Moving the SMART Train Station NOW when Healdsburg’s elected-officials & citizens made it CLEAR for the past two years where we want it located, is just plain tone-deaf, dumb & arrogant.
I don’t know how many times we Healdsburg residents have to say this until you hear us: We want the SMART Train Station in our town at the Hudson Street Station Hub, NOT on Vine Street.
Two years ago, in 2024, our Healdsburg City Council voted 4-1 to support the citing of the SMART Train Station at the old Rail Station Hub. At that time, SMART didn’t have all the funding it needed to continue the commuter rail line from Windsor to Healdsburg and up to Cloverdale.
To make certain that would happen, our small but mighty City of 11,137 citizens has repeatedly voted overwhelmingly for environmental and mass transit issues, for the fractional sales tax to fund SMART’s work, and to increase the funding necessary to do the job, resulting in the $270 million now available to bring the Healdsburg station home.
Then, just this Spring, because we were enthusiastic that “The SMART Train was coming to town,” as Mike McGuire cheered—with every single public and SMART official present—1,000 of us packed our new Foley Family Pavilion to show our support, that this part of the North Bay was finally receiving commuter rail-service. WE voted by our very presence—with nearly 10% of the entire town showing up—for the SMART Train. We gladly accepted all the “swag” SMART handed out, to boost this project, because Healdburg residents were delighted that “a new train was coming to town,” and that the location of the Station had long-been decided.
Unfortunately, that doesn’t seem to be the message the SMART Board appears to be getting from the one Healdsburg resident on the Board, our former Mayor Ariele Kelley—who is still insisting now, as she did even before her unsuccessful Assembly run against Chris Rogers—that she preferred the Vine Street station for the SMART train.
Many of us in Healdsburg have supported Kelley for every public office she has sought, and are proud of her leadership for affordable housing, diversity, and on the California Coastal Commission. However, on this specific issue of locating the SMART Train Station, Kelley is utterly out of touch with the people of Healdsburg, who by electing her Mayor, made it possible for her to serve on the SMART Board in the first place. Sadly, our former Mayor seems to have forgotten the voice of the very community she represents, unless she perceives her audience to be elsewhere.
By contrast, our current Healdsburg Mayor Chris Herrod perfectly expressed the astonishment of most Healdsburg residents when he told the San Francisco Chronicle last week:
“To have SMART come up now and re-think this at this fairly late time—is flabbergasting!”
And, to further compound the dumb decision of the SMART Train staff to do a fast bait & switch with the Station location, former Healdsburg Mayor Evelyn Mitchell—who served as Mayor when the original SMART Station commitment was made to the City—told the standing-room-only City Council meeting crowd:
“I felt like I was blindsided.”
In that one, single, ill-advised and highly biased presentation delivered by SMART’s General Manager Eddy Cumins and his assistant ZoeUnruh at the September 21, 2016, Healdsburg City Council meeting, SMART jettisoned years of good faith, trust and public support it carefully developed, since the passage of it’s original enabling State legislation in 2002.
As I pointedly asked SMART’s General Manager Cumins, “What the hell were you guys thinking?”
My question came from a deep well-spring of support for SMART’s work, and a lifetime of support for environmental protection, mass transit, and public service. As a former State Official in New York, responsible for the integrity of the Governor’s office as well as for the that of numerous State agencies, I am acutely aware of the critical need for government, public agencies and public officials—who believe in the importance of public service and good government—to protect and nurture the public’s trust in our work.
Such an extraordinary sensitivity to treating public trust as a precious natural resource is essential to rebuild the public’s confidence that government can work effectively, honestly, well, and responsibly on behalf of the people it serves—especially in the face of anti-government forces, with the malevolent mission of destroying government, and denying urgent public services to those most in need.
The collection of stale, 3-year old data, blatantly biased conclusions, and the use of such disconnected, bureaucratic jargon like “Euclidian Walksheds,” which SMART’s executive team delivered to the citizens of Healdsburg, and the entire City Council at the packed-public meeting, was an insult and a violation of trust to a well-educated population that has formed the backbone of the North Bay’s public support for “bringing the train to town.”
