Shabsie Saphirstein

I was honored to attend the NYPD High Holidays Briefing once again held at One Police Plaza on Monday, September 9. My day was set to have begun with New York City Mayor Eric Adams, the Community Affairs Unit, and the Office of Ethnic and Community Media for a Jewish media roundtable in advance of the Yamim Tovim at City Hall. Due to the mayor’s Covid diagnosis late in the morning, the roundtable was canceled. Instead, I joined my dear friend Pesach Osina and his colleagues at the New York City Council’s Community Engagement Division, where we discussed pertinent issues and preliminary concepts for the Council’s upcoming annual Chanukah celebration. I would also like to extend heartfelt mazal tov wishes to Moshe Davis of the mayor’s Community Affairs Unit on the birth of a son days ago.

This past Sunday afternoon, September 1, Republican Mayoral Candidate Curtis Sliwa delivered a powerful keynote address at the grand opening of the joint campaign office set to house Republican New York State Senate Candidate for District 11 Yiatin Chu, Republican New York State Assembly Candidate for District 25 Kenneth Paek, and Republican Candidate for Queens Surrogate Court Judge Stephen Weiner. The Oakland Gardens headquarters on Springfield Boulevard was standing room only as the candidates made their case to supporters.

Rabbi Dr. Ari Berman, President of Yeshiva University, threw out the opening pitch at the Sunday, September 8, New York Mets game at Citi Field in Queens.

Queens Shmira plays pivotal role

This past Sunday afternoon at 1:30 p.m., Queens Shmira members responded to a hotline call for a perpetrator on the loose in Kew Gardens Hills after shoving a teenage female to the pavement. The incident occurred in the heart of the neighborhood at Jewel Avenue and Main Street and evolved throughout the area as the suspect walked about. Shmira volunteers, together with the victim, tracked the perpetrator along Main Street towards 73^rd Avenue and then further towards 76^th Avenue, all while keeping a close eye until police officers responded. The perpetrator stopped off at a convenience store and continued his stroll to Union Turnpike where officers finally took control.

Last Sunday, a steady stream of neighborhood families participated in The Q Kosher Back-to-School Sunday Funday. Based in Fresh Meadows, the supermarket is the Queens Jewish community’s newest one-stop shop for a wide array of beautifully displayed groceries, produce, meat, poultry, fish, sushi, bakery goods, and weekly super specials.

Yeshiva Sha’arei Zion and its affiliate boys and girls elementary schools, boys high school Yeshiva Tiferet Tzion, and girls high school alongside the greater Beth Gavriel Congregation community, invited Forest Hills families to its annual Back To School Celebration in conjunction with Queens Shmira.