part of a town,” Romaine said. “She’s the heart of Brookhaven because she takes the heart of all the problems and tries to make them better. … We should have more people like her in this world. If we did, it’d be a much better place.”
Jumping out of a plane, mentoring younger people and planting flowers are all in a day’s work for Ed DiNunzio.
He’s officially the head of membership for the Port Jefferson Rotary but he has worn many more hats during his years with the service organization, filling in wherever he can to make his community a better place to live.
For selflessly dedicating his endless energy to serving his neighbors, DiNunzio is a Times Beacon Record Newspapers Person of the Year.
One of DiNunzio’s biggest roles is in the Gift of Life program, which started in Suffolk County 40 years ago — but has expanded through Rotary International — and provides lifesaving heart procedures to children around the globe. The Person of the Year has been involved since the beginning, Port Jefferson Rotary member Debbie Engelhardt said, using his skills as a lawyer to help it get organized and off the ground.
Suffolk Rotary clubs have most recently raised funds and brought a 4-year-old girl to Long Island from Kosovo, for a surgery to repair a nickel-sized hole in her heart called an atrial septal defect. Gift of Life also works to provide medical staff in other countries with equipment and training to perform such procedures, so children will not have to travel so far for treatment in the future.
DiNunzio has gone to extremes for the program. He once raised money for Gift of Life by skydiving.
“That was a great thing that he did personally,” fellow Rotarian Dennis Brennan said, noting the physical risk involved in jumping out of a plane for charity. “That was a large sacrifice on his part to do that.”
Each jumper in that fundraising effort was supposed to bring in $1,500 but DiNunzio collected $2,150 for Gift of Life.
“He’s true blue,” said Engelhardt, who is also the director of the Comsewogue Public Library.
“He’s got more energy than basically anybody I know.”
Skydiving isn’t the only way DiNunzio brings in funding for Rotary. Engelhardt said the club holds an annual raffle fundraiser in which each member is expected to sell at least 25 tickets, but “without fail, Ed sells over 200 every year.”
But it’s not just about the money — between attending to his family in Mount Sinai and his law practice in Port Jefferson, DiNunzio also gives his time.
He is heavily involved in the Rotary Youth Exchange program, through which students study abroad and stay with a host family. According to Engelhardt, DiNunzio has lent a hand on an organizational level for the Northeastern region for many years and has opened his home to exchange students from other areas.
Between those kids and others from the Northeast who had life-changing experiences overseas through the program, DiNunzio has made an impact on the lives of numerous young people. Engelhardt explained that a lot of them are now grown adults living all over the world, but whenever they are in the area they look up DiNunzio.
She said Rotary is about using your life to make the world a better place, and DiNunzio does that.
“Everybody’s part of something bigger,” Engelhardt said. “He’s not a child, but he’d be our poster child.”
Brennan described DiNunzio’s meticulous nature, which is obvious when the volunteer manages one of the Rotary’s bank accounts.
“He watches it like a hawk,” Brennan said.
And he is meticulous about his physical fitness too. Brennan said DiNunzio brings an important strength to the Rotary: The club uses a heavy wooden sign when it collects food for donation, and “we depend on Ed” to bring it to the collections because he’s the only one who can lift it on his own.
Once at Camp Pa-Qua-Tuck, a Center Moriches camp for kids with disabilities where the Rotary does cleanups and beautification, a group was planting perennials by a flagpole but the ground was hard, making digging difficult.
“Old Ed, he just kept going at it,” Brennan said. “He never quit.”
Brennan refers to the Person of the Year as “Mr. Rotary” because he has his hand in every program and gives his all.
“When he gets involved with something … he puts his whole self into it and the results are easy to see,” he said. “He’s a very caring person and I think that he’s demonstrated that.”
By Rachel Siford
Vicki Rybak has been serving the Long Island community for more than a decade, known by her friends and coworkers as one of the busiest and most resourceful people they know.
As the director of social ministry and outreach for Infant Jesus R.C. Church in Port Jefferson, Rybak has gone above and beyond her job description. For that reason, she has been named a Times Beacon Record Newspapers Person of the Year.
“She is a last resort for a lot of people,” said Debbie Engelhardt, director of the Comsewogue Public Library and a Port Jefferson Rotary Club member.
