Joe Leto, President GC Retired Men's Club, Althea Robinson, Executive Director GC Chamber of Commerce George Salem, Programs Director GC Retired Men's Club On Monday, September 15th, The Garden City Retired Men's Club enjoyed a lively, interesting discussion with Althea Robinson, Executive Director of the Garden City Chamber of Commerce. The Chamber with a staff of 4 Officers and 18 Directors works constantly to maintain an attractive business community in our Village. The departure of several upscale department stores and specialty retail shops left the Franklin Avenue area with many unattractive building and store vacancies. The ratio of business to residential has a great bearing on our tax structure. Consequently, we suffered a huge loss of tax revenue. With tireless effort, clever advertising and ingenuity, the Chamber is attracting banks, brokerage firms, restaurants, boutiques and other small retail shops to help fill the gap. There is also a program in place to develop and improve Seventh Street. The former Texaco property and IGA store are presently in planning and/or construction. The plan submitted to the Zoning Board for the Texaco site is for a three story building with street level retail stores and second and third floor residential units. In construction at the former IGA store is a full service market featuring high end organic produce and specialty foods, along with a vitamin/health food section. We applaud the Chamber for its diligence to attract quality business establishments to our area. We not only have an attractive business community, we also maintain an equitable tax allocation. The Chamber publishes a business Bulletin Magazine and an annual community guide and Calendar of Events. Both of these publications are free and should be of interest to each resident of Garden City. Did you know the Garden City Chamber of Commerce has been cited as the largest, most active and one of the most successful Chambers in the state?