Riis Park will be coming back to life with some new life. Earlier this week, the National Park Service announced that it has selected a new contractor to take over Bay 9 and other nearby concession areas, previously operated by Riis Park Beach Bazaar. A group of Rockaway locals, known as the Riis Beach Cooperative, will be stepping up to the plate with a new seven-year lease.

After NPS put out a Request for Proposals, Riis Beach Collective (which will be known as Riis Beach Cooperative), was

 We published The Top 30 finalists in The Rockaway Times Photo Contest in last week’s issue. The only problem was, we only had 29, as one photo was a duplicate. So here’s the missing photo. Maybe it’s the one you took?  In the coming weeks, we will announce the names of all the finalists.

 No access. Sand only. Full access, for half a summer. After NYC Parks released its closure plan in relation to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers shoreline protection work taking place this summer, one thing is clear—it’s going to be a confusing, and oftentimes frustrating summer.

After The Wave shared that NYC Parks would be closing Beach 90th to Beach 116th Street through July earlier this month, NYC Parks told The Rockaway Times that these reports were “not accurate” and that they were still

*****

Count on Parks. Well, one thing is pretty consistent every beach season, the NYC Parks Department throws a stink bomb on the beach blanket. The announcement of beach closures comes late, the reasoning of such closures comes half-baked, and the delivery comes from who-knows-who? The Press office (who are just taking orders from ???? ) makes the announcement, there’s an uproar, and then some tweaks are made. And even then, you have to be a puzzle-solver to figure out which beaches are

 Save the day. On Monday, May 30, 2022 the American Legion Daniel M. O’Connell Post #272 will host its 100th Memorial Day Parade. The day will commence with a Memorial mass at 10:30 a.m. on Beach 129th street at Saint Francis De Sales Church. At the conclusion of services, a ceremony will be held at the Four Chaplains monument outside the church. The parade will proceed to 121st Street for a ceremony at the Jewish War Veterans Memorial Circle. Upon conclusion of our services there, the parade

 Who let the dogs out? On Saturday…everyone! Rockaway's Pups on Parade, the inaugural Rockaway Doggie Parade hosted by Dana Humphrey, took place on May 14 on the boardwalk, and even the cool cats say it was pawsitively awesome!

Humphrey, originally from California, moved to New York 15 years ago, and has been calling Rockaway home for the past four. Some may know her as the “The Pet Lady.” Others know Humphrey as the lead Marketing and PR Consultant for her company Whitegate PR. She

*****

Count on Parks. Well, one thing is pretty consistent every beach season, the NYC Parks Department throws a stink bomb on the beach blanket. The announcement of beach closures comes late, the reasoning of such closures comes half-baked, and the delivery comes from who-knows-who? The Press office (who are just taking orders from ???? ) makes the announcement, there’s an uproar, and then some tweaks are made. And even then, you have to be a puzzle-solver to figure out which beaches are

*****

As usual, it was a tough task selecting a Top 30 in the annual Rockaway Times Photo Contest. Our selections are on Pages 14, 15, and 16. Unfortunately some great shots couldn’t make the cut because the resolution was too low. In fact, we had to make some last minute choices because a few photos we picked lost quality as we enlarged them. The Top 30 get enlarged to poster-size and are put up on display on the boardwalk. If the resolution is too low the photos become pixelated and aren’t

*****

Happy Mother’s Day! We’ve got some great photos of Moms on Pages 20 and 22. Thanks for sending them in!

*****

120 Pages! We’re putting together our annual Rockaway Times Summer & Community Guide and we’re thrilled to say it’ll be a record-setter for us. There’s been such a positive response from advertisers (pretty smart advertisers!) that we’ve had to keep increasing the size of the summer magazine that everybody loves. As usual, it’ll be chock full of fun, interesting stuff and

*****

The funeral Mass for Firefighter Timothy Klein is tomorrow, Friday, April 29, 11 a.m. at St. Francis de Sales.

*****

A newspaper isn’t the place where the phrase, “there are no words” makes much sense but it sure seems appropriate when trying to express the deep sadness and shock the community feels in the aftermath of the death of Firefighter Timothy Klein. A young man, just 31, part of well-known much-loved family, Timothy gave his life protecting others. There are no words, but try

*****

Happy anniversary to us. It’s our 408th week of publishing. It doesn’t mean anything, but we just felt like celebrating.

*****

Every year, without fail, The Rockaway Times Summer & Community Guide comes out and a couple of advertisers have instant remorse and envy because they missed the boat. They know they should have been in it. Don’t let that happen. The Rockaway Times Summer Guide is something people keep and look through all year. You want to reach people from one end of the

*****

Happy Easter. Happy Passover.

*****

In our We Get Email section last week, a letter from Allen Rosen had a wrong link to the online petition he’s promoting regarding transit. The petition Oppose the MTA's Plan to Eliminate Bus Stops, can be found at www.change.org/p/mta-oppose-the-mta-s-plan-to-eliminate-bus-stops. And while we’re cleaning up, credit for last week’s front-page photo of the city bus should have been given to Jean O’Connell.