The Rotary Club works closely with Rybak and the church. One of their biggest collaborations is on The Open Cupboard at the church, a food pantry for needy Long Islanders that the Rotary donates to. According to Engelhardt, one in eight on Long Island currently need help from food banks.
“Year-round she is involved in projects like this,” Engelhardt said about Rybak. “She tries to be everything that anyone needs, which can be exhausting. She is helping families from falling through the cracks and they are really fortunate to have someone who has the time and energy to be that person.”
Jim Fenton is one of the oldest volunteers at Infant Jesus and has worked with Rybak closely.
“Vicki is extremely resourceful when someone comes to her with a problem,” Fenton said. “She has all these phone numbers at her fingertips, and is very compassionate too.”
Fenton added that Rybak devotes time to applying for grants to keep the food pantries stocked and keep the equipment working — “all of her own initiative.”
“She goes above and beyond what is in her job description,” Fenton added. “There is nothing she won’t do.”
Sharon Brennan, another Rotary Club member, shared an anecdote of working with Rybak. Once, a couple went to her office crying because a fire had destroyed everything they owned.
“Vicki started making calls immediately, getting them stuff over the phone, getting Christmas presents for their children,” Brennan said. “She just goes into high gear and makes stuff happen.”
Rybak is involved in many different programs throughout the year, including the Adopt-A-Family program for the holiday season, through which volunteers purchase Christmas presents such as toys and clothes for families who do not have enough money to spend on those items themselves. That project gets a lot of residents and community groups involved, including the Interact Club at Port Jefferson’s Earl L. Vandermeulen High School, right down the road from the church.
The Person of the Year also works on a back-to-school project, filling up 150 backpacks with school supplies — such as composition notebooks and pencils — for children at the start of the each new school year, with the help of community donations.
“Vicki somewhere, somehow finds a way to help them, no matter what they need,” Laszlo Girhiny, a church member, said about Rybak’s dedication to local people in need. “Hundreds of people have walked through her doors.”
If Rybak cannot help people herself, she connects them with other social service agencies so the job can get done.
“She has the right attitude and always treats the people she helps with dignity,” Brennan said. “She says everyone has been there one time in their life.”
Quality health care and, to hear state Sen. Ken LaValle (R-Port Jefferson) describe it, home cooking are good for the body, mind, soul and community. That’s the argument the Republican senator has been making for years on behalf of the Stony Brook University medical center and its hospital.
After the university lost out earlier this year on a partnership with Peconic Bay Medical Center, which agreed to team up with North Shore-LIJ Health System, the longtime local senator has continued his unflagging support of Stony Brook, particularly with John T. Mather Memorial Hospital.
“If we think of a wheel, the hub of a wheel, and the local community hospitals are its spokes,” LaValle said, referring to Stony Brook as that hub in the center. “This is my vision and one that I think is good for the people I represent” to allow them to have the “best quality health care” close to home.
For his consistent and long-term efforts to lend the support of his office to an important area institution, and for the passion and dedication he has shown to the residents of the region for close to four decades, LaValle is a Times Beacon Record Newspapers Person of the Year.
Stony Brook officials appreciated LaValle’s work on their behalf and suggested that he played a seminal role in keeping their ongoing relationship with Southampton Hospital on track.
“It took perseverance to continue to push the Southampton relationship with Stony Brook through,” said Reuven Pasternak, the CEO of Stony Brook University Hospital. “He was absolutely critical in keeping those discussions going and seeing them to fruition.”
Pasternak said LaValle also facilitated a connection with Eastern Long Island Hospital in Greenport.
The senator has been “a big supporter” of that relationship, Pasternak said. “He’s always made himself available to speak to people in Albany.”
LaValle was instrumental in the building of the new Medicine and Research Translation building, a 240,000-square foot facility that is expected to be completed in 2016. Kenneth Kaushansky, the dean of the School of Medicine and the senior vice president of health sciences, said LaValle helped secure critical state financing.
LaValle identified $45 million that was earmarked for a law school at Stony Brook that was never built that he “was able get reallocated,” Kaushansky said. “The state support for MART was hugely dependent on the senator.”
Kaushansky said he and LaValle have regular discussions about any potential issues that arise.
If things aren’t proceeding the way the university would like, LaValle “always volunteers to help put them back on track.”
State Assemblyman Steve Englebright said LaValle deserves recognition for his work on behalf of Stony Brook and all the area hospitals.