That egregiously bad effort could only be described as a colossal public relations and administrative agency failure, which smacked many of us involved local citizens as an arrogant, not-so-SMART move. Healdsburg residents, and the majority of our public officials who are among SMART’s most loyal and ardent mass transit and green environmental supporters, felt stabbed in the back by SMART staff trying to pull a last-minute, bad-faith switcheroo on the long-settled location of the Healdsburg Station.
Yet, as someone who has devoted my entire career to making governments and humane non-profit organizations succeed on behalf of the people we serve, I still have faith in many of the public officials who lead the SMART Board, particularly it’s Chair, Chris Coursey, who worked for years as a first-rate journalist, before being elected as Santa Rosa’s Mayor, and as a Sonoma County Supervisor. I believe Coursey has the courage, strength & intelligence to put the SMART staff back on track, reminding them that it is our tax dollars and citizen support that is critical to the short and long-term success of the SMART Train to improve all our lives in the North Bay.
Perhaps the two most telling messages delivered by the people of Healdsburg to SMART’s staff came from City Manager Jeff Kay, and from Healdsburg resident Oded Shakked, a local businessman.
The Healdsburg Patch reported that “the city manager (Kay) said Healdsburg received between $1.1 million and $1.2 million from the Metropolitan Transportation Commission after the 2024 vote to prepare a plan centered on the (Hudson Street) depot. The planning area includes land south of the river”.
In fact, the City Council, acting on those commitments, created a seven-page, “SMART Station Area Specific Plan,” predicated upon the SMART Station being sited at the Hudson Street Hub, and including Veterans Memorial Beach in the important tourist area that SMART Train passengers would be able to walk to upon their arrival in Healdsburg by train. It will be the only Russian River beach reachable within walking distance by SMART train from Larkspur to Cloverdale, the full length of the route when completed, IF the Healdsburg Station is at the Hudson Street Hub.
But it was a Healdsburg resident and taxpayer, Oded Shakked, who, in a straight-forward common-sense way, was among the final speakers at the City Council hearing and, in less than 30 seconds, demolished the detached-from-reality “Euclidian Walksheds” being relied upon by the SMART staff to justify it’s conclusion to unilaterally move the Station from the already-committed Hudson Street Hub to Vine Street:
“I walked both distances from each of the proposed SMART Station sites to the Healdsburg Town Square. From the Hudson Street Hub, it is 376 steps; from the Vine Street spot, it is 232 steps.”
Shakked then succinctly summed up the sentiments of many of his follow Healdsburg citizens and taxpayers:
“The SMART Board owes this Council, and the whole town, an apology.”
To that quietly eloquent request, I would add that we want the SMART Board to rebuild our trust; respect the democratically arrived at decision by a Healdsburg public that wants a vibrant SMART Train station in our town; and, to continue to involve this community in this great public achievement that will improve all of our lives.
Yours for a community built on trust & a world worthy of our grandchildren,
Before the GOP (Gang of Pedophiles) gets too excited over the photos of a Democratic Congressional Candidate modeling a harness at age 21, they might want to look at Melania Trump’s portfolio.
(Photos, top to bottom and left to right: Top left, Melania Knauss Trump posed in a unique metal harness for a GQ Britain photo shoot in 2000, the same year Melania met Jeffrey Epstein at party with Trump, when Melania was a 26-year old supermodel. The photos were taken aboard Donald Trump’s private jet, five years before Melania married Trump.
Top right, Democratic Congressional Candidate (NY-1) Chris Gallant posed in a leather harness, as a 21-year old college student, six-years after he began serving in the Air National Guard, while still in high school.
Bottom left, Gallant posed in front of a Black Hawk Helicopter like the one he piloted in 2022 to 2024 on missions he flew in Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and the UAE.
Bottom right, Melania Knauss Trump, posed in front of Donald Trump’s private jet with a gun, in ths same British GQ photo shoot, in January, 2000, for a special edition of the magazine entitled “NAKED SUPERMODEL SPECIAL.” A front page subhead specifically pertaining to Melania read: “SEX AT 30,000 FT: Melania Knauss Earns Her Air Miles.” Photos of Melania, including the British GQ cover story, were taken by the photographer Antoine Verglas.)