*****

If you own a business or run a

 Dear Editor:

I would like to commend Tori Dresch, a former pre-K student of mine at Our Lady Help of Christians in Marine Park, on her poignant tribute to firefighter Tim Klein, a former student in my St. Francis de Sales' Library Media Center class for a number of years.  It was a pleasure to learn how two of my pupils, one from Brooklyn, and one from Queens, forged a long friendship here on the Rockaway peninsula, which began one summer working at The Silver Gull. Tori recognized the

 Dear Editor:

I just got my flood insurance renewal and the premium has doubled from $2,300 to $4,464!  How is it possible the tenants can be given a 2-year moratorium on rent, students can be given a moratorium on repaying loans but home owners can have premiums doubled!?

I reached out to Sen. Schumer and Sen. Gillibrand for help with this, but I am not counting on any help. I reached out to both of them two years ago for help with a different issue and neither even acknowledged my

 Dear Editor:

Scuttlebutt around town is the old Tuberculosis hospital turned nursing home before being vacated in the ‘90s is about to be demolished. The property that straddles Neponsit and Riis Park is a prime location for Senator Schumer to keep one of his many long-lost campaign promises he made to us to send him to D.C.: A Pool. NYS has deemed the property to be used for a health care facility. For a beach community, it is a perfect fit!  Swimming is not only healthy, it actually could

 Dear Editor:

Richard Berger is so right about Memorial Circle. Seventy-five years ago this May, the Belle Harbor Garden Club established Memorial Circle to honor those local men who were killed in WWII. They obtained a local law to name the area “Memorial Circle,” and it is by that name that locals identify the area. On a whim, Parks Commissioner Henry Stern decided to rename the area “Veterans Circle” and replaced all the signs at the Circle with that name. On a number of occasions, the

 Dear Editor:

I'd like to congratulate Ms. Joan Diehl, Creative Writing teacher at PS/MS 114 on last week’s column of excerpted essays by her students on the end of required masks. As a former high school, college teacher, and weekly columnist, I know the importance of proper writing skills. It requires organization, research, critical thinking, planning, attention to spelling, grammar and sentence structure. Writing is a skill that needs to be nurtured and practiced, just as playing an

 Dear Editor:

It is with interest that I read the article on the "Washington Avenue Memorial Circle." However, there are some comments I'd like to express on it.

My historians advise me that Rockaway Beach Boulevard used to be called Washington Boulevard, for which the traffic circle on Beach 120th Street was named, as was the now-gone Washington Hotel and Catering Hall. Heck, the street I live on was originally known as Park Avenue, in addition to the Beach numbered street.

The Memorial

I have lived in Rockaway Park for most of my life. I lived in Broad Channel for about ten years and I did a one-year stint in Indiana. When I was a child, I lived on Beach 117th Street and we did not have a driveway. On Friday afternoon, after alternate side, my parents would park the car on the beach block until Monday morning. I tell you this both because I know what it is like to want to come to the beach on the weekends and not have a spot and I know what it is like to not have a car on the

Today I am going to start teaching Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird to my 9th grade English class. I am glad the New York City Department of Education and my school, specifically, have not yet said that this is a banned book. YET. Over the years, this novel has been the subject of debate about its racial insensitivity due to the language used in the novel. Even before cancel culture came out and everything became offensive, I always started the novel with the explanation that, in my opinion

I have been a high school and sometimes middle school English teacher for almost 25 years. During those 25 years, the New York State English Regents and the SAT have changed multiple times. I have sat through numerous professional developments and meetings discussing the changes and how to align your instruction for the exam. Each time we worked on this I would ask: We teach reading and writing, what are we changing? I am just a lowly teacher, not someone who sits at the Board of Regents in

In case you have not seen the barrage of sports betting advertisements, sports betting is now legally allowed in New York State. Now I love JB Smooth, aka Leon from “Curb Your Enthusiasm,” but I am done with seeing him dressed as a Roman Emperor on the commercials all day long.  And come on, his wife/empress is Halle Berry? That is another column entirely. 

One of the reasons why this is a fabulous idea is the revenue that it will bring to the State. According to Forbes Magazine, “the State

I recently celebrated my marriage of 29 years, and I am still amazed at the actions of my spouse once in a while. How is it that after 29 years of marriage, you can still realize something new about your spouse and it can drive you a bit crazy? It can also add humor as some incidents become running jokes. 

Last September, we were driving out of a medical building where I had just seen a doctor. While we were exiting the parking garage, a large man was walking towards us. The man had bandages

I recently showed my Film and Literature students the film It’s A Wonderful Life. We first read an excerpt of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, and as we were watching, we compared and contrasted the Dickens’ work with Frank Capra’s film. It was so refreshing how much they enjoyed the film. What is even more interesting is many of my students do not even celebrate Christmas. One young man who is quite polite and enjoys the class usually comes only four days a week. When he entered the class