“He is firmly supportive of Stony Brook’s role and mission, as well as for all the hospitals in our community,” Englebright (D-Setauket) said.
LaValle suggested his role as chairman of the Senate Committee on Higher Education gives him an opportunity to advocate on behalf of the SBU medical school. His chairmanship provides “a vehicle to be able to work with other people in the state university system and within state agencies,” he said.
The approximately 129 students in each medical school class contribute to area health care while they pursue their education, LaValle said.
“That is one of the very first helping points for the university,” LaValle said. “It’s being able to fulfill the education of their medical students. There are also people doing their clinical work and residencies.”
LaValle is contributing to Stony Brook’s effort to secure a longer-term connection with Mather. He cited numerous such two-way benefits for a potential longer-term alliance.
Stony Brook can provide services that “will save Mather a lot of money,” LaValle said.
For patients of the two hospitals, the quality and convenience are also a winning combination.
“If someone needs cardiac care, it is a hop, skip and a jump to get that care,” LaValle said. “They don’t have to be helicoptered some place or drive a long time distance.”
Kaushansky appreciated the support from the senator.
“He’s doing everything he can,” Kaushansky said. LaValle has “been a strong proponent of getting us and Mather to work together for the benefit” of the patient population in the area.
Kaushansky cited several other benefits to Mather of an ongoing and deeper connection with Stony Brook, including support for Mather’s stroke center with back-up cerebral artery intervention, and support for their radiology department.
While a deeper connection with Mather would be mutually beneficial for the hospitals, LaValle suggested, it would also create an important level of convenience for patients.
“I have started with the premise that patient care closest to home is the best care for the patient,” LaValle said. “The families can interact and it’s convenient. We are focused in a way to ensure that the quality of health care is at its maximum.”
From the leaders through the rank and file, Stony Brook health care professionals appreciate LaValle’s support.
“If anybody were to ask a person working in the dialysis unit, ‘Of all the politicians in the state of New York, who do you think is the strongest advocate for Stony Brook Medical School and Stony Brook University Hospital?’ most of them would say Ken LaValle,” said Kaushansky.
Pasternak, who considers LaValle a friend, called him sincere in his beliefs.
“It’s not the politics that drives him,” Pasternak said. “It’s his passion for the region and the people in the region.”
Tracey Budd’s son died of a heroin overdose in September 2012.
One year later, Budd, of Rocky Point, was asked to speak at the North Shore Youth Council. Since then, she’s ended up on a public service announcement, “Not My Child,” that’s shown in high schools and middle schools along the North Shore, aiding her in becoming an advocate for drug abuse prevention and rehabilitation. She also teamed up with another mother, Debbie Longo, of Miller Place, and the two have become advocates for prevention and rehabilitation along the North Shore.
It is because of their hard work and dedication to this issue on Long Island that they are 2015 Times Beacon Record Newspapers People of the Year.
“I made the decision not to be ashamed of how he passed away,” Budd said about her son. “Just from speaking that one time at North Shore Youth Council, it was so very healing for me, and so many things have come from that and taken me in a direction that I never thought I’d be in, but it seems like it’s my calling.”
Janene Gentile, a drug and alcohol counselor and executive director of the North Shore Youth Council, helped work on that PSA.
“It was very powerful,” she said. “It was walking her through her grief. She has a lot of courage.”
Budd, who is also a member of Families in Support of Treatment, pulled together as much information as she could, and this past October created a Facebook page — North Shore Drug Awareness Advocates — pooling together families from Rocky Point, Miller Place, Mount Sinai and Shoreham-Wading River to spread the word about the rising concern over dangerous drugs, like heroin, growing in popularity across the Island.
“It just seemed that so many people were inboxing me and asking me for help,” she said. “I created the page so we could have a centralized area where we share information, and organize meetings where the group could all meet up. I also organized meetings once a month so we could to teach people about advocacy.”
Having a 12-year-old daughter, Cristina Dimou attended the meetings to begin to gather information on the issue. About one week ago, someone Dimou knows suffered an unexpected overdose, she said. She immediately reached out to Budd asking for guidance.
“She gave me three phone numbers telling me who to call for what and even gave me websites of rehabilitation centers,” Dimou said about Budd. “She checks up on me every day, asking me if I’m okay and what’s going on. I don’t know her personally, but she had a sense of urgency and a willingness to help. I think that speaks volumes.”
