Thursday, July 17, 2025
The West Hempstead Community Support and Civic Association hosted a day of community service on Sunday by organizing a clean up of Halls Pond Park on Nassau Boulevard.
Sarah Greenberg, the association’s treasurer, and board member Kurt Rockensies orchestrated the event.
“We try to do the Halls Pond clean up once or twice a year, just to make sure the park is looking nice and clean,” Greenberg said. “A lot of people come through here in the spring and summer. They play on the playgrounds, they’re around the ponds, so we just want (to) make sure it looks nice for everybody.”
The Nassau County Department of Parks, Recreation and Museums dropped off supplies for the clean up, including gloves, garbage bags, rakes, shovels, brooms, grabber tools, and more. Volunteers from the community then gathered their needed supplies at the gazebo and set off into the park to help remove litter and debris.
“We just want to make sure that the one public space in town, the park and the playground, is clean for our community,” Rockensies said. “You know, this is really the entrance way when people first come into West Hempstead, so we want to make sure it looks good.”
25 people participated in the event, including local Scouts, high school students seeking community service hours, support association members, along with members of the local Lions Club and others looking to get involved in a worthwhile community project. They spent three hours cleaning the park, despite the ongoing mist and light rain.
“We try to do the clean up at least twice a year to make sure that community members have that opportunity to participate and volunteer,” Rockensies said. “Even on a rainy day like this, it’s nice to see how people still come out and help.”
While the parks department keeps the park clean most of the year and is responsible for garbage collection at the park, community clean-ups provide community members with the opportunity to pick up small pieces of plastic and bottle caps that the department’s employees might not see lodged in the grass.
“We try to rake some of the leaves that are in the back,” Greenberg said. “You don’t really realize how much little stuff is all over until you’re really looking for it.”
Moshe Hill, a lifelong West Hempstead resident who’s running for Nassau County legislator in the 5th District, which includes Merrick and Freeport, described the importance of the community pitching in.
“I live right down the block from the pond,” Hill said. “It is a place I come to pretty much every week with my kids, and it’s wonderful. The parks department does a great job, and we like to help out whenever we can. We really need to ensure that all parks are clean and safe for all families in the area and not just in West Hempstead, but throughout Nassau County.”
County Legislator for District 14, William Gaylor, emphasized the need to keep the neighborhood park beautiful.
“This is where we live, work and play, and we want to keep it a nice area, especially Halls Pond,” Gaylor said. “We’ve got a beautiful kids’ park down here. There’s a lot of activity here every day.”
Volunteers filled more than 20 bags with garbage and waste collected around the park. After the clean up, parks department employees returned to collect the full trash bags, as well as the equipment loaned to the association.
“In the Town of Hempstead, we have absolutely beautiful parks, beautiful beaches, a lot of amenities, and it’s up to us to really keep it usable and pristine,” said Jean-Baptiste Carelus, who’s running for Deputy Supervisor and Senior Councilwoman Dorothy L. Goosby’s seat as Town of Hempstead councilman in the 1st District, which includes West Hempstead and Lakeview. “You don’t want to live in trash. You want to be able to come out to the park, enjoy the pond, enjoy the swing set, have a nice ball field for (kids). It creates community.”
