By Donald Gilpin

Luigi Prete

For the past 32 years, Luigi Prete has presided at Luigi’s Shoe Repair, his 600-square-foot domain behind a storefront in the Montgomery Shopping Center. Thousands of soles and heels, many miles of stitching, and acres of polishing and stretching, sometimes pocketbooks or belts, sometimes zippers — for 10 hours a day, six days a week he’s been welcoming a wide variety of customers with their shoes and leather goods.

“I like my job,” said Prete, who had already been in the shoe repair business for 23 years, first working for his uncle in the Princeton Shopping Center, then in his own shop in Twin Rivers, before coming to his present location. “If you don’t like what you’re doing, don’t do it. I’ve been doing it for 55 years, and it’s the only thing I know how to do.”

He continued, “I’m relaxed when I come over here. You know why? I deal with the customers. I’ve seen most of them before. I talk to the customers. Time goes by. I’m busy.”

When he’s not interacting with customers in the front of his compact store, with its counter and shelves covered with shoe boxes and shoe polish and a wall of family photos, he’s operating the stretching, or sewing, or trimming, or polishing, or finishing, or nailing machines in the workroom behind.

“I do whatever comes first, whenever I get a chance,” he explained. “You know, the shoes for Monday or Tuesday first. You’ve got to break it up. I don’t want to be working on work that has to be done for next week and get behind on work that needs to be done for tomorrow. You’ve got to stay on top of things.”

The pace of activity and the challenges of the job vary greatly at Luigi’s. “It’s not a heavy duty job,” he said. “Shoes don’t weigh too much, but you’ve got to know what to do. You’ve got to know how to operate the machines. You’ve got to know how to put on the soles and the heels. And you’ve got to know when to put the glue on and how to finish them up. You have to have a little bit of patience and a lot of skill.” more

“PAYING IT FORWARD”: Pammie Vandermark, left, transportation coordinator and bus driver for the Princeton Public Schools, and Transportation Supervisor Donna Bradin make sure that Princeton’s students are delivered to school every morning and brought back home safely in the afternoon. (Photo courtesy of Pammie Vandermark)

By Donald Gilpin

Pammie Vandermark found her calling about 30 years ago. She’s a school bus driver and transportation coordinator for the Princeton Public Schools (PPS), and for her and her sisters, “it’s a family affair,” she said. One of her sisters is also a bus driver for the district and the other sister is a school bus assistant who works in the cafeteria at Riverside Elementary School between bus runs.

Vandermark, a Princeton native who now lives in Ewing, described how she got started as a school bus driver. She continues to drive the buses frequently, as needed, though she has progressed from aide to driver to transportation assistant and, since 2015, transportation coordinator.

“My children had started school and I was home all day, and I needed to talk to people, and the job of bus aide fit the hours of my children being in school,” she said. “I got home just in time before my children got home, and I got benefits and health insurance for my family.”

Vandermark started work with the transportation department as an aide on a bus run with special education students. She quickly realized how important her work was to the children and their parents. “My heart went out to the families,” she said. “The first week I cried the whole week. My boss asked, ‘Are you going to make it?’ To see these children with disabilities and to see what the parents had to go through every day broke my heart.” more

By Donald Gilpin

Liz Dyevich (“Nurse Liz”)

The students’ physical and mental well-being is the top priority of the Princeton Public Schools (PPS), and in the forefront of that endeavor are the seven nurses at the district schools. The past two years have presented them with situations beyond what they could possibly have imagined or trained for, but they have stepped up to lead the schools in confronting the challenges of COVID-19.

“Throughout the pandemic, our nurses have embodied the best of PPS as they assist our students, families, and staff with compassion, understanding, and patience,” said PPS Human Services Director Micki Crisafulli. “They make sure everyone is cared for and informed. They complete contact tracing at all times, including instances when they work nights and weekends. Our entire community is healthier and safer as a result of their dedication.”

The team of PPS nurses includes Magarida Cruz and Gail Cipolloni at Princeton High School, Kathleen Bihuniak at Princeton Middle School, Liz Dyevich at Johnson Park, Sarah Gooen-Chen at Riverside, Holly Javick at Littlebrook, and Vera Maynard at Community Park.