Legislator Sarah Anker (D-Mount Sinai) said with Budd’s outspokenness and Longo’s long-standing knowledge of the issue, they’ll be successful in their efforts.
“These women put their energy, their anger, their frustration, their sorrow into something that is helpful to the community,” she said. “I think they’re going to do amazing work.”
Longo has been involved in advocacy across the Island for the last five years, after her son suffered an overdose 10 years ago. Since then, her son has recovered, and currently lives in Del Ray, Florida as a director of marketing for a rehabilitation center called Insight to Recovery.
She said she found sending her son out of state helped him recover, because once he was done with his treatment, he wasn’t going back to seeing the same people he knew when he was using.
But she too has been involved in outreach and drug abuse prevention, aside from being to co-administrator of Budd’s Facebook page.
“I get a call just about every day from a parent saying they have a kid that’s addicted and they don’t know what to do,” she said. “We’re losing kids left and right. We’re losing a generation, is what we’re losing.”
Longo is a part of a 501(c)3 not-for-profit program, Steered Straight, which spreads prevention in schools. Recovered addict Michael DeLeon leads the program.
“You can hear a pin drop in the auditorium, that’s how dynamic of a speaker he is,” she said. “I can’t tell you how many kids come up to us at the end of the program and say, ‘I have a problem.’”
Longo was the chapter coordinator for New York State for a website called The Addict’s Mom, and is currently the head of Before the Petals Fall, Magnolia Addiction Support’s New York chapter. She is a 12-step yoga teacher to recovering addicts, and does post-traumatic stress disorder programs to help those dealing with grief.
After leaving nursing to go into medical marketing for hospitals, Longo said she thought she’d know where to turn when she found out her son was an addict, but said she really didn’t know what to do.
“There was such a bad stigma about addiction that you didn’t want to talk about it — you kind of suffered in silence,” she said. “If I was a nurse and had these contacts and didn’t know what to do, the average mother may have no idea. I’m trying to open the community up to what we have here on the North Shore.”
Longo has helped mothers like Sheila “Terry” Littler, of Rocky Point, whose son is a second-time recovering heroin addict. Currently, he is three months sober.
Knowing about treatment and where to get help, because it was something that started for her 13 years ago, Littler reached out to Longo for mental support.
“It was nice to have somebody else that’s gone through it to talk to, to know you’re not alone,” Littler said. “But at the same time, it’s sad that I’m not alone.”
When her son relapsed after being four and a half years sober, she reached out to Budd.
“It takes a lot of guts to come out in the open and do this and help people,” she said. “There are a lot of hurting people out there.”
She recently reached out to Longo about a friend of her son, who is a drug user, and the two were calling each other back and forth to find ways to overcome addiction.
“She cared to take the time to help me,” she said. “She spent a whole day doing that with me — that’s dedication right there.”
With the contacts Longo’s made with support centers and prevention agencies and Budd’s relationship with the county after creating the PSA, the two are teaming up to use their resources to form a coalition based on the Facebook page. It was also have the same name.
It’s in its early stages, but the hope is to help spread awareness about prevention through schools. As part of a coalition, Budd said, you can also apply for grants, which she hopes will help fund the spread of their advocacy.
“I felt Tracey was on the same path that I was on,” Longo said. “She is as tenacious as I am in what we’re trying to do.”
Longo said that she and Budd are trying to be vigilantes and have started Narcan training classes, like ones they’ve previously hosted in Miller Place and East Setauket, to continue to help fight the Island’s drug addiction problem. Narcan is a medication that stops opioid overdoses.
“I think together we’re a good team,” Budd said. “To me, you have a choice. You can either dig your head in the sand and be embarrassed that your child is an addict, or you can be proactive and say, ‘Enough of this, let’s help each other.’ When you speak to another parent that’s going through it, there’s a bond that you automatically create. In a way, I feel like my son is right there with me, helping these families. It’s very important to me, and I’m never going to stop doing it.”
By Clayton Collier
Suffolk County Sheriff Vincent DeMarco has worked diligently over the last nine years, going above and beyond what’s asked of his position.
His creation and development of the Youth Re-Entry Task Force, a program created to rehabilitate youth inmates, among his other initiatives, has earned him the distinction of a 2015 Times Beacon Record Newspapers Person of the Year.
