He's deeply committed to helping

A lifelong resident of East Rockaway, David Donovan has spent his free time giving back to the community and his church ever since his high school days. In recognition of his efforts — including considerable volunteer work with Bethany Congregational Church — the Herald is proud to name Donovan its 2022 Person of the Year.

His volunteer work started during his time at East Rockaway Junior-Senior High School. In 1976, Donovan, along with students in every high school class, helped paint a mural on an open wall on Main Street a block away from Bethany Congregational Church.

“That was one of the biggest community events I remember doing,” Donovan said.

Donovan’s involvement in the community accelerated when he started to get involved with the Bethany church. He initially was part of the church from kindergarten to his confirmation at age 14. He took a break from the church for a few years, but returned to become a huge contributor to the church community.

“I started teaching Sunday school and I taught the nursery for 10 years,” Donovan said. “Then I taught the confirmation class, which is the 14-year-olds, and I taught that for about 14 years.” With decades of involvement, Donavan secured a spot as a trustee on the church’s board.

Fellow trustee Richard Eaves said Donovan’s personality makes him good at his job. “David is humble enough to be able to be able to listen to others,” Eaves said. “He’s also intelligent enough, and most of the trustees are intelligent, but he is intelligent enough to be able to listen, stop, and digest.”

Donovan considers his greatest strength to be his sense of humor, which he uses to reach out to people and to get to know them. “If I can get someone to smile, then I probably can get them to talk, and that’s a great way to make them feel welcomed and less nervous,” he said.

Eaves would agree. “He is a fun loving, family-caring, just bigger-than-life guy,” Eaves said. “His laugh is a whole body laugh. Just jiggles and wiggles.”

According to Eaves, Donovan treats his church family as close as his real family, which is why Donovan is so involved in volunteer work at the church. “His greatest strength is his family and whoever he considers family, he is extremely loyal, positive, and caring,” Eaves said.

A broadcast professional who works for AMC Broadcasting and Technology as a technical director, Donovan personally travels to Freeport to drop off the food collected at Bethany for the Long Island Council of Churches with his wife when he is off from work. Recently, he also dropped off toys from the church’s toy drive.

“We picked up the toys and then brought them over to the pantry,” Donovan said. “I’ve also collected food and clothing at my job and bring them to the pantry as well.”

Donovan tried to start a group home for homeless people, though it didn’t come to fruition due to complications with paperwork. His work ethic in trying to get this home up and running showed Eaves the type of man Donovan is.

“Donovan believes that everyone should have a place to live, everyone should be comfortable, and everyone should be well-fed and loved,” Eaves said.

Donovan’s grounding in church teaching has shaped his desire to help the less fortunate. Stories in the Bible shaped who he is today.

“Jesus taught us that we have to look outside of ourselves and look into the community,” Donovan said.

Donovan started a event, HurriCon, to raise money to fix the flooring in Bethany Congregational Church after Hurricane Sandy. The fundraiser’s community impact turned out to be much higher than Donovan expected, as fixing the church gym floors made it functional to the community again.

“If there ever was a child that went to high school that was in Rock Rivalry and needed rehearsal space, we had it now because of the floor,” Eaves said.

The church can now host the Boy Scouts again, as well. “People come to the church to meet there, whether it’s the Boy Scouts, the Girl Scouts, or we have a dog club that meets at the church as well,” Donovan said.

The money Donovan raised from HurriCon also allowed Bethany to host Thanksgiving dinner and give out free meals to those in need. “Barbara Herrmann has been hosting this event for 10 years, but they weren’t able to host this while the floors were damaged,” Eaves said. “We couldn’t allow people to come in, but we did deliver the food.”

Roughly 40 people showed up this past year for Bethany’s Thanksgiving meal, which wouldn’t have been possible if not for Donovan’s contributions to the church.

Bethany Congregational Church has been in the community since 1885. “It really needs a lot of work to be able to survive,” Donovan said. He views the church as a “vehicle” because of all the events it hosts, and he tries to contribute wherever he can. Donovan hosted another event earlier this year, FurnaceCon, to raise money to replace the church’s broken furnace.

Going forward, Donovan plans to help Bethany expand and to increase awareness about the church.

“The biggest concern is making sure that people know that the church is in the community and that it is there for the community,” Donovan said. He wants people in the community to know that “the church is there for you and we’ll welcome you with open arms.”