Open Letter to Jean Celender, Mayor of Great Neck Plaza
Dear Jean,
I couldn’t help but respond to the comments you made in the last issue of the News regarding your desire to see people come out and vote. While I understand that this past election cycle was irrelevant to you since your name did not appear on the ballot, I thought I would correct the position you have taken publicly about voting.
In fact, it is worth pointing out that your actions over the past number of years contradict your statement to the News. For someone who prides herself as being a great (self) promoter for Great Neck, one who instructs her assistant to e-mail notices of ribbon-cutting ceremonies and photograph such for the public record. you methodically did nothing this time around, ensuring that the election went undetected.
Given your track record of late, I can certainly understand why you didn’t want anyone to vote.
While the News deserves credit for delivering statistics around the latest election, it would have been more useful for them to point out that those you previously anointed, I mean appointed, garnered the lowest vote in Plaza history.
I am sure you are as proud of Trustee Schneiderman as I am for losing about 112 votes from his previous election in 2011. Jean – did you forget to collect the absentee ballots from Atria this year? Oh, dear.
Your history of appointing trustees has really improved the community. Let’s recount the ways: Gerry Schneiderman in 2000; Shelly Goodman in 2007 (resigned in 2008); Rafe Lieber in 2008 (resigned in 2009); Pam Marksheid in 2009; and Marion Green in 2010 (resigned in 2012).
And let’s not forget your latest appointment, Lawrence Katz in 2012. While I don’t know Mr. Katz, I hope you finally found someone who can bring decorum and intelligence to the band of merry men you have seamlessly assembled at Village Hall.
Perhaps it will be Mr. Katz who leads the charge to reverse the mess you have thoughtlessly created by allowing Shop Delight to destroy the quality of life for all who live around Welwyn Road.
Maybe it will be Mr. Katz who encourages you to do something about the train station that is littered with debris; or the downtown that is littered with “for rent” signs; or the streets that are littered with potholes; or maybe even Village Hall that is littered with inept politicians.
If only you would spend as much time addressing this community’s real needs, as you did rubbing out massage parlor prostitutes, things might actually improve around here. As the sidewalks crumble and pedestrians cross each street at risk, you deserve much credit for dashing the hopes of many for a return to a prosperous and vibrant Great Neck.
I wonder if the other villages recognize that the plight of Great Neck Plaza is their problem as well. And that the pace of ruin and despair you have imparted on our village will eventually infect their communities as well.
Please clean up your act Mayor Celender and show this community that you are worth even a fraction of the exorbitant salary and benefits you have afforded yourself.
Perhaps you might want to consider going back into private practice as your next election cycle probably won’t be one that goes unchallenged.
Michael S. Glickman
Great Neck
