Kevin Greene, a member of the Floral Park Board of Trustees since 1995, is seeking re-election on the Citizens' Party ticket. "Serving the residents of Floral Park has been an honor and I look forward to continuing to work with the village board and for the residents of the village," he said.

Deputy Mayor Greene is currently fire commissioner and chairman of the Emergency Management Task Force. He has worked closely with the fire and police departments, preparing the village's emergency management response plan. He also serves on the Nassau County Village Officials Committee for Emergency Management. Deputy Mayor Greene is liaison to the Council of Cultural Affairs and liaison to Four Village Studio.

He has served as commissioner of public works, recreation and library. He, along with the Recreation Committee, worked on the design and refurbishment of Tiny Town at the Recreation Center as well as the refurbishment of the tennis courts and he worked with the recreation staff to develop a plan for refurbishing the baseball fields.

As Public Works commissioner, he worked on updating and tightening up the restoration requirements for street openings performed by the various utility companies and he assisted in the redesign of the parking area on Terrace Avenue, improving traffic flow. This past year he worked closely with the village engineer on the Magnolia Avenue reconstruction project and the installation of the new heating, ventilation and air conditioning system at the Library.

He joined the Floral Park Fire Department in March 1979 and is still an active member. He served as lieutenant and captain of Alert Engine Company, was elected to the chief's office in April 1989 and served as assistant chief until he was elected chief in 1993. In addition, he served on the New Resident and Substance Abuse committees and was co-chair of a Library Exploratory Committee, which was organized to meet with residents and discuss the needs and future plans of the library.

Deputy Mayor Greene is also a member of the North End Civic Association. He believes one of the greatest lines of communication with residents is through the civic association. "These meetings provide the opportunity for the mayor and trustees to update residents on village issues as well as provide a personal line of communication for residents to ask questions or raise concerns," he said, vowing to continue to be accessible, responsible and responsive to village residents.

He has worked for Con Edison for over 26 years, where he is the section manager for the Environmental, Health and Safety group of Maintenance and Construction Services. Deputy Mayor Greene received his bachelor's degree in business from Manhattan College. When he is not working, he enjoys coaching in the Indians soccer and basketball programs and the Little League baseball program. He is on the Little League board and is a member of the Floral Park Youth Council.

Deputy Mayor Greene is a long-time resident of Floral Park. His parents moved to the village over 40 years ago; he and his brothers, Ray, Mike and Pat, were raised on Magnolia Avenue. His wife, Janet, also a long-time resident, is co-owner of J-J's Dance Studio. She is also a member of the Chamber of Commerce and Floral Park Kiwanis. They have five children: Heather, Brian, Stephen, Julia and Jaime.

He says he has many fond memories of growing up in Floral Park and "like many, I have seen many changes. I am committed to accept only the changes that will enhance the village and keep it as nice a place to grow up for all our children as it was for me and my family."

Mary-Grace Tomecki is the Citizens' Party candidate for the position of trustee in the upcoming, Tuesday, March 20, Floral Park village election. She is a life-long resident of Floral Park and resides in the house built by her father, Walter, who purchased the property on Hinsdale Avenue in 1956.

Mary-Grace graduated from St. Hedwig's School and Floral Park Memorial High School. During college years, she gained her first public service experience as an assistant at the Department of Buildings in the Town of Hempstead, and completed internships with the Nassau County Board of Supervisors and the New York City Department of Business Services.

Mary-Grace completed coursework at the prestigious London School of Economics. In 1996 she graduated magna cum laude from Adelphi University with a bachelor's degree in economics. She went on to earn a master's degree in elementary education with distinction from Mercy College and expects to receive a second master's degree in political science from New York University later this year.

Today, Mary-Grace is a special education teacher in New York City and serves on the Benchmark Committee and the School Discipline Teacher Advisory Team. Her class was recognized as a model classroom during the past academic year.

"I was introduced to civic life when my father ran for mayor of the village on the Village Party ticket when I was eight years old. Later he ran for trustee. I have fond memories of the campaigns, his enthusiasm and commitment to Floral Park. If elected, I will welcome the opportunity to work with Mayor Phil Guarnieri and the other trustees to enhance the quality of life enjoyed by our residents. Floral Park is a great place to live," Tomecki said.

As the Floral Park Aircraft Traffic & Noise Abatement Officer, Mary-Grace is studying the possibility of having noise monitors placed in Floral Park to secure data to help support the village's efforts to obtain a more equitable distribution of air traffic over area communities. She is diligently working to have another public meeting held in Floral Park of the Town and Village Safety and Noise Abatement Committee (TVASNAC).

She is active in civic and service groups. She is a member of the Floral Park Grievance Committee, which is responsible for conducting hearings related to union and employment issues. She is a member of Floral Park's North End Civic Association, Friends of the Library and Historical Society. She is helping to coordinate the efforts of the Centennial Fair Committee now planning for the 100th anniversary of Floral Park in 2008. She was a volunteer for Liz's Day 2006, the annual charity event for breast cancer research, held at the Floral Park Recreation Center.

A lifetime member of St. Hedwig's Parish, she enjoys volunteering her time to work with young people as a CCD teacher for the eighth grade confirmation class.

Mary-Grace has served on a Citizens' Party Committee of Ten and other event and campaign committees. She is a Nassau County Republican Committeewoman and a New York State Poll Watcher.

In her professional life, as the assistant director in the President's Office at Touro College, Mary-Grace worked with the United States Information Agency to establish a joint Arts and Business degree program in Beijing, China. She secured funding for the college from grants, when she was their grants administrator.

Mary-Grace worked for the American Foundation of Suicide Prevention and was recognized by the Mid-Island Conservative Club of Long Island for her dedicated service in the not-for-profit sector.

She was the coordinator for the March of the Living International, a global, not-for-profit educational organization, spearheading the March of Remembrance and Hope, an international interfaith program for college students, which included visits to Holocaust sites in Poland. Mary-Grace worked as an assistant to the dean of the Undergraduate College at New York University's Stern School of Business before assuming her present position as a special education teacher.

Floral Park Mayor Phil Guarnieri is the Citizens' Party candidate seeking re-election Tuesday, March 20, in the village's general election. He is a village resident for over 40 years and the current mayor succeeding Ann Corbett.

A member of the village board since 1995, he has won five consecutive trusteeships, including serving as deputy mayor in 2001 before becoming mayor in 2005.

During his tenure, Mayor Guarnieri has served in numerous capacities, including as commissioner of public works, building and the fire department. He noted that Floral Park is only one of five full service villages and that the rotating system of trustees serving in all of the respective departments is a great education leading up to becoming mayor. As a result, the mayor noted, there is very little on-the-job training.

He also served as chairman of the Zoning and Recodification Committee established in 1995 to review the entire zoning code. He called this ad hoc committee one of the most important in the village's history. An exhaustive review of the entire zoning code was undertaken. "Zoning is the axis upon which community life revolves and its governing precepts of divisions of land uses has had the most sweeping, far reaching and comprehensive impacts on community planning," he said.

Although the committee's influence was sometimes limited since the village was almost completely developed, Mayor Guarnieri said, it still made important advances, especially in protecting the community by mitigating the impacts of commercial developments through a review process, public hearings and restrictive covenants. The same protective measures would be adopted at a later date regarding residential uses with the potential for unwelcome consequences such as subdivisions.

The beauty of the new zoning code, he continued, is that it gave emphasis to the fact that our laws are neither static nor moribund but breathe with the vitality of a living document. Mayor Guarnieri spotlighted the recent public hearing regarding the expansion of the various uses permitted in the business B-1 zone. It is a perfect example, he said, of the board's flexibility to change their views in the light of experience.

Mayor Guarnieri also served on the Architectural Site Plan Review Board, Resident Committee and the Citizens With Disabilities Committee. Prior to joining the village board, he served on the Board of Zoning Appeals, various committees and was a two-term president of the South Side Civic Association.

In terms of governing, Mayor Guarnieri noted that temperament ca be just as important as philosophy in determining success. Mayor Guarnieri told The Dispatch that he sees his role as guiding the board members to view themselves as a cohesive, deliberative body rather than an assemblage of individuals with their own agendas. There are among us, he observed, no preconceived theories on governing but rather a pragmatic ideology of working out policy decisions based on the facts, one issue at a time.

Mayor Guarnieri pointed to the unified efforts regarding the proposed third track and the Belmont flea market at the Floral Park-Bellerose School as prime examples of where a willingness to work together as a community resulted in the defeat of the flea market, even though the application did not fall within our jurisdiction, and a commitment by the MTA-LIRR to dramatically downscale the dimensions of the initial project.

While more work needs to be done with the third track to guard against reversals and to build upon early successes, the mayor said he remains buoyed by the memory of the scoping hearing that was in the village in June 2005. "Over 1,000 people crowded into the Floral Terrace and spoke against the project with such insightful eloquence and grace," the mayor remembered, "that one could not help but be moved by the sincerity and concern of the people who live here."

As the centennial rapidly approaches, Mayor Guarnieri believes the "dauntless and enterprising spirit that served us well in the past will be a lantern for our tomorrows. Here in Floral Park we have people who truly care about the community, care about their children and care about the future. It is a wonderful privilege and a distinct honor to serve such a great community."

Mayor Guarnieri has had a long career in public service in the Town of Hempstead, where he currently serves as the first deputy town clerk. For the past 11 years, he has been the executive leader of the Floral Park-Bellerose Republican Committee, a member of the Knights of Columbus and attends St. Hedwig's Roman Catholic Church.

Born in Brooklyn, he moved to Floral Park as a child and graduated from John Lewis Childs School and Floral Park Memorial High School before attending St. John's University, where he earned bachelor's and master's degrees in history. He now lives on Laurel Street with his wife, Sonia.