“The sheriff has truly changed the culture of corrections in Suffolk County, and has put particular emphasis on rehabilitation of incarcerated youth,” said Kristin MacKay, director of public relations for the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Office. “He has been at the forefront of the fight to eliminate state mandates for new county jail construction, which saved the county’s taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars.”
Though you wouldn’t know it from speaking with him, DeMarco did not initially intend to go into law enforcement. A Ronkonkoma native, DeMarco went to St. John’s University, graduating with a degree in economics in 1991.
“I always had an interest in law enforcement,” DeMarco said. “But I didn’t think it was going to be my career.”
After two years working in the financial industry in New York City, DeMarco transitioned into law enforcement, becoming a deputy sheriff for Suffolk County in 1994. He took to the job quickly.
“I think I have the best job in the world, I really do,” he said. “I love coming to work every day. I love what I do.”
DeMarco became Suffolk County sheriff in 2006, the first uniformed member of the office to be elected sheriff, and one of the youngest sheriffs ever elected in Suffolk County. From the beginning of his tenure, DeMarco said he has made working with youth inmates a priority. In 2011, DeMarco began assembling the partners needed for an undertaking like the Youth Re-Entry Task Force.
“We needed partners on the outside in order to make this a success,” DeMarco said. “We needed housing. … We also had to find not-for-profits that were willing to come into the correctional facilities and do some counseling: drug counseling, anger management, life skill counseling, vocational counseling, all types of stuff to fill our program, so when they leave the facilities they actually have the tools to succeed instead of just warehousing them in a correctional facility where you’re not giving them any tools and they’re going to fail.”
Among the most essential resources DeMarco and his administration found was housing for youths at Hope House Ministries in Port Jefferson and Timothy Hill Children’s Ranch in Riverhead.
Thaddaeus Hill, executive director of Timothy Hill Children’s Ranch — created and named in memory of his older brother — said the program has seen great success, highlighted by the 50 percent drop in recidivism among youths who go through.
“Sheriff DeMarco has pioneered programs that few in this country have had the courage to take on,” Hill said. “He looks at the big picture beyond the walls of his jail and that has allowed him to make a significant impact on the lives of many young people on Long Island.”
Another key component was Eastern Suffolk BOCES to incorporate education into the program. Barbara Egloff, divisional administrator for Eastern Suffolk BOCES and Oversight of the Jail Education Program and Career, Technical and Adult Education, said DeMarco has effectively used the strengths of all of his partnerships to make the program a success.
“It is inspiring to work with Sheriff DeMarco,” Egloff said. “He has instilled the importance of effective collaboration to all who have the opportunity to work with him.”
Suffolk County Court Judge Fernando Camacho, who heads the County’s Felony Youth Part, a program created in conjunction with Sheriff DeMarco, said it is rare to come across a sheriff so dedicated to creating better lives for his inmates after they have served their time.
“I’ve worked in criminal justice my entire professional career, over 30 years, and I’ve worked with a lot of individuals running correctional facilities, and I can honestly say I’ve run across somebody who’s actually bringing in social workers and service providers into his jail to help young people to identify what the issues are, and to try to come up with solutions,” Camacho said.
Camacho said it is important to work with youth inmates to improve their situations upon leaving the jail.
“Rather than putting them upstate for three years and forgetting about them, we’re actually thinking about it in a different way,” Camacho said. “Let’s see if we can figure out why this kid got in trouble, and let’s see if we can put a plan in place that’s going to give this kid an opportunity to break out of the cycle and get back on track.”
As DeMarco explains, the program’s numbers speak for themselves.
“Nationally, the average inmate has an 83 percent chance of returning,” DeMarco said. “The kids that come through our program have a 23 percent chance of coming back; that’s a big difference.”
Overall, the program contributes to lowering the number of inmates in county jails, allowing DeMarco to prevent the costly undertaking of additional facilities.
“It doesn’t cost us any more to provide these services to the youth in this facility, but the return we get is that they don’t come back to the facility and we lower the jail population.”
In the future, DeMarco hopes to expand for additional age groups. The more people he can help, he said, the better.
“If someone winds up touching the criminal justice system and they wind up in this facility, and we can find out the underlying reason why this crime was committed,” he said, “we can change that and change their behavior when they get out, we’ve increased public safety, and that’s the goal.”
The last two years have been rough for Dunia Sibomana, but now that he has been brought to the United States for reconstructive surgery, everything could change.
