Third Avenue to host Senior Sidewalk Social

Event is aimed at attracting shoppers 60 and above

February 23, 2016 By Paula Katinas Brooklyn Daily Eagle

Liz Amato (left) and Judith Grimaldi are working on plans for the May 17 event. Eagle photo by Paula Katinas

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Bay Ridge’s Third Avenue is fast becoming the king of New York City street fairs. The commercial corridor, which boasts hundreds of shops and restaurants and already plays host to the Summer Stroll on 3rd and the Third Avenue Festival, is adding a new outdoor event to its busy social calendar.

Plans are moving forward for a Senior Sidewalk Social to take place on Tuesday, May 17, on Third Avenue from 83rd Street to 93rd Street, from 2 to 7 p.m.

The event, which is also being called “Welcome to the 60’s,” will feature Bingo games, a Frank Sinatra impersonator, dancing, cooking demonstrations, beauty and fashion tips, exercise classes, discounts, special restaurant menus and much more, according to Judith Grimaldi, a lawyer who is serving as the project coordinator.

Grimaldi unveiled the plans for the Senior Sidewalk Social at a meeting of the Merchants of Third Avenue business group on Feb. 22 at the Cocoa Grinder restaurant at 8511 Third Ave. The May 17 event will be co-sponsored by the Merchants of Third Avenue and the Bay Ridge Center, a program for senior citizens housed at Bethlehem Lutheran Church at 411 Ovington Ave.

“Our focus is on trying to make Bay Ridge more senior-friendly,” said Grimaldi, whose law firm Grimaldi & Yeung LLP specializes in senior citizen issues.

A map will be printed and distributed to visitors to provide information on which stores were hosting which events for the afternoon.

The organizers want to reach residents aged 60 and older as well as older adults who have recently retired. “We want to reintroduce the neighborhood to them,” Grimaldi said. The idea is to make a strong case for seniors to stay in Bay Ridge in their retirement years and patronize local shops. “You don’t have to move to Florida,” she said.

The project would educate seniors about the wide array of shops and restaurants at their disposal on Third Avenue, one of Brooklyn’s premier shopping strips, while at the same time help store owners build a new base of loyal customers, according to Grimaldi, who called older adults “a growing market.”

The May 17 date was selected because May is National Older Americans Month, Grimaldi said.

Bay Ridge is known as a Naturally Occurring Retirement Community (NORC) because it is a neighborhood populated by a large number of senior citizens who grew up there, or moved in when they married, and remained in their homes long after they retired and their children left the nest.

“We live in a neighborhood that has a large senior population,” Merchants President Bob Howe said.

Nearly 15 percent of the residents of Community Board 10 (Bay Ridge-Dyker Heights) are age 65 and older, according to the U.S. Census of 2010. And 26.4 percent of people residing in Board 10 are between the ages of 45 and 64.

Liz Amato, a Bay Ridge civic activist who has worked with the Merchants on Summer Stroll on 3rd events, is helping to plan the Senior Sidewalk Social. “It’s not like the Summer Stroll. We’re not closing down the street,” she said.

During Summer Stroll, vehicular traffic is banned on the avenue and a pedestrian plaza is created to allow people to walk in the street. The Senior Sidewalk Social will be strictly limited to the sidewalk, Amato said.