The photos speak volumes for themselves.
They might not be so loud and clear if they didn’t underscore the utter hypocrisy oozing out from the National GOP, which has produced more convicted pedophiles, sexual harassers, and individual references (Donald Trump leads all) in the Epstein files than any other affinity group in America.
That’s what made the 2010 college-student leather-harness modeling photos of gay Democratic Congressional Candidate (NY-1) Chris Gallant all the more laughable. It’s what made the matter-of-fact response by the former Air traffic controller, Volunteer Firefighter and Blackhawk Helicopter pilot all so refreshing:
“I’m not embarrassed or ashamed; I’ve always been unapologetically me.”
Gallant, some 40 days before arguably the most important Congressional election in the country’s history, is locked in a neck-and-neck battle for Long Island’s 1st Congressional District, a recently red-district which both Trump and the incumbent GOP Congressman Nick LaLotta won handily in 2024.
The District that represents Eastern Long Island and, now, whole swaths of western Suffolk County was, for years, represented by Democratic Congressmen Otis Pike and Tim Bishop, and—just this week— was described as a “toss-up” by pollster Nate Silver. It’s a big reason by the Republicans are freaking out.
GOP political operatives—fresh off of crashing GRINDR at the GOP revivalist meeting in Dallas and ogling a near-naked photo of Social Media “influencer” Hasan Piker on their “Jumbotron”— leaked the 16-year old photos to conservative news outlets, the New York Post and the Messenger News Group, and the Suffolk County Conservative Party posted the “harness” photo on its Facebook page, with the tagline:
“Is this who you want to represent you in Congress?”
The New York Post, known for its posting of nude photos of supermodel Melania Knauss (Trump) nearly 10 years ago, handled the revelation a bit more tongue in harness, with much more perspective, compared to the photos of Melania they revealed to the world, when Trump was running for President in 2016:
“There is now documented proof that Chris Gallant has a 6-pack.”
It was a far different approach than the ultra-Right Wing Post took in 2016, when they did a 2-day photo spread of nude photos published of Melania in the French Men’s Magazine MAX, back in 1997. Melania Knauss was 23-years old then, two years older than Chris Gallant was when he harnessed his modeling skills.
(The New York Post’s back-to-back front pages on July 31, 2016, and August 1, 2016, revealing nude photos of the supermodel Melania Trump,) taken for the French Men’s Magazine MAX, in 1997.)
The Post’s photo montage-a-trois, appeared to raise the question:
“IS THIS THE KIND OF FIRST LADY YOU WANT TO REPRESENT YOU?”
The British GQ cover and photos published in 2000, when Trump flirted with a “Reform Party” candidacy for President, read like a puff piece for Trump, decorated throughout with fleshy photos of Melania sprawled all over Trump’s private jet.
GQ referred to Trump as “ an expert in in-flight entertainment.” Yes, they really did, decades before he orgasmed over the ultimate airborne play-toy he was gifted from the Qataris.
Better, the international magazine described Melania as:
“And, his personal hostess, is 26-year old Slovenian supermodel Melania Knauss, just might end up as the next First Lady. Flight of fancy? Not if THE DONALD has his way.”
So, there you have it. Harmless harness on a college kid, or “in-flight hostess” for high fliers?
(Image of my own reflection, taken at the World Trade Center site, 9/11/2021, on the 20th anniversary of the unending, unimaginable trauma. It was the first and only time I was emotionally able to visit the sacred site, since the early hours of the destruction of the Towers, and of the lives of nearly 3,000 of our brothers and sisters.)
I am a ghost.
My memories are quaint, dead.
I want people to mourn quietly,
Cellphones banned in sacred places.
Selfies, taken with luminescent gravestone towers of light, illegal.
The Trump Tower Prostitute is still dancing on the graves of the 3,000 human beings massacred on 9/11, sucking up attention from that tragedy, and money from their families, and all of us.