Since the 8-year-old was disfigured in a chimpanzee attack — the same one that killed his younger brother — he had stopped going to school because the other children in his native Congo ridiculed him. And being extremely poor, he came to America weighing only 40-something pounds, although the typical weight for a boy his age is almost double that, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Despite all he has gone through, volunteers from the Smile Rescue Fund for Kids said Dunia is still a sweet kid.
That group, founded by Poquott resident Dr. Leon Klempner, who until recently was an orthodontist based in Port Jefferson, is hosting Dunia on Long Island and will care for him through a series of surgeries to reconstruct his lips and cheek.
Klempner started his nonprofit organization a few years ago to care for kids with severe facial deformities who are often ignored by similar groups that repair simpler issues like cleft lips.
Dunia lost both his lips and has scarring on his cheeks after the chimpanzee attack two years ago on the outskirts of Virunga National Park in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, near that country’s border with Uganda and Rwanda. While his father was working in the fields, he was playing with his friends and his 4-year-old brother, Klempner said. The chimps “killed and completely dismembered” the brother, but a ranger fortunately found Dunia and rushed him to the hospital.
“He refused to go to school after the injury because the kids were just ridiculing him too much,” the Poquott man said. “He lost most of his friends.”
Smile Rescue Fund stepped in, bringing Dunia and that park ranger, Andre Bauma, stateside. Bauma was acting as a translator for Dunia, who only speaks Swahili, and helping him get settled with his Hauppauge host family, the Creans, but had to return to Congo last week.
Jennifer Crean said Dunia is getting along well with her three children, ages 10, 12 and 15.
“They have fun with him and he loves them,” she said. “So far so good.”
The family has taught him how to swing at the Hoyt Farm playground in Commack and taken him horseback riding, Crean said. Dunia has also played on an iPad, learned about Santa Claus and gone bowling.
“Everything for him is like brand new. It’s pretty cool.”
After the holidays, when things have slowed down, Crean said, the plan is to take him into New York City to see the big Christmas tree at Rockefeller Center.
Dunia’s experiences here deeply contrast with his life back home — Klempner said the boy’s mother died when he was a toddler and his father is indigent, picking up work wherever he can, so they don’t have a home. And there’s not much food to go around.
At his temporary Hauppauge home, “He eats like a horse,” Klempner said. “He eats as much as Jenn’s teenage son.”
He’s also recently started instruction at Hauppauge’s Pines Elementary School, where he’s in the second grade. Klempner noted the biggest benefit of school is that Dunia is being reintegrated into a social setting, with kids who don’t mock him.
“They’ve been very warmly receiving him.”
He’s already picked up some English — Crean said with a laugh that “he knows the word ‘No’” — and has adapted to the new environment.
The surgeries begin in early January, when Dr. Alex Dagum will put three tissue expanders into his face, under the skin on his cheeks and chin. Over a few months, Dagum will slowly fill those with saline, expanding them and stretching the skin. Once there is enough excess skin created, the expanders will come out and that skin will be cut away and used to reconstruct the lips and cheek.
Stony Brook University Hospital, where Dagum is chief of plastic surgery, has donated the facility and medical staff’s time to operate on Dunia, and is even preparing special meals for him. In addition, Klempner said, “nurses volunteered to be dedicated nurses for him when he comes in for surgery so he sees the same faces.”
All of the work will add up to a new look for Dunia that will hopefully improve his quality of life at home in Congo when he is ready to return.
“He is sweet, and he is fun-loving; he’s got a sense of humor,” Klempner said. “He’s an 8-year-old kid that got a bad draw on life.”
Help needed
Smile Rescue Fund for Kids is searching for a local volunteer who speaks Swahili to translate for Dunia while he is in the United States, as well as volunteers who will spend time with Dunia, as a way of helping out his hosts, the Crean family. Contact Leon Klempner at 631-974-7511 or [email protected]. For those who cannot volunteer but would like to help, Smile Rescue Fund accepts donations online, at www.smilerescuefund.org.
Curbing a DWAI
Police arrested a 20-year-old man from Port Jefferson Station for driving while ability impaired on Dec. 15, after they saw him drive over a curb on Wilson Avenue and pulled him over.
Hitting the trifecta
A 31-year-old Medford man was arrested for driving while ability impaired on Dec. 17 after he failed to maintain his lane and struck a grassy median while speeding on Lincoln Drive in Rocky Point. Police said the man was going 70 miles per hour in a 45-mile-per-hour zone in a 1998 GMC.