In an email exchange earlier this week, Dyevich, “Nurse Liz,” discussed the world of school nursing and how that world has been transformed since the pandemic arrived in early 2020.

“Over the past two years my job has changed drastically,” she said. “The only constant has been the amazing students and their love for being in school with friends and teachers. I have added the extra responsibilities of contact tracing, keeping up on all the COVID guidelines and policies, and being a part of the school district’s COVID committee.”

She continued, “I had to learn how to do virtual health lessons, monitor close contacts and quarantines, and navigate helping students with the mental and physical effects of COVID.” more

By Donald Gilpin

Cecilia Jimenez-Weeast

Cecilia Jimenez-Weeast, executive director of the Latin American Legal Defense and Education Fund for just over two months, has deep roots in serving the Latino community and an enduring commitment to the thousands of immigrants she has worked with.

“I’m passionate about working with the community,” she said in an interview earlier this month. “Coming from El Salvador I’ve seen the reason why people want to come to the United States. They just want to come here and they want the American dream. They want to be able to sustain a family, to provide for their kids, because those opportunities are not available in their country.”

She added, “That’s what keeps me going and that’s how I ended up with LALDEF.” The director of Latinas Unidas for about 20 years, Jimenez-Weeast sees her new position as carrying on in pursuit of her passion. “Becoming executive director of LALDEF is continuing what is so close to my heart,” she said.

Her early years in El Salvador, her work with her father in the cause of social justice, and his subsequent death in the civil war in the early 1980s were formative experiences for her, establishing the path that Jimenez-Weeast would take in her career and her life.

“My father has been my inspiration to continue working for people’s rights,” she said, explaining, “I come from a family that has always been very involved in social justice. He was a well-known community activist in El Salvador. All his life he fought for the rights of workers.”

Her father was a member of the International Labor Organization, a U.N. agency headquartered in Switzerland with a mandate to advance social and economic justice. “I used to go help my father at union rallies, basically fighting for workers’ rights in El Salvador,” said Jimenez-Weeast, “and at the same time I would go volunteer in the schools in small towns. I continue to do that. Every time I go to El Salvador I visit the little schools in some of the villages and spend time with the kids. They are humble schools where having a computer is not even in their dreams.”

Her father paid a high price for his involvement in politics, she explained. “I lost my father as a result of the chaos that El Salvador went through. He was murdered, but he left a legacy in that country.” more

“EVERYBODY KNOWS YOUR NAME”:  Mijin Kim presides over the Kingston Deli on Route 27 in Kingston. In addition to serving more than 100 customers every day, she describes herself as “like a psychologist” or “like a bartender,” as she talks with her customers and learns about their families, their jobs, and their lives.

By Donald Gilpin

At 8 o’clock on a weekday morning, the Kingston Deli is a busy scene. The regulars, mostly men in their 70s and 80s, are all in their places, one at each of the eight tables spread around the room. They’ve been there for about an hour, and most of them were sitting outside in their cars before that, waiting for the deli to open.

There’s coffee drinking and eating breakfast and non-stop discussion of topics ranging from local news to personal reflections on the day ahead to history, politics, and international events. Difficulties in the COVID vaccination roll-out seemed to be the main topic on Monday this week, but most of the regulars apparently had succeeded in getting at least one of their two shots.

As the dialogue continues, a constant stream of customers — most essential workers, fire department, road crews, construction workers, snow plowers, landscapers,  painters, and others who don’t have time to sit down—come in, order at the counter, and take their food and coffee with them.

Presiding over the Kingston Deli is a woman named Mijin Kim. At least that’s her real name and the name her Korean friends and family know her by, but to most of the customers she’s known as just Kim, because, she says, her first name is too difficult for Americans to remember. And her Latino customers and employees all know her as Maria, a name given to her when she took Spanish classes in high school. She studies the Spanish language every day, regularly checks her Spanish notes posted on the counter, converses readily in Spanish, and says she is now semi-fluent.

