WNY Cuban Lions Club health fair set for April 13
The West New York Cuban Lions Club has teamed with Palisades Medical Center to present its annual Community Health Fair. The event, which is free and open to the general public, will be held on Sunday, April 13, from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. in the New Community Room, 515 – 54th St., West New York, NJ. Please use back entrance. (All welcome.)
Free health tests and screenings will include: Blood Pressure, cholesterol, dental exams, diabetes, mental health/depression, vision/glaucoma, and more.
Several physicians will also be in attendance to answer questions. Attendees will also receive free samples and giveaways.
Union City music organization joins national orchestra in concert on March 30
The joint concert, “UCMP and UCHS Present Face the Music,” will benefit Union City Music Project (UCMP), a bilingual non-profit organization serving at-risk children in Union City through afterschool orchestral and vocal instruction and regular performances of UCMP’s children’s orchestra and chorus. Tickets are $5 and can be purchased at the door.
UCMP’s child musicians, ages 5 to 11 years old, will be joined by 160-member Face the Music, the country’s only 18-and-under ensemble solely devoted to music of living composers, and about 20 high school students in the UCHS Jazz Ensemble.
The combined musical ensembles will perform Dean Deng’s new piano concerto, “Soliloquy,” described as a piece in which “orchestra and soloist move through a variety of moods and atmospheres,” as they “share a collection of thoughts with the audience in an intimate, personal setting.”
Since 2012, UCMP has provided free instruments and low-cost afterschool musical instruction at Robert Waters Elementary School to Union City’s low-income public school students from preschool through 5th grade. Besides learning violin, cello, percussion, flute, clarinet and vocals, the UCMP musicians perform throughout the tri-state area in their growing orchestra and chorus.
UCMP is grateful to the Union City Board of Education and UC Mayor / NJ State Senator Brian P. Stack for their support, as well as funders such as the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation, Turrell Fund, D’Addario Music Foundation, Target, and Wells Fargo and Oritani Banks.
For more information about the March 30 concert, visit the UCMP website (www.ucmusicproject.org) or call Melina Garcia at (646) 831-7719, or email her at mgarcia@ucmusicproject.org.
The UCHS Theater is at 2500 Kennedy Blvd. in Union City.
Rice-Stack Bill to help clean up foreclosed properties advances
A bill sponsored by Senators Ronald L. Rice and Brian Stack to help clean up foreclosed properties by allowing municipalities to penalize creditors that fail to timely remedy code violations was approved by the Senate Community and Urban Affairs Committee last week by a vote of 5-0.
“When a foreclosed home sits vacant within a community, it can become a magnet for criminal activity, and can deteriorate to cause an economic blight on the remaining homes within the community,” said Senator Rice, D-Essex. “When these abandoned homes fall into disrepair, the creditors who are legally responsible for them should step up, do the right thing, and maintain the home. If they fail to fix the property in a timely manner, municipal officials should have the ability to impose penalties.”
“We’ve seen cases where abandoned foreclosed homes aren’t kept up and as a result create problems that affect the rest of the municipality,” said Senator Stack, D-Hudson. “Not only can these properties drag down home values but they also can create a financial burden on everyone else when towns are forced to conduct maintenance and police patrols of the area. By requiring creditors who initiate the foreclosure proceedings to maintain these homes or face penalties, we’re putting the responsibility for maintenance where it belongs.”
The bill, S288, would authorize municipalities to impose penalties on creditors that fail to timely remedy code violations for residential properties in foreclosure for which the creditor is legally responsible. Under the bill, if the creditor fails to remedy the violation within a 30-day time period from receiving notice, then the municipality would be permitted to impose penalties as outlined for violations of municipal ordinances under current law.
The bill next heads to the full Senate for consideration.
WNY residents re-named to Hispanic board
Elis Sosa, of Jersey City, and Professor Roland A. Alum, of West New York, were re-appointed by Gov. Chris Christie to a second term of the Board of the N.J. Center for Hispanic Policy, Research & Development. The Center, which board consists of nine members, functions within the state’s Department of State, in Trenton, headed by Lt. Governor Kim Guadagno.
Sosa has been an academic advisor at Kean University for many years and previously taught and served as an administrator at Hudson County Community College and Essex County College. Additionally, she has a long history of civic activism in the Dominican-American community.
Alum is a former university professor of anthropology and served as chairman of the West New York Public Library and as the Governor’s Representative to the WNY Housing Authority. Additionally, he was named recently by the governor as Public Member to the N.J. Licensed Psychoanalysts Committee, a regulatory professional board that functions within the N.J. Attorney General’s Office.
Sosa served as Board Secretary and Alum as Vice-Chairman during their first term (originally named in 2010).
The Hispanic Center was founded by then Gov. W. Cahill in 1973; its role was upgraded recently to that of advising on Hispanic affairs to the wider Executive Branch. Abraham López, a Jersey City native, is the Center’s executive director. Hudson is home of the largest and oldest community of Hispanic origin in the Garden State.
Three out of four ‘top hospitals’ in NJ are in Hudson County
Inside Jersey magazine and Castle Connolly Medical Ltd. released their annual survey of “Top Hospitals” in the state of New Jersey, and among hospitals with 350 beds or fewer, three of the top four hospitals were in Hudson County. Bayonne Medical Center and Jersey City Medical Center were ranked #2 and #3 respectively, with Palisades Medical Center in North Bergen coming in at #4. The prestigious “Top Hospitals in New Jersey” list was tabulated based on votes from 2,076 licensed physicians in the state.
Eight-week hospice training course beginning
Do you want to do volunteer work that really makes a difference in the lives of the terminally ill and their families? Volunteer roles include companionship for the patients, emotional support for patient and family, errands, and telephone reassurance.
This volunteer training program consists of eight classes on eight consecutive Tuesdays. Participants MUST attend all eight classes, beginning April 1 and ending May 20.
Classes take place on Tuesday mornings from 10 a.m. to noon or Tuesday evenings from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Hudson Hospice Office, 93 Clerk St. in Jersey City.
For further information call Sister Carol at (201) 433-6225.