East Hills race pits 2 incumbents against 2 challengers

Two incumbents are squaring off against two challengers in East Hills for trustee seats carrying four-year terms.

Deputy Mayor Emanuel Zuckerman, 68, grew up in the Bronx and studied mathematics at City College, though he did not graduate. He moved to East Hills in 1978 and retired in 2008 from owning small businesses. He’s running on the Unity Party line with trustee Clara Pomerantz.

He was first elected to the board in 2000, was appointed deputy mayor in 2010, and is seeking his fifth term as trustee.

He said he’s proud of his service. “We’ve managed to build this into a tremendous community,” he said. “We increased property values. We’ve had a balanced budget and no tax increases for six years.”

Zuckerman highlighted his work in helping design and plan the village’s park. “I oversaw several committees and helped with the design and planning of the park, and helped to maintain the park once it was opened.”

He also helped developd the village’s security and public safety programs. In the future, he said, he wants to continue working on the park’s amenities, including acquiring a snow-making machine for winter sledding activities, and using solar energy to heat the public pool.

Pomerantz, 55, a nursery school and religious school teacher, was born in Israel and moved to Great Neck as a child. She received a bachelor’s degree in mathematics and computer science from Hofstra University in 1983. She moved to East Hills 14 years ago.

She was first appointed to the board in 2010 to fill a vacated seat, then won election in 2011 to serve the rest of the term. She was re-elected in 2012.

“I love the community. It’s very vibrant,” she said. “I’m very creative and I come up with a lot of ideas and I do a lot of special events.”

She said she developed an elderly outreach program after superstorm Sandy left many homes without power for several days.

“We had a lot of elderly residents here, so we started knocking on doors and we transported them to the village hall where we had generators,” she said.

The storm response grew into a database that enables neighbors to check on elderly residents.

“We have a database to match the elderly and neighbors, and I check that if a storm is coming, we make sure neighbors know to check on them,” she said.

Pomerantz said she’s launched other programs for kids and teens in the village, and said these programs have been “self-funded, sponsored or grant-funded” without raising taxes.

Challenger Neil Foster declined to answer Newsday’s interview questions about his background and his candidacy. According to a local newspaper, the Roslyn News, he was on the boards of the Albertson Soccer Club and Roslyn Booster Basketball, and co-founder of Shooting Stars, a basketball program for children with special needs.

Challenger Jana Goldenberg did not respond to several phone messages asking for an interview. According to a local news site, The Island Now, she has served on the East Hills Architectural Review Board, the Aircraft Noise and Air Pollution Abatement committee and the Building, Zoning, Tree Review committee, and was president of the Country Estates Civic Association and co-created the Roslyn Women’s Softball League.