Hundreds of Bay Ridge residents flocked to the El Caribe Country Club last week to celebrate their community and the activists who help to make it the unique place that it is.
The occasion was the 58th anniversary celebration of the Bay Ridge Community Council (BRCC), whose members toasted each other and their Civic Award winner for 2009, Jim Clark, during the organization’s annual dinner−dance.
Throughout, the focus was on the type of concerned activism that helps maintain the quality−of−life in Bay Ridge, Dyker Heights and Fort Hamilton, where the over 100 civic groups that belong to BRCC concentrate their efforts.
Given his decades of commitment to the Boy Scouts of America, as well as his work on behalf of the establishment of the Fifth Avenue Business Improvement District (BID), Clark was a natural choice for Civic Award Winner, said Arlene Keating, BRCC’s outgoing president,
As for Clark, he accepted the award with grace. “I am deeply honored and embarrassed at the same time,” he told the assembled crowd, who gave him a standing ovation. “My mother always said to me, you only go through this world once. Do it well.”
Also in the limelight was Keating, who closed out her year at the helm of the BRCC as the Honorable Matthew D’Emic, judge of the Court of Claims, swore in the group’s new officers: Andrew Windsor as president, Jonathan Judge as first vice president, Janet Gounis as second vice president, Eleanor Sabbagh as treasurer, Linda Orlando as recording secretary, Kevin Carroll as corresponding secretary, and Keating as executive secretary.
“I can’t tell you what a privilege and an honor it has been to be president of BRCC,” Keating said in her valedictory address as the group’s president. “Between the contacts I’ve made, politically, socially, militarily and personally, it’s beyond any scope you can imagine.”
Among the successes Keating cited for the year of her presidency was the introduction of new organizations into the BRCC. “It’s wonderful news for the council,” Keating stressed. “It means the council is viable, still interesting, and extremely important, and it needs to remain important and vital in this community.”
Also recognized over the course of the evening was Gloria Melnick, who had served nine years as BRCC’s executive secretary before stepping down. Melnick, who was taken aback by the tribute, showed her emotion as she accepted flowers and a pin with her initials from two other BRCC members who had served as BRCC’s executive secretary, Mary Ann Walsh and Robert Kassenbrock.
“This is completely unexpected,” Melnick said through tears. “Becoming involved in the council −− it’s wonderful.”
Perhaps Clark said it best. “I believe the team spirit is alive and well in this room,” he told the assembled crowd. “The best−kept secret in the city of New York is the Bay Ridge community.”
The El Caribe is located at 5945 Strickland Avenue.
