By Mary Ellen Zangara, Special Writer
Help came into Manville Friday night by way of a group who felt they wanted to help Manville after the recent flooding. The Piscataway Rotary Club, with the assistance of the Hillsborough Rotary Club, sponsored a spaghetti dinner at the Manville-Hillsborough Elks to aid the Manville area flood victims.
David Szymanski of the Rotary Club is a former Manville resident who came to town after Hurricane Irene.
”I went down to the valley just to see how the houses made out and I was shocked to see how much destruction was there,” he said. “The foundations were gone. People wrote on their houses ‘Bank, take me’. I couldn’t believe it.”
Mr. Szymanski said Unity Bank that they would supply the club with fixings for a spaghetti dinner. All the club had to do was to find a hall.
”I called the Manville Elks expecting to talk to the Exalted Ruler and not knowing it was my cousin Andrea,” said Mr. Szymanski. “She said ‘Dave, we are willing to help you with anything.’ We even got a nice donation from the Manville Elks today $1,850.”
Elks Past District Deputy Gary Abramson said after discussing it over with the officers, “We had no problem and there was no charge. They were doing all the cooking. They did all the advertising and the tickets and we just gave them a place to hold it. They approached us back in the beginning of November and we said yes. They wanted to do it after the new year so we gave them a couple of dates and this is the one that stuck.”
The dinner was funded by three banks Unity, Provident and Investors. The Manville-Hillsborough Elks hall and use of the kitchen was donated. The members of the club spent two days making 700 meatballs for the dinner.
Mr. Szymanski said he went to all the businesses in town to drop off flyers and was surprised to “see that over half are still not open. The devastation was beyond belief. I couldn’t believe it.”
Mr. Szymanski said he was surprised that there is not a foundation set up in the borough. He went to the Schools Superintendent Dr. Johanna Ruberto and they are now deciding how the money will get to the people who need it.
At the dinner were Tom Cronin and his wife, Barbara, who were residents and flood victims on South 5th Avenue but now are the landlords. Mr. Cronin is still upset about the flooding.
”This is just ridiculous that there are so many people in town that have not received their money from their insurance companies as far as flood relief goes,” he said. “It is absolutely just horrendous.”
Councilmen Rich Onderko and Steve Szabo attended to show their support.
Mr. Onderko said, “It’s always nice to see the community come out for a good cause. I was happy to donate to the spaghetti dinner for flood victims. A special thank you goes out to the Piscataway Rotary Club and the Manville Elks for making the event possible.”
”We call ourselves a small but mighty club,” said Mr. Szymanski. “We only have 15 members but we do a lot for the community. It was 100 percent profit and a no-brainer and it is all going to go back to the people. It is a wonderful thing to help people that are going to flood again.”