Wanted woman
On Dec. 16, police collared a Wading River woman who had five warrants out for her arrest. At the time officers found her on Babylon Drive in Sound Beach, the 26-year-old was also allegedly in possession of a controlled substance, and was charged with that crime.
That sucks
Police arrested a 28-year-old man from Lake Grove for petit larceny on Dec. 16, right after he stole two vacuums from a store at the Centereach Mall.
Hand-to-hand-to-cuffs
Police observed a woman in a hand-to-hand drug transaction on Route 25A in Selden on Dec. 18, and stopped the 55-year-old before she could pull away in her 2002 Cadillac. Officers found heroin in her possession and arrested her for criminal possession of a controlled substance.
Caffeine fiend
On Dec. 18, a 69-year-old man from Centereach was arrested for petit larceny. According to police, the man entered the Shoprite on College Road in Selden on Sept. 15 and took a Keurig Coffee Maker worth around $190.
Vroom vroom to jail
Police arrested a 29-year-old Ronkonkoma man on Dec. 13 for driving while ability impaired, after the suspect failed to maintain his lane while driving a 2008 Volkswagen south on Nicolls Road in Stony Brook. Police said the man was speeding, at 62 miles per hour.
Unwarranted steal
A 27-year-old woman from Port Jefferson Station was arrested for petit larceny on Dec. 18, after stealing assorted costume jewelry, clothing and other items from a store on Route 347 in Setauket-East Setauket. According to police, there were already two unrelated warrants out for the woman’s arrest.
Cashing in
Between Dec. 13 and Dec. 15, an unknown person withdrew more than $200 cash from a bank without the Port Jefferson Station cardholder’s permission.
That’s a big dog
On Dec. 19, an unknown person entered the Walmart on Nesconset Highway in Setauket-East Setauket and stole a television and a dog bed. Police said the person may have used the dog bed to conceal the TV.
In hot water
An unidentified person stole three faucets from the Lowe’s Home Improvement store on Nesconset Highway in Stony Brook on Dec. 18.
Taking it to-go
On Dec. 18, three unknown men with guns entered the Peking Chinese Kitchen on Middle Country Road in Selden as someone was closing the restaurant. The men demanded money but the suspects fled empty-handed.
Visa revoked
On Dec. 19, someone stole a jacket, a wallet and a person’s visa from a car in the Starbucks parking lot on Middle Country Road in Selden.
Rock on Tree
According to police, an unidentified person threw a large rock at a 2010 Mitsubishi Lancer and damaged the car. Police didn’t specify where the car was damaged but said the incident happened some time between Dec. 18 and Dec. 19 on Tree Road in Centereach.
Tired of theft
An unknown person gained entry to the Mavis Discount Tire on Route 25A in Mount Sinai and stole money from the register before fleeing the store. The incident happened on Dec. 14 around 8:25 p.m.
Smashed
On Dec. 19, someone smashed the back window of a 2009 Honda outside a residence on Deepdale Drive in Rocky Point.
Police are in purse-uit
An unidentified person stole someone’s bag from the Walmart at the Centereach Mall on Dec. 19. Police said the victim put the bag down and walked away. When they returned, the bag was gone. According to police, the bag contained money and an ATM card.
Lest we forget the Lexus
On Dec. 18 at 2 p.m. police said an unknown person stole a 2015 Lexus parked on Jericho Turnpike in Elwood.
Climbing in your windows
Police said an unknown person entered a 2015 Jeep with a window open in the parking lot of Eastern Athletic Club on Jericho Turnpike in Dix Hills on Dec. 18 at midnight and stole an iPad and credit cards.
On Dec. 18 a 50-year-old man from Wyandanch was arrested for a previous incident that occurred sometime between June 17 and 18. Police said he broke through a window at a residence on May Street in Huntington Station and stole electronics. He was charged with second-degree burglary.
Painted love
On Dec. 19 an 18-year-old man from Huntington was arrested for multiple graffiti incidents. According to police, he spray painted several vehicles parked on Stewart Avenue in Huntington and a wall on the exterior of a Payless Shoe store on New York Avenue in Huntington on Nov. 26 and 27 around midnight. He was charged with making graffiti.
