This civic group meets 24-7.
A Sunset Park Facebook group that started as a lark has become the neighborhood’s de facto civic organization — and it just registered its 6,000th member.
Members of Sunset Parker use the site to apprise one another of neighborhood events, point out quality-of-life issues, and plan a sustainable future for the gentrifying neighborhood.
And with so many friends, the page’s creator isn’t afraid to make a few enemies — he and contributors have taken on practically every politician in the neighborhood, because there is no other civic organization in the area capable of doing so, the founder claimed.
“I see myself almost as a political satirist — they’ve chosen this field, and they have to take the heat that comes with it,” said Tony Giordano, a retired educator and admitted gadfly. “Sunset Park has been without a general civic organization for 20 years. We have a landmarks group, Sprig — that’s more about parks — and a community board that’s just nuts and senile, and a precinct council co-opted by the police.”
Some of the group’s accomplishments include pushing city and state officials to open the Bush Terminal Park after lengthy delays, pointing out a polluting bus depot that was making kids sick at a nearby school, training locals to take public service exams, and alerting the city that the now-sold 68th Precinct Station House was crumbling under previous owners.
The page has created a much-needed community hub for the nabe, said one member.
“It’s brought people together — different cultures nationalities, religions — to bring attention to a neighborhood that has been long under-served,” said Tom Lyons, a Staten Island resident who grew up in Sunset Park.
But Giordano didn’t start the page with a civic bent in mind. He said he first created the page when he was stuck inside on a winter’s day last January and, on a whim, decided to share a handful of old photos from the neighborhood with friends. At the time, he wasn’t sure how long he would stick around Sunset Park, he said.
“When I posted those pictures, I had one foot out of the community,” he said. “I really wanted to transition to Pennsylvania.”
Now the site has evolved into a clearing house for information that can provide folks with frequent updates and deeper analysis, Giordano said.
“We’re sort of a 1010 WINS meets the Courier kind of thing,” he said.
And Giordano doesn’t do it alone. He has an army of 23 other administrators who help maintain the page and connect its members with services.
Lyons is an administrator, and he plans to use the group to spread the word about a series of Nar-Anon meetings he wants to hold for Sunset Parkers who have been affected by friends’ or family members’ drug use, he said.
Another administrator uses the page to promote workshops on preventing sexual assault, and said access to the huge community has made it easy to recruit attendees for her events.
“It changed my life,” said Nathali Zamora. “Sex assault prevention is something I’m very passionate about, and I was wondering what I could do to get out into the community, and Tony let it fall in my lap.”
Giordano may still make that move to Pennsylvania, where he and his wife have been fixing up an old schoolhouse they bought, but not until he is sure the page’s day-to-day operation will be in capable hands.
“I’m always worried about the group being co-opted,” he said. “All of us are there for the fun and enjoyment, but there are people who are around for their income.”
Find the page at www.faceb
