This morning we were expecting to have as our speaker Dowling College’s President Bob Gaffney. Unfortunately Mr. Gaffney had an emergency that prevented his attendance. Instead Michael DeLuise, Dowling’s Development officer was there to fill in. Later we went on to other issues that are of concern to LIMBA and its membership.

 

In the portion of the meeting that Mike DeLuise handled he pointed out that many of Long Island’s teachers were graduates of Dowling, 5100 was the number he cited. I have had some knowledge of Dowling College for many years and that number was a surprise to me.

 

Mike’s attitude was that his college and other Long Island based higher education institutions are part of a very essential industry on Long Island. It is important that we retain as many of these graduates on Long Island as we can. According to DeLuise about 80% of all Dowling grads remain on Long Island. Cooperation with other schools is desirable and possible. The ultimate goal is to have students regard all of the schools on Long Island as quality institutions. Much can, and should, be done to foster that concept.

 

Later in the meeting we discussed the sale of Keyspan to National Grid some in the audience thought that if this sale should be completed, that perhaps that National Grid should make substantial promises to the community. For the sake of clean air and more power availability LIMBA has been advocating the repowering of the oldest and most polluting plants. Will National Grid be inclined to repower later? Frankly we don’t know, but we do know that additional power supplies coming in from new feeder cables will open a window of opportunity very soon, and we should take advantage of that fact.

 

we then went on to discuss the fact that the budget that the last congress past left Brookhaven National Lab without the funds to continue several of it’s most important research projects. This is an outrage when you consider our need to transform America and create a new energy policy. Our Congressional delegation is very aware of the BNL situation, and they are working together to correct the situation, but they need our support.

 

Lastly we briefly discussed the property at Kings Park. The site of the psychiatric hospital is in terrible condition and is a candidate for a “super fund” clean-up. The town of Smithtown is reluctant to do anything with it. These derelict buildings are mostly unused and the potential for a magnificent facility is not being realized. That will be a the subject of a panel discussion in March.

 

We didn’t start out to have a “Round Table” discussion, but it turned out that way

There is an acute interest in these topics, and we more than ran out the clock. We’ve got a lot to talk about going forward and great opportunities, if we have the good sense to make them happen.