(“The Falling Man,” a photo taken by the AP photographer Richard Drew on September 11, 2001, at 9:41 am. It captures an unidentified man falling from the World Trade Center’s North Tower, after the tower was attacked. The photo is on display at the 9/11 Memorial Museum, on the site of where the World Trade Center once stood.)
I don’t know if I have ever despised any living creature as much as I utterly detest the scum-filled dirtbag, Donald Trump. I know it’s wrong; but Trump is far worse.
Hundreds of times per day–on 9/11 I’ll wish it 3,000 times–I pray hard that he drops dead from some terrible, horrible disease or accident where he experiences the most extreme torture ever visited upon any human being. It’s the only thing in life Trump has ever earned.
Trump has always been a puss-filled boil on the ass of life, but I never felt this viscerally about him until 9/11/2001, when the Twin Towers went down, and flesh-and-blood human beings were leaping out of windows from 90 stories up to avoid intense heat that would melt their skin.
The grotesque ghoul publicly gloated–GLOATED—in his flatulent fucked-upped, Roy Cohn-uglified face–that now that the World Trade Center Towers were destroyed–HE, the horrendously horrid whore-of-life Donald Trump, owned the tallest skyscraper in NYC at 40 Wall Street.
YES, TRUMP REALLYDID SAY THAT. I know. I was there. I worked in Tower 2 of the World Trade Center for years along with Willie Rodriquez and Matt Monahan and Steve Schlesinger and Peter Quinn and Maria Taddei and Mary Tragale & Mario Cuomo, and we considered the Trade Center sacred ground, having survived the 1993 bombing of the Tower in which we worked. Only the indomitable, life-loving and heroic Willie Rodriquez still worked there in 2001, and he risked his life—again and again— to save others from the carnage.
We all heard the moronic monster Trump utter those callous, self-aggrandizing words while the ruins of the Towers were still smoldering in 2001. The bulbous bloviator bleated that blasphemous brag again, and again, while so many innocent humans—and those who attempted to rescue them—perished.
The puffy, hot-aired, deranged, dirigible of inhumanity was nowhere near the site of the WTC disaster–not as a citizen, not as victim, not as a helper, not as a person trying to assist the exhausted police, fire and EMS personnel; not as nothing.
Compounding his mortal sin, the criminal cipher White Supremacist sexual abuser fraud felon’s multi-million dollar organization collected some $150,000 of funds intended for small business relief in lower Manhattan. Whining like the stuffed pig he is, Trump said he was entitled to the money because of the life-shattering event’s effect on HIS business’ bottom line—despite Trump’s immediate denials that his businesses suffered ANY financial loss from the 9/11 attacks.
Worse, despite repeatedly lying that he donated $10,000 to the 9/11 Victims Fund up until he ran for President in 2016—a lie easily proven through an examination of the Victim Funds’ financial records by NYC’s Comptroller— the Trump Tower Prostitute profited in every way he could off of the mass murder of 3,000 human beings. Not only did he lust after bragging rights over the size of HIS phallus-like building with the World Trade Center wiped out of the Manhattan skyline, he pilfered money intended for small Mom and Pop business struggling to survive, and promised, but never delivered on his public pledges to help 9/11 victims and their families. Then, like now, he lied about his lies, or just made up brand new totally false stories.
Now, as a senile, syphilis-seeking, shit-smelling babbling imbecile, this lower-than-rodent ball of garbage lies even more, hallucinating that he was rescued from the rubble of the WTC disaster by 2 firefighters–never named nor thanked–whose families he cheated out of money, along with 8 million of us other New Yorkers.
For years, I cursed God, for allowing the attack on the World Trade Center to happen, and for permitting 3,000 innocent humans to be crushed or incinerated to death. The photo of “Falling Man” on display at the 9/11 Memorial/World Trade Center Museum haunts me, as did the 8 x11 mimeographed “Missing” fliers plastered all over the outer walls of St. Vincent’s hospital, each with young eyes and smiling faces that would never see life again.
Like Job, I still curse God for taking so many good people, then and now, for causing unimaginable pain to thousands of families, and yet still permitting this terrible two-legged plague of pure evil to continue to walk among us. The next time you see the “Falling Man” photo, think of the smug, disgusting , spittle-spewing mouth of Donald Trump laughing and smirking all the way down, glad that the “Falling Man,” wasn’t him.
