Letter to the Editor: New Library Should Not Be Approved

Editor’s Note: Below is the latest in an exchange between concerned citizen John Steele and Pat Hasapis of the Howland Library regarding the costs of the new library in Beacon. You can read Mr. Steele’s original letter here, as well as Ms Hasapis’ response here. These letters do not necessarily represent the views of the [...]

Editorial: Beauty, History, and a Master Plan to Save Them

Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in
and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul. —John
Muir, Naturalist
It’s not often that a community gets the opportunity to save
something uniquely beautiful and historically significant. Presently the City
of Beacon and its residents have both.
The 123 acre Hiddenbrooke property, [...]

Bannerman Island: Bringing the Castle Back to Life

by Gina Masullo
It’s a typically hot summer day as I buzz along the Hudson River with Bannerman Island in full view. Normally I’d be zipping past that looming, arsenal-topped island 1000 yards off the Beacon shoreline on Metro-North, but today I’m braving the heat in a life jacket sitting on a bulky pontoon boat headed [...]

Beacon Voices: Mark & Pam Seegler

Co-founders, Kid’s Place 
by Michael Daecher

As the saying goes, it takes a village to raise a family. And
if the measure of a healthy community is how much responsibility people take in
caring for each other’s children, Beacon seems to be doing just fine. Mark and
Pam Seegler had been working with children for years in Brooklyn.
When they [...]

Howland Library – A Long Journey Towards a New Building Nears Its End

September 13th Library vote promises to
spur debate
by Jack Sine
It’s funny,” said Anne
Forman, vice president of Howland Public Library, “there’s always a controversy
where the library and money are concerned. Take our latest budget. It was the
same as last year’s – zero percent increase – and yet it was voted down by a
handful of votes. That meant [...]

Dazzling: Beacon Youth Light the Way

by Katherine M. Tallon
“Sharing stories and sharing conversation are ways that we
communicate,” says Ginny Figlia, Youth Services Librarian at the Howland Public
Library. “In my own work, the challenge to communicate with all ages, from
babies, children and teens to parents to grandparents, opened my eyes to how
crucial communication is in one’s community.”  
“The latest focus in [...]