26 THE QUEENS COURIER • MARCH 30, 2017 FOR BREAKING NEWS VISIT WWW.QNS.COM THE QUEENS editorial PUBLISHER & EDITOR CO-PUBLISHER ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER EDITOR-IN-CHIEF VP, EVENTS, WEB & SOCIAL MEDIA ART DIRECTOR ARTIST SOCIAL MEDIA MANAGER STAFF REPORTERS CONTRIBUTING REPORTERS ASSISTANT TO PUBLISHER CLASSIFIED MANAGER CONTROLLER PRESIDENT & CEO VICE PRESIDENT VICTORIA SCHNEPS-YUNIS JOSHUA A. SCHNEPS BOB BRENNAN ROBERT POZARYCKI AMY AMATO-SANCHEZ NIRMAL SINGH RON TORINA EMILY DAVENPORT KATRINA MEDOFF, ANTHONY GIUDICE, ANGELA MATUA SUZANNE MONTEVERDI CLIFF KASDEN, SAMANTHA SOHMER, ELIZABETH ALONI DEBORAH CUSICK CELESTE ALAMIN MARIA VALENCIA VICTORIA SCHNEPS-YUNIS JOSHUA A. SCHNEPS Schneps Communications, 38-15 Bell Blvd., Bayside, NY 11361 718-224-5863 • Fax 718-224-5441 www.qns.com editorial e-mail: [email protected] for advertising e-mail: [email protected] Entire Contents Copyright 2017 by The Queens Courier All letters sent to THE QUEENS COURIER should be brief and are subject to condensing. Writers should include a full address and home and offi ce telephone numbers, where available, as well as affi liation, indicating special interest. Anonymous letters are not printed. Name withheld on request. LETTERS TO THE EDITOR, AS WELL AS OP-ED PIECES IN NO WAY REFLECT THE PAPER’S POSITION. No such ad or any part thereof may be reproduced without prior permission of THE QUEENS COURIER. The publishers will not be responsible for any error in advertising beyond the cost of the space occupied by the error. Errors must be reported to THE QUEENS COURIER within fi ve days of publication. Ad position cannot be guaranteed unless paid prior to publication. Schneps Communications assumes no liability for the content or reply to any ads. The advertiser assumes all liability for the content of and all replies. The advertiser agrees to hold THE QUEENS COURIER and its employees harmless from all cost, expenses, liabilities, and damages resulting from or caused by the publication or recording placed by the advertiser or any reply to any such advertisement. PURPLE SPRING // PHOTO BY JEFFREY PFLAUM Send us your photos of Queens and you could see them online or in our paper! To submit them to us tag @queenscourier on Instagram, visit our Facebook page, tweet @QNS or email [email protected] (subject: Queens Snaps). Yes or no on street safety plan What does a community have to do to get a safer street? Th at’s what many Corona residents found themselves asking following last week’s Community Board 4 meeting in which the board tabled yet again a plan to implement traffi c control measures along 111th Street, a very wide roadway adjacent to Flushing Meadows Corona Park that can oft en be hazardous to cross. Ensuring a safe street, especially near a park as active as Flushing Meadows, ought to be a priority for any community board. Th e board has been working with the Department of Transportation (DOT) for months, but it seems that whenever one step forward is proposed, somebody suggests taking a half-step back. Th ere have been disputes over removing traffi c lanes from 111th Street and installing bike lanes along the roadway, citing concerns about congestion. Board members grumbled about the lack of marked crosswalks at certain intersections. Some suggested installing traffi c signals at each intersection, but that might slow things down too much. So with one grievance raised with every solution presented, the board tabled the plan. Th at only caused more grief at the March 21 meeting, as the decision was made before any of the supporters of the street improvements got a chance to speak publicly about it. It almost seems as if the board and the DOT are striving to fi nd a plan that makes everybody happy. Whatever the motive, it is backfi ring terribly, and it’s giving both the board and the city DOT black eyes in the process. Few decisions in government are unanimous, and few decisions make everyone happy. Th ere will always be people unhappy about bike lanes or traffi c signals. Th e job of a community board or a city agency is not to make everyone happy as much as it is about making the community safer. Searching for practical solutions to serious problems should always take priority. For decades, Queens community boards have played a valuable role in improving neighborhoods across the borough. However, there shouldn’t be such micromanaging and hair splitting when it comes to improving an unsafe safe that puts everyone at risk. We call on CB 4 puts the plan to a vote at its April meeting. Th e community deserves an answer once and for all. STORY: Queens is the language capital of not just NYC, but also Earth: World Economic Forum SUMMARY: With over 160 languages spoken and counting, Queens is truly living up to its name of the “World’s Borough” REACH: 40,032 (as of 3/27/17)
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