Glenn Yule
Executive director of Sunnyside BID
Former police officer
COMMUNITY INVOLVEMENT: Glenn Yule is the executive director of the Sunnyside Business Improvement District (BID), which was established this May and represents about 290 businesses. Most of the businesses in the district are mom-and-pop establishments, Yule explained.
These businesses are benefiting from the BID because it does things like cleaning the streets and putting up holiday lights, making the area more attractive, Yule said.
His job is to act as a liaison between the city and the businesses. Another aspect of his job is to try to bring customers to the area. “We’re aggressively trying to market the BID because the businesses are hurting,” Yule said.
PERSONAL: Forty-six-year-old Yule, of Bayside, said he chose this job because it’s about helping others - which is what he used to do for over 21 years as a police officer.
He said working for the police department taught him things he uses at his current job, like treating people respectfully. “I was always thinking that it’s someone’s mother or sister and how would I want my mother or sister to be treated.”
But, of course, being a cop was dangerous - he got hurt several times. One of the incidents happened in 1987 when he was dealing with a woman on a subway platform in Brooklyn. The woman ignored his request to put out her cigarette, so while Yule was handcuffing her, she bit his calf so hard it started bleeding. “I was nervous about getting AIDS,” he said, explaining that back then little was known about the disease.
Some of Yule’s experiences as a police officer have touched him deeply. “I’d be crying like a baby whenever a child passed away,” he said. Then he recalled a road accident where a two-year-old girl flew threw a car’s windshield and died. “It was a horrible day.”
INSPIRATION: “It was a new challenge. It was my introduction to a life not being a civil servant,” Yule said of his current job. “But I do miss driving like a maniac to where people need help. Every time I hear a siren, I turn around.”
BIGGEST CHALLENGE: The hardest thing for Yule to do as a BID director is to persuade new immigrants who own businesses in the area to join the BID. “It’s that cultural and language barrier. They think I’m going to ask them for money.”
FONDEST MEMORY: One of Yule’s fondest memories – being able to help on 9/11 – is also one of his worst. That day he wasn’t working but when he heard about the attacks, he headed for the scene from his home in Queens.
He didn’t make it to Manhattan. Instead, he stayed on the Queensboro Bridge, helping to steer the crowds down Queens Boulevard. The buses and the subway weren’t working, but the police wanted to direct people away from Manhattan as fast as possible because it still wasn’t clear if the attack was over, Yule said.
- Yaldaz Sadakova
