A local youth sports powerhouse is one step closer to being honored with a street sign in his memory.
Community Board 10, at its June meeting, unanimously voted to recommend that the corner of Shore Road and 83rd Street be named for Richard Sherry, a longtime volunteer with the 68th Precinct Youth Council who died in April.
Speaking to the group gathered in the community room at Shore Hill, 9000 Shore Road, Brian Kieran, the chairperson of the board’s Traffic & Transportation Committee, told his fellow board members that Sherry – a longtime Bay Ridge resident – had volunteered with the youth council for over 15 years, helping to administer “programs that serve over 1,000 children a year in our community.
“He made selfless contributions of time and effort as a commissioner, a coach and an advocate for the program over the years,” Kieran stressed, noted that Sherry had been honored by Borough President Marty Markowitz in 2004.
Bob Capano, the current president of the youth council, urged the board to support the renaming. “Richard Sherry was the glue that held the organization together,” he attested. “I can’t recite the number of positions he was involved in, with the youth council. He did everything. He was the bedrock of the organization.”
Sherry’s family is following in his footsteps, Capano added. “The reason his son and daughter aren’t here,” he told board members, “is because they’re running our soccer draft.”
The selection of 83rd Street and Shore Road for Richard B. Sherry way was a logical one, Capano noted. One of the fields the organization uses is there, he explained. “We felt it was fitting, because that’s where he spent so much of his time.
“I can honestly say that naming a street after Richard Sherry epitomizes what street namings should be about,” Capano concluded, “someone who voluntarily gives of himself, his time, his energy and his passion to the community he loved so much.”
Besides the support of CB 10, the street renaming has the support of City Councilmember Vincent Gentile, State Senator Marty Golden and Rep. Vito Fossella. With the backing of the board, it will be presented to the City Council, which has the final vote on the matter.