What’s the difference between having Trump’s illegal Ballroom shoved down our throats, or an illegal senior medical care project for the rich, when we need more affordable housing for families?
(Norman Rockwell’s “Freedom of Speech”, from the National Archives, painted in 1943, and published in the Saturday Evening Post. Rockwell’s “Freedom of Speech,” was inspired by FDR’s January 6, 1941, State of the Union Address, where he outlined the “Four Freedoms” which went on to be included in the United Nations Charter. Those freedoms, as spelled out by President Roosevelt were: “Freedom of Speech, Expression;’“ Freedom of Worship;” “Freedom from Want;” and “Freedom from Fear.”)
US Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts was correct last week, when he wrote in a blistering dissent to the Supreme Court’s tone deaf 5-4 decision to greenlight the developer Trump’s illegal ballroom, that the construction was “likely unlawful.”
The same is true about the senior medical care project in Healdsburg, in the shadow of the SMART Train Station, when local laws specifically prohibit the use of that site for medical care, and favor the building of affordable housing for working families.
The people of our town—educated, engaged and enthusiastic for greater inclusion—with 1/3 of our population being of Latino Heritage—are ready to fight for what’s right. That courage frightens our timid town officials, terrified of incurring the wrath of rich, powerful real estate interests. Freedom from Fear, anyone?
All along, and under local ordinances and State laws encouraging affordable housing and more inclusionary housing—for seniors and everyone of Healdsburg’s non-wealthy citizens—that Hudson street site—located smack in the immediate zone of the SMART Train Station Local Plan—was supposed to be shaped by a high level of community input, not by high rollers rushing to game the system, and sneak “medical care” into an area where it IS strictly prohibited by Healdsburg’s land use code.
The proposed construction of a Residential Care Facility for the Elderly (RCFE) which includes both “personal care,” and “medical care,” in an exclusive community requiring a nearly million-dollar equity buy in, is not just, as Justice Roberts wrote of The Bully’s Ballroom “likely unlawful,” itis clearly unlawful, under our local zoning laws. Those of us with experience in public health know how “luxury” RCFEs or Continuing Care Communities for the wealthy have become golden cash cows for developers who reap vast profits from multiple millions in high buy-in costs from rich customers.
Worse, Healdsburg’s local Planning Commission gave conditional approval of the Hudson Street proposal on the basis of false information. At last month’s meeting the developer’s representatives —when asked if the proposed RCFE facility would include “medical” as well as “personal” care— misinformed the Commission, saying it would not, despite the fact that medical care is authorized—and in some instances statelaw requires—RCFE’s to provide medical or clinical care.
And, at virtually the same time the developer was misinforming Healdsburg’s planning officials that there would be no medical care at The Hudson, the company ran a recruitment ad seeking a “Regional Clinical Nursing Leader,” whose responsibilities include overseeing “clinical operations.” Under Nursing guidelines “clinical means involving or relating to direct medical treatment or testing of patients.”
So, surprise:in the same breath that the wealthy developer’s team was telling one crucial falsehood to the Planning Commission, it was confirming that, in fact, medical care IS central to his RCFE operations, by actively head-hunting to hire an expert in medical & clinical care to oversee all of their operations, including in Healdsburg.
A number of Healdsburg citizens, led by long-time residents Jon Eisenberg and Lewis Bangham, filed an appeal to the City Council of the The Hudson’s flawed plan, and demanded that the Planning Commission rescind its’ conditional approval of the proposal on the clear grounds that material facts were misrepresented to them by the developer. In a court of law, such a material misrepresentation is perjury; but, in the court of public opinion, it was simply the way the wealthy were accustomed to editing the facts to fit their own self-interests. But that misrepresentation should be enough to enable the Planning Commission to overturn their own conditional approval, since it was a decision based upon false information. The timely and concise Healdsburg citizens’ appeal insists that the City stick to the letter, the intent and the spirit of local and state zoning and affordable housing laws in the best interests of the people of the City.
