Youth Task Force cleans Front Street, Rockville Centre train station

Nearly 40 students came together on Sept. 17 to participate in Mayor Francis Murray’s Youth Task Force.

The students met at 7:30 a.m. to begin cleaning Front Street, the railroad station and a couple of parking lots in the surrounding area. “I gave them a pep talk about how this village really belongs to them and how proud I was of them to get up so early on a Saturday morning,” Murray said. “The kids worked very hard. I told them they were the stewards [of] the village.”

The coordinators broke the students up into seven groups of five and set them to work in five separate areas. “It was an amazing group effort with parent volunteers not only supervising but cleaning up alongside the volunteers,” said program coordinator Bridget Kelly said. “We knew it was a success when several of the volunteers asked at 9:30, ‘what’s our new project?’”

According to Kelly, the Youth Task Force is open to all Rockville Centre residents in the 7th through 12th grades. Kelly added that they are looking for a commitment of 36 voluntary hours a year.

The next planned clean up is scheduled for Oct. 1 in the parks around Skelos Sports Complex. Additional plans for the Youth Task Force include helping to run food drives and providing after-school tutoring.

Interested youth and adult volunteers may e-mail their name, age, grade and contact information to youthtaskforce@rvcny.us or visit the village website at www.rvcny.us to fill out an online sign-up form. They can also call the Mayor’s Office at (516) 678-9260.

The task force is also reaching out to schools, temples, churches and not-for-profit agencies for community service projects suitable for its volunteers. Adults wishing to volunteer or suggest volunteer projects should also contact the Mayor’s Youth Task Force.