COMMUNITY SERVICE: Janet McEneaney works as an attorney, arbitrator and mediator and is a professor on the adjunct faculty at New York University, where she teaches law and business subjects, in addition to her work with the community. After experiencing some neighborhood problems shortly after McEneaney arrived in Bayside, she began a civic association.
In 2008, State Senator Tony Avella appointed McEneaney to serve as a member of Community Board 11. In 2012, after noticing an increase in noise from airplanes, McEneaney organized Queens Quiet Skies.
“Queens Quiet Skies has worked with Congressmembers Steve Israel and Grace Meng, Senator Tony Avella, Assemblymember Ed Braunstein, many other elected officials and representatives of aviation community groups and municipalities in Queens, Brooklyn, Nassau County and northern New Jersey,” explained McEneaney. “Together we have pushed to established a Community Aviation Roundtable, to increase the number of noise monitors on the runways at our local airports, to convince the FAA to implement a current environmental study rather than relying on a study from 2007, as they plan to do, and to have the Port Authority conduct noise compatibility studies in our communities around the airports.”
BACKGROUND: McEneaney was born in Brooklyn, lived in Rego Park for 25 years, then moved to Bayside where she has lived since. McEneaney received her J.D. degree from the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law and a Masters of Law degree from the University of Leicester School of Law in England.
FAVORITE MEMORY: “My best recent moment was when we received a letter from the entire Congressional delegation headed by Senators Charles Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand that endorsed the establishment of a Community Aviation Roundtable; that felt like a victory for everybody.”
BIGGEST CHALLENGE: McEneaney says her biggest challenge has been “to not get bogged down in interpersonal relationships and to always keep your eyes on the prize.”
INSPIRATION: “I’ve been thinking a lot about [advocate] Bella Abzug, she really was somebody who was committed to the welfare of ordinary New York people. There have been a lot of people who have worked very hard for the benefit of their communities, and they have been my inspiration.”
MELISSA FERRARI
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