Honda hijacked
A 22-year-old from East Northport was arrested on Dec. 16 after police said he took a 1998 Honda without permission at 2:30 a.m. and then hit a pole with the car while driving on Cuba Hill Road in Huntington and then fled the scene. He was charged with unauthorized use of a vehicle without the owner’s consent.
If only it was a candy cane
An 18-year-old man and a 19-year-old man from Huntington were arrested on Dec. 19 at 3 a.m. after police said they hit a man in the head with a cane and stole his money on Fairview Street in Huntington and then tried to flee the scene. When searched, the men were discovered to have gravity knives and marijuana in their possession. They were charged with resisting arrest, unlawful possession of marijuana, fourth-degree criminal possession of a weapon and first-degree robbery with use of a dangerous instrument.
Jag at the Jag Salon
At Jag Salon on Wall Street in Huntington on Dec. 16 at 7 p.m. an unknown person entered the business through an unlocked window and stole money.
Taken: Tools edition
Police said a 38-year-old man from Holbrook stole assorted power tools from Home Depot in East Islip at 1:15 p.m. on Dec. 17. He was charged with fourth-degree grand larceny valuing property of more than $1,000.
Minor problem
A 45-year-old man from Commack was arrested on Dec. 18 after police said he sold beer to a minor at a food market on Laurel Road in East Northport at 7:30 p.m. He was charged with first-degree unlawfully dealing with a child.
Gone in a blink of an eye
On Dec.19 at noon at Blink Fitness on Broadhollow Road in Elwood police said an unknown person stole a wallet with credit cards inside of it from an unlocked locker inside the gym.
Dry cleaners cleaned out
On Dec. 16 at 6:30 p.m. an unknown person broke a window of Parkmore Dry Cleaning on New York Avenue in Huntington and stole money.
Of-fenced taken
A 16-year-old from Holbrook was arrested on Dec. 19 at 10:40 p.m. after police said he was trespassing on the property of United Fence and Guard Rail Corporation in Ronkonkoma and damaged the windows of five vehicles. He was charged with third-degree criminal mischief valued at more than $250 and first-degree criminal trespassing.
Dissed on Craigslist
Police said a resident of Mount Pleasant Road in Smithtown reported that on Dec. 16 at 8 p.m. someone used counterfeit money to pay for a transaction done through Craigslist.
Blurred lines
On Dec. 19 a 29-year-old man from East Setauket was arrested at 2 a.m. after police pulled him over for making an illegal left turn while driving a 2002 Chevy on East Main Street and then discovering he was driving drunk. He was charged with driving while intoxicated within 10 years of being convicted for a previous DWI.
Illegal use of legal papers
A woman reported to police that an unknown man followed her into her driveway on Roderick Court in Commack on Dec. 17 at 2:35 p.m. and threw legal papers in her face and ran off.
On tree down on Acorn Road
Police said a 51-year-old man from St. James crashed a 2014 Lexus into a tree while driving on North Country Road and Acorn Road at 10:50 p.m. on Dec. 17 and then discovered he was drunk. He was arrested and charged with driving while intoxicated within 10 years of being convicted for a previous DWI.
Tool stealing stools
Police said a 38-year-old man from Holbrook stole assorted power tools from Home Depot in East Islip at 1:15 p.m. on Dec. 17. He was charged with fourth-degree grand larceny valuing property of more than $1,000.
Minor mistake
A 45-year-old man from Commack was arrested on Dec. 18 after police said he sold beer to a minor at a food market on Laurel Road in East Northport at 7:30 p.m. He was charged with first-degree unlawfully dealing with a child.
Don’t phone home
Police said a man called on Dec. 19 at 1:49 p.m. to report that an ex-tenant from a residence on Karen Place in Commack was calling continuously and threatening the man.
This stinks
On Dec. 17 at 5:30 p.m. an unknown person stole assorted cologne and perfumes from Ulta Beauty on Veterans Memorial Highway in Commack.
Kohl’s woes
An unknown person stole assorted clothing and jewelry from Kohl’s on Crooked Hill Road in Commack on Dec. 18 at 1:42 p.m.
The Doors
On Dec. 18 at 7 a.m. an unknown person entered a residence through a back door on Harned Road in Commack and stole assorted jewelry and a television.
Retired tires
On Dec. 17 at 1:20 p.m. an unknown person slashed two tires of a 1989 Acura parked in the parking lot of a 7-Eleven on Lake Avenue in St. James.
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