Nine candidates in the Villages of Great Neck, Lake Success and Kings Point ran uncontested in Tuesday’s elections – and all nine won.
In the Village of Lake Success, managing member of the Inn at Great Neck Alan Mindel received 38 votes to replace outgoing Trustee Paul Glantz, who chose not to run for re-election.
Mindel said he was asked to run by Lake Success resident Bill Zimmerman, who had intended to run for the board but pulled out at the last minute.
Mindel, who had served on the village’s planning board for 14 years, said he was drawn to serve by his long ties to success.
“The same area where my children hang out, I was hanging out as a kid,” Mindel said. “I learned how to swim here, I learned how to play golf, I learned how to play tennis here.”
After graduating from Benjamin M. Cardozo Law School, Mindel began his practice as a real estate and transaction attorney.
That practice was brought to a halt in 2000 when his parents asked him to take over as a managing partner of the Inn at Great Neck, which they have owned since its opening in 1995.
Fourteen years later, Mindel is still the managing partner of the hotel, located at 30 Cutter Mill Road.
Mindel is also a managing partner at Four Points by Sheraton in Plainview, Viana Hotel and Spa in Westbury and the Adria Hotel and Conference Center in Bayside, which are all owned by his family.
He lives in the village with his wife, Kara, and their three daughters.
Village of Lake Success Mayor Ronald Cooper and Deputy Mayor Stephen Lam both received 41 votes and trustee Fred Handsman received 39 votes.
Cooper served on the board of trustees for eight years before becoming mayor.
Cooper, who will be serving his fifth term as mayor, was a managing member of the Ernst and Young account firm before his retirement. He is the treasurer and a member of the executive committee of the Cradle of Aviation Museum in Garden City.
Lam has been a member of the Board of Trustees for more than 20 years and has served as deputy mayor under Cooper and former Mayor Robert Bernstein.
Handsman will serve his 10th term on the Board of Trustees and is the board’s liaison to the village’s public works committee.
In Great Neck, trustees Barton Sobel and Norman Namdar were voted to another two-year term with 140 and 143 votes, respectively.
“Congratulations to you both,” Village of Great Neck Mayor Ralph Kreitzman said at a meeting after the results were announced.
Village of Great Neck resident Jean Pierce received one write-in vote, according to the village’s clerk/treasurer Joe Gill.
Sobel had said that a repeat of last year’s last-minute write-in vote campaign was something that was in the back of his mind, but was not a major concern.
Kreitzman, Deputy Mayor Mitchell Beckerman and Trustee Jeffrey Bass narrowly won re-election last June after a write-in campaign was organized by community activist Rebecca Rosenblatt Gilliar, which resulted in hundreds of Great Neck residents lining around the block to vote for candidates who had not previously announced their candidacies.
Sobel was elected to the board of trustees in 2010 after former Trustee Edna Guilor-Segal stepped down.
Segal had also recommended Sobel to serve on the village planning board, the position he held before becoming trustee.
At the same time, Sobel had been recommended as a member of the nominating committee for the Great Neck Public Library and as a member of the Great Neck Park District’s Advisory Committee for the Children’s Play Garden at the Village Green.
Sobel works as an attorney at his own private practice. He has been married for 17 years and has four children.
On the same night as the write-in campaign former village Trustee Mark Birnbaum, husband of Nassau County Legislator Ellen Birnbaum (D-Great Neck), was elected as the village justice.
Kreitzman appointed Namdar, who had served on the village’s board zoning appeals for nine years, to fill Birnbaum’s seat, which had one year remaining on his term.
“The mayor thought it would be better service for the community,” Namdar said. “It was at the time I thought it would be something I could do as a service.”
Namdar, who has lived in the village for 16 years, said he has enjoyed his term on the board and wishes to continue.
“I respect the mayor and the members of the board,” he said. “All of the applications that come before the board, they’re handled very properly.”
Namadar currently works part-time as a structural engineer for DMB Enginerring Firm in Woodbury. Prior to that he was an engineer at Gennat Flemming.
He has a wife, three kids and eight grandchildren.
In Kings Point, Mayor Michael Kalnick received 167 votes, Deputy Mayor David Harounian 170 and trustee Sheldon Kwiat 160.
Kings Point resident David Silverman received two write-in votes.
The village’s public relations firm, Ryan and Ryan PR Inc., provided statements for all three of the candidates, which were paid for by Friends of Kalnick, Kwiat & Harounian.
Kalnick will serve 17th term as Kings Point’s mayor, having previously served as trustee and deputy mayor.
Kalnick, in Ryan and Ryan’s statement, said he wishes “to continue to use his vast experience in village government as mayor of Kings Point to ensure the village continues to thrive.”
A resident of Kings Point for more than 40 years, Kalnick has also chaired the village’s board of zoning appeals and the Great Neck Fire Alert Company’s Length of Service Award Program. He is also the current chairperson of the Water Authority of Great Neck North.
A graduate of New York University School of Law, Kalnick is a partner at the law firm of Kalnick, Klee & Green LLP in Manhattan. He also holds a bachelor’s degree in accounting from the University of Pennsylvania. Harounian, a resident of Kings Point for more than 40 years, is seeking his sixth term on the board.
A statement from Ryan and Ryan said that Harounian wishes to “serve the community he holds so dear to his heart.”
“As a village trustee, he plans to carry out his commitment to maintaining the area as one of the best places to live in America, practicing fiscal responsibility, upholding an open door government and preserving the excellent quality of life enjoyed by the residents,” the statement said.
Harounian in March was offered a plea deal to have sexual harassment charges against him held in abeyance for six months.
The agreement, called an “adjournment upon contemplation of dismissal,” was granted by Nassau County First District Judge Susan Kluewer during a brief bench trial in which Kluewer agreed to drop the case for six months on the condition that the 75-year-old Harounian completes 14 hours of community service and “stay(s) out of trouble.”
Harounian, who was born in Iran and moved to the United States at the age of 19, is the owner of Harounian Rugs International, a rug manufacturing business located in Manhattan.
He holds a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from Fairleigh Dickinson University.
Harounian has served as the vice president and first vice president of Temple Israel of Great Neck and is currently the temple’s chair of the President’s Advisory Board.
Harounian also served on the village’s architectural review committee before being elected to the board of trustees.
In December of 2013, Harounian created the Persian-American Business Leadership Council, an organization that strengthens “the bonds between the vibrant immigrant ethnic group and the broader American business community,” according to a press release.
Harounian helped to start Keren Hayeled, an institution that works with orphans around the world to offer rehabilitation and educational services.
Kwiat is extending his more than 30-year stay on the board.
Ryan and Ryan’s statement says that Kwiat, the village’s architectural review board chair and president of his family’s diamond jewelry firm, wishes to work to improve the village’s police force.
Kwiat has also served on the board of governors of the Gemological Institute of America for 12 years, the executive board of directors of the Diamond Manufacturers and Importers Association, the board of directors of the Jewelers Vigilance Committee and chairs the board of directors of the Jewelers Security Alliance.
He has previously served as the vice-chair for Young Adult Institute/National Institute of People with Disabilities.
