Village Notebook: New Fire Chiefs, Parking Issues, and Proposed Budget

Four new fire chiefs were elected to the Babylon Fire Department. Paul Twardy, previously 1st Assistant Chief takes over as Chief of Department for Anthony Cardali. Michael Sasuk was elected to 1st Assistant from 2nd Assistant and Scott Gleen to 2nd from 3rd. The newest chief, Michael Golub, was appointed as 3rd Assistant Chief. Family, friends and fellow volunteers attended a ceremony at Village Hall on April 10.

The restaurant moratorium, designed to allow the village to assess the impact on parking and traffic of new restaurants, especially the many-seat Monsoon, was extended in March for another six months. Village Attorney Joel Sikowitz noted that the municipal lots to the east of Deer Park Avenue almost always have room, even on a busy Friday or Saturday night, but that the challenge was encouraging restaurant and bar patrons to utilize the lot.

"They either don't know they're there or they don't want to walk. They can't be bothered to park that far away," Sikowitz commented, adding that there had been some illegal parking spillover into the St. Joseph's Church lots. There were no immediate plans for additional signage.

Village restaurants may also be affected by another change: Sikowitz mentioned the possibility of adopting a new hybrid code for eateries that offer limited cooking and food, and self-service instead of table service. The code is still in preliminary discussion stages.

The proposed Village of Babylon 2012-2013 budget is online for public viewing. Mayor Ralph Scordino told Patch that the biggest line item increases were foremployee benefits, due to increases in the cost of health insurance. Repairs to the truck fleet including village dump trucks, garbage and plowing vehicles also impacted the $8 million dollar budget.

"Fixed costs things like increase in lighting and fuel costs affected us," said Scordino. A public hearing last week on the budget proposal was lightly attended, with one resident inquiring if upgrades to the golf course were responsible for a portion of the budget increase. Mayor Scordino replied that golf course expenses were not a major factor.