That misrepresentation of the truth was only the first head fake by the developer to see if Healdsburg’s public officials could be tricked into killing community involvement. The other powerful threat to our prized local democratic process, was for them to simply bulldoze—the way Trump bulldozed the East Wing of the White House— over the existence of the SMART Train Station Area Plan—the specific, City-created planning framework for the area to ensure citizen involvement in this crucial plan for our future involving mass transit.
Similar “overlay” plans were created in Saggio Hills, the Mill District, and in North Healdsburg (Enso Village), to create and accommodate a diversity of needs for affordable housing, and an RCFE that would qualify for providing medical care.
That inclusive planning process worked, producing an abundance of affordable units, and a legitimate, state-of-the art RCFE rendering medical & clinical care (Enso Village), providing proof that community-based democracy can do what it’s supposed to do, when the onlyprice attached to it is public participation, and the time taken to do the right thing.
Our friend died this week. He marched with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., in 1963; befriended singer Harry Chapin and they founded an anti-hunger organization still saving lives, 51 years later.
(Bill Ayres died this week, just one week after the death of Rolling Stone Magazine’s long-time music writer, Dave Marsh, who wrote the forward to the book Bill co-wrote with Pete Fornatale, entitled “All You Need Is Love.” It was the central message of Bill’s life, and he acted on it, in every way he could, every single day. I first wrote this opening piece 30 months ago, on Martin Luther King’s birthday to celebrate, during his lifetime, the lessons of love and humanity Bill Ayres taught us. I repost it today, to honor Bill’s life and the impact it had upon me and millions of others who lives he touched, and changed. My piece is followed by the posting of an article from “WHY Hunger” Magazine, honoring the life and legacy of Bill Ayres, which continues to this day. Please contribute to WHY Hunger to carry on the fight against poverty and hunger, to which Bill dedicated himself. You can find a link to donate at the very bottom of the article.)
One of Dr. King’s Disciples of Love, Hope, Humanity & Social Action.
How a small town Catholic priest from Long Island, gained a nationwide congregation of the hungry, the exhausted, and the powerless, and brought out the best in everyone to make life better.
By Steve Villano
To be in the presence of Bill Ayres, former Catholic priest and co-founder of WHYHunger with Harry Chapin, is to be bathed in the warm glow of hope and love.
Whenever we celebrate human service, and try to replicate in some small way, the life and actions of Dr. Martin Luther King, Bill Ayres’ life gives us mortals some practical instructions of just how to do it.
As with Dr. King, the driving forces of Bill Ayres’ activism are his faith, and his love of the dignity of all human beings. It’s what’s guided Bill’s life for some six decades—in addition to a unique sense of how music can change individual lives, and through it, the world.
Our Bill Ayres of Huntington Station, NY, whom I know and love–the real Bill Ayres, as I call him, so he cannot be confused with the Chicago-area, headline-grabbing, violence-winking, Weather Underground’s Bill Ayers (different spelling) —is the real, long-term radical social activist. His indefatigable efforts fighting hunger and poverty continue to make a difference in thousands of lives each day. Beyond his remarkable work fighting hunger, poverty and food insecurity with singer/songwriter Harry Chapin, and the Chapin family over the past 5+ decades, Bill Ayres’ own lifeand work is the stuff of inspiration.
It’s fitting that Huntington’s Bill Ayres—our Bill Ayres– shares a birthday with long-time Civil Rights leader, Julian Bond, on the day before Dr. Martin Luther King’s birthday. Not only did both men march and work with Dr. King, but they devoted most of their lives to practicing the kind of targeted, effective, never-ending non-violence which Martin Luther King preached.
Both Bill Ayres and Julian Bond became aware of the continuing struggle for civil and human rights in this country at roughly the same time. Bond co-founded the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) while a student at all-Black Morehouse College in 1960, where he first met Dr. King. He risked his life registering new voters during Freedom Summer in Mississippi, in 1964. Ayres, entered the seminary to study the priesthood, in 1963—not to escape the troubled world, but to embrace andrepair it, influenced by the teachings of Catholic progressives like Dorothy Day & Thomas Merton.
