Sag Harbor Partnership Honors April Gornik With First Annual Community Service Award

Susan Mead, President of the Sag Harbor Partnership, recently announced that the nonprofit organization has chosen to honor April Gornik with its first annual Community Service Award.

“I am thrilled to be honored! But I’m going to repeat over and over again how me being honored is very much a matter of being able to work with extraordinary community partners, starting with my fantastic Sag Harbor Partnership board, and the wonderful people I’ve met through Save Sag Harbor over the years,” shared Gornik. “Not to mention that I have the best and most generous friends in the world who step up time and again to make projects and fundraisers happen with their networking and organizational skills and their donations. And Sag Harbor is most fortunate to have village officials who are leaders, and make change possible.”

The Community Service Award is designed to commemorate those who have done exceptionally in the field of community service around the Village of Sag Harbor. “There are many helping hands in Sag Harbor that together make it the vibrant and caring community it is,” explained Mead. “The Sag Harbor Partnership Community Service Award is a natural extension of that fine work.”

Gornik is a celebrated artist and avid volunteer in the Village. “April has touched the lives of so many people, charitable organizations and institutions in our community that it is hard to keep track,” Mead shared. Gornik’s contributions include everything from organizing an array of fundraisers for the Sag Harbor Partnership, as well as serving on a number of other boards, such as Fighting Chance and the Eastville Community Historical Society. For the Sag Harbor Partnership alone, she has spearheaded fundraisers for causes such as Planned Parenthood, the Evelyn Alexander Wildlife Rescue Center, and Shark’s Eye, Montauk’s only catch-and-release Shark Tournament, and provided invaluable long-term support for a number of other organizations. Proving success and compassion in such a wide range of events, April has come to be known as The Long Island Express, in a nod to the 1938 hurricane; she is truly unstoppable!

“There are many people in our community from whom I’ve learned so much, and to whom I owe a huge debt of gratitude, and who should rightly be thinking it’s they who should be being honored, and I hope they will be its next recipients,” added Gornik. “But I’m very grateful for this acknowledgement.”

On Sunday, October 23rd, Baron’s Cove in Sag Harbor will host a dinner in celebration of Ms. Gornik and her award.

For more information about the Sag Harbor Partnership, visit www.sagharborpartnership.org.