BY DUSICA SUE MALESEVIC | Community Board 1 may have recently lost some veterans, but it has gained seven new members, which include one returning and for the first time a minor.
Susan Wu, 17, lives in Battery Park City and is a junior at Stuyvesant High School.
C.B. 1 Chairperson Catherine McVay Hughes said in an email that the board is “fortunate to have a local high school student who lives in C.B. 1 and attends Stuyvesant to keep us all on our toes!”
Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer pushed for 16- and 17-year-olds to serve on community boards — something that was illegal until last summer.
In addition to Wu, there is a returning member, Tiffany Winbush, 32, a Financial District resident who served two terms from 2008 to 2012.
“I wanted to return just to give back to the community,” Winbush said in a phone interview.
She took some time away to complete graduate school and start a family, she said, and has a two and a half year old daughter.
Winbush is interested in serving on the Financial District Committee, where she has lived for ten years. Originally from Louisiana, she works in digital marketing and also does social media and public relations for women entrepreneurs. She is also considering joining the board’s Youth and Education Committee.
“It is great to have an experienced member and new mom, Tiffany Winbush, back on the board so that her young parent perspective will be included — and she is up to speed already,” said Hughes, who noted that there is still no locally zoned public K-8 school in the Financial District, which has experienced a changing and growing population.
Winbush previously served on the Quality of Life Committee and said she would continue to focus on those types of issues.
Wendy Chapman, 48, is new to the community board, but not a new face. Chapman, who is one of the leaders of Build Schools Now, was already coming to a lot of meetings when Hughes asked if she had ever thought about joining the board.
Her interest in community boards was spurred when, in April 2013, the Department of Education was set to move P.S. 150 from Tribeca to Chelsea. Chapman, who was P.T.A. president at the time and has lived in Tribeca since 1997, went to C.B. 1 for help. Eventually the D.O.E. relented and P.S. 150, which recently won a National Blue Ribbon Award for academic achievement, was not relocated.
Her son is currently in fifth grade at P.S. 150 and her two daughters went there as well. Her eldest daughter now goes to Bronx High School of Science and her middle daughter attends NYC Lab Middle School for Collaborative Studies.
Chapman will serve on the Youth and Education Committee and will continue to tackle school overcrowding.
“This problem’s not going away,” she said in a phone interview. “If you’re just talking to parents in the playground — they have no idea.”
Another new member is Tom Berton, 50,
who runs Manhattan By Sail that operates tours in his historic schooner Shearwater. Born and raised in New York City, he has resided in Lower Manhattan since 1995 and currently lives in the Seaport.
He is a P.T.A. member of Peck Slip School, whose new building is slated to open in the Seaport this fall, where his 6-year-old daughter is in kindergarten and his 4-year-old will go next year.
Berton has gone to C.B. 1 a few times for assistance and support and “found board members to be diligent, caring and really engaged and helpful,” he said in a phone interview.
Berton’s Shearwater was docking at North Cove Marina, but as it has recently switched operators, he is awaiting word.
He will be focused on congestion and all its related issues, such as pedestrian safety, and mentioned the car that recently drove onto the curb and badly injured a woman near Spruce Street School April 13.
[Police on Tuesday said they identified the car, but are unlikely to charge anyone with the misdemeanor of leaving the scene of an accident, because video does not show if the owner was the driver.]
Patrick Kennell, 38, has been a public member for the Financial District Committee for a little over a year and now will be on the board.
Kennell has lived in the Financial District for eight years and Downtown for 11. The major reason he got involved, he said in a phone interview, is that he saw the community going through a big period of change.
He is the father of two young children, a four-year-old son and a second grader at P.S. 11 in Chelsea. The big issue for the Financial District, he said, is getting the school that it needs and he mentioned the 456-seat elementary school, which was announced in November 2013 but has yet to be sited.
A litigator, Kennell, wants to bring his legal training perspective to the table. He will serve on the Financial District Committee and is interested in being part of the Planning and Personnel committees.
Another new member is Fern Cunningham, who has lived in Lower Manhattan for 30 years and has seen numerous changes — including what name to give the neighborhood she currently lives in. She lives on Nassau St. by Pace University, which some consider Civic Center, others the Financial District.
She told Downtown Express by phone that she is interested in quality of life issues, and is excited to be part of the board and learn about how decisions are made that affect the community. She has worked for the media marketing firm, Nielsen Company, for over 20 years.
Originally from Lima, Peru, Elizabeth Avila, 32,
has lived in the Financial District since 2012. She said in an email that growing up she split her time between Lima and New York City thanks to her father’s association with the United Nations.
She said she is interested in affordable housing, city planning and education issues. Avila works at Standard Charter Bank and said she decided to join C.B. 1 because she likes to volunteer and collaborate with the community.