The regulars, “Kingstonians not Princetonians” who come every day to the deli on Route 27, feel like a family, Kim says. “They grew up here and went to school together and their kids went to school together, and their grandchildren went to school together —for generations. Maybe they’re attracted to Kingston Deli because it feels like home. Everybody knows everybody here.” more

AIRCRAFT COMMANDER: Gavin Owens, U.S. Air Force captain and Princeton resident, shows off the KC-10 aerial refueling tanker aircraft he pilots out of McGuire Air Force Base on missions supporting military planes in the United States, Europe, and the Middle East. (Photo courtesy of Gavin Owen)

By Donald Gilpin

For many Princeton residents, “a day’s work,” at least before the pandemic, might have involved significant travel, perhaps a long commute to New York or Philadelphia, maybe even a long road trip out of the area.

But in a typical day’s work, Gavin Owens, a U.S. Air Force captain and aircraft commander, often finds himself flying across the Atlantic, and maybe even returning to his apartment in downtown Princeton on the same day.

In the Air Force since 2014 after graduating from the U.S. Air Force  Academy in Colorado Springs with a degree in systems engineering management, Owens, 28, is currently based at McGuire Air Force Base in Burlington County, from where he pilots a KC-10 aerial refueling tanker, a military version of the DC-10 airliner.

Owens described his job: “There’s a crew of four. I’m the pilot in one of the front two seats of the plane, manipulating the controls. There are two pilots up front and a flight engineer who monitors all the systems. He calls out the steps on his check list, and the crew members respond as they accomplish those items. The last crew member is the boom operator.” more

“AN AMAZING GUY”: Dago Villanueva, just promoted to general manger at The Meeting House restaurant, came to the United States from Mexico 20 years ago. He has been in the restaurant business ever since, working his way up from porter to bus boy, to waiter to host, to front-of-the-house manager, and then manager. (Photo courtesy of Dago Villanueva)

By Donald Gilpin

When the pandemic hit New Jersey in March and all non-essential businesses faced a shutdown, Dago Villanueva sat down with Amar Gautam, The Meeting House co-owner, every day, trying to help chart the way forward for the Witherspoon Street restaurant that had opened just four months before.

“We didn’t know week to week if we were going to stay open,” said Gautam.  “But Dago never wavered throughout the pandemic. He was this force of ‘Let’s try,’ ‘Let’s do the best,’ ‘Let’s create a new business model,’ ‘Let’s become a takeout restaurant,’ which we had to do  — and he stayed with us.”

Gautam described how he had met Villaneuva before even buying the restaurant. “He’s a person you see everywhere. I knew him working in restaurants and walking around town,” he said. The previous owner of what used to be Two Sevens Eatery told Gautam, co-owner of The Meeting House with his wife Amanda Maher, that he’d need someone to help run the restaurant and that Villanueva was the right man  — “the best we’ve ever had.” more

TREE MAN’S HOLIDAY: Princeton Arborist Taylor Sapudar admires an eastern redbud while on vacation in London. Sapudar, who has been on the job in Princeton for just 14 months, has been in love with the outdoors ever since growing up in the Groveville section of Hamilton, near the woods that border Crosswicks Creek. (Photo courtesy of Taylor Sapudar)

By Donald Gilpin

As it develops its Climate Action Plan, the town is asking, “What can Princeton do to protect our natural environment?” One man with an answer to that question is Municipal Arborist Taylor Sapudar. His answer is “trees.”

In little more than a year since he was hired, Sapudar and his crew of six have planted more than 220 trees, with another 200 planned for the coming year. In a speech last week at a Sustainable Princeton forum at the Princeton Public Library, he noted the many ways in which trees can fight climate change and enhance the environment.

Sapudar pointed out that trees provide oxygen and clean air; can reduce asphalt temperature by nearly 36 degrees; can each absorb as much as 48 pounds of carbon dioxide per year; reduce storm water runoff; reduce A/C costs by nearly 30 percent; improve health and reduce stress levels and community violence; increase property values nearly 15 percent; and create an area that encourages people to shop more and spend more. more