The question is often asked, "Why do community leaders constantly stir the pot?" Answer: If you don't stir the pot, the good stuff sinks to the bottom, and we all know what floats to the top!

Why raise issues, particularly the contentious ones? Because if we do not, then there can be no progress, no beneficial change, no better day for our community. To stir that proverbial pot is to get our neighbors to think - both outside and inside that box, to stimulate the collective imagination, to provoke meaningful discussion and debate, to keep our elected representatives on their toes, and to motivate the masses (or at least move them to do more than just moan and groan about the way things are).

True, all community advocates can do in stirring the pot is to increase awareness and put the issues out there for public consideration and possible action. Whether we build libraries, establish Community Courts, create Business Improvement Districts or explore the pros and cons of incorporating as a village depends on what the many cooks think and do. All that the master chefs can do is to put the recipes for a successful community before us. The proof - and the pudding - is ours to make!

Are we to be home to illegal apartments or to affordable senior and workforce housing? The place where shopping carts go to die or where business thrives along the Avenue? Testament to the perpetual eyesores of the Turnpike or portal to the inviting visages of a caring community? Haven for unlawful signage, blatant code violations and haphazard commercial development or model for the quintessential 21st century suburban community? The ingredients are all in the pot. What happens next - to skim, to add a pinch of sugar, to stir - is in our hands.

In charting a community's future, as in preparing a meal as keen on the palate as it is in nutritional value, we have several choices: We can simply watch the pot as it boils over; we can place the pot on simmer, and wait forever for something to happen; or (and may we suggest this option as our special of the season), we can pick up that spoon and stir. The future of our town is in our hands, my friends. Let's pick up the spoon and stir!

Seth D. Bykofsky

(The writer is past president of the West Hempstead Civic Association and Co-Chair of the Tri-Community Alliance of Elmont, Franklin Square and West Hempstead.)