Minding Your Business: Taking it to the ring for charity
Photo credit: Joseph D. Sullivan | Dana "The Devastator" Battaglia stops a shot with her nose delivered by Kim "The Cyclone" Masi during their match. Long Island Fight For Charity, an annual charity event in which business people, civic leaders and politicians get into the ring and box. The event held at the Huntington Hilton raised $80,000. (Nov. 23, 2009)
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In the red trunks was "Lady Liberty," and in the blue was "Diesel."
When the bell rang they squared off, at first trading light punches but then delivering somewhat sharper blows in a ring set up at the Huntington Hilton on Monday night.
But neither took a real punch or got hurt. At the end of the three one-minute rounds, they embraced.
This is boxing? Yes, it was - at Long Island's seventh annual Fight for Charity, an event that pits businesspeople, civic leaders and others against one another. It's all for charity. The boxers, or their companies, are asked to raise $5,000 each. Long Island Community Chest and the Genesis School of Plainview, an organization that works with young people with autism, were among the beneficiaries. Jeff Cohen, an organizer of the event, estimated $80,000 was raised.
In real life, "Lady Liberty" is Laurinda Handlik, executive director of business development at Liberty Moving & Storage in Commack. "Diesel" is Andrea Attivissimo, personal training manager at Life Fitness Clubs in Lawrence. After her bout, a slightly winded and sweaty Handlik stepped out of the ring to hugs from friends and fans.
"I hope people appreciate what we did for them," she said, smiling. In these fights everyone is a winner. About 1,200 people showed up for the fights and whooped and cheered as young and not-so-young went at it in the ring.
CPI Aero Inc., an aircraft parts maker in Edgewood, sponsored Gregg "Thunderbolt" Aramanda, a 53-year-old vice president of business development. While Aramanda prepared for his fight, his wife, Siobhan, stood nervously near the ring.
"I pray he doesn't get hurt," she said. Just in case, the Melville fire department had an ambulance outside the hotel. It wasn't needed.
Retailer takes a holiday
Thursday, Thanksgiving Day, many of the big department stores and discounters were open. But not P.C. Richard & Son, the giant East Farmingdale-based consumer electronics retailer and one of Long Island's oldest companies.
According to its tradition, P.C. Richard doors were closed.
"It is our opinion that retailers who choose to open on Thanksgiving Day show no respect to their employees and families and are in total disrespect of family values," P.C. Richard says in an annual advertisement it runs. Chief executive Gary Richard said in a phone interview that the Thanksgiving closing would always be a part of the retail company's tradition, no matter what other stores did.
"If you need one more day to make your year-end [figures] then you better get out of business," Richard said. "Those stores that are going to be open, are the CEOs going to be there working? How can they have a Thanksgiving dinner knowing their workers are working?"
But this year, P.C. Richard might be hurt more than in the past, said Joel Evans, a business and marketing professor at Hofstra.
Because of the bad economy, shoppers will be hunting for deals, and retailers will be obliging them in an effort to move merchandise.
"This year, [P.C. Richard] will probably take a big hit," Evans said. Shoppers are not likely to wait till the day after Thanksgiving to go to P.C. Richard, as they may have done in the past, because the hunger for immediate deals is so strong.
But, Evans said, "I have tremendous respect for anybody who sticks to their guns and believes workers should be home" for Thanksgiving.
Search for LIA chief under way
The process of replacing Matt Crosson, the outgoing president of the Long Island Association after 16 years at the helm, has officially begun, said Kirk Kordeleski, an LIA board member heading a search committee.
The committee held its first meeting Tuesday. Kordeleski announced the names of seven members: Adelphi president Robert Scott; attorney Michael Faltischek of Ruskin Moscou Faltischek; Chris Giamo, metro president for suburban New York and Connecticut TD Bank; Linda Amper, senior vice president at Melville-based OSI Pharmaceuticals Inc.; Katherine Heaviside, president of public relations and marketing firm Epoch 5 of Huntington; EGC marketing agency president Ernie Canadeo; and Larry Waldman of Holtz Rubenstein Reminick Llp.
Kordeleski said one or two more people may be added to the committee. Actual candidate interviews, he said, would probably not take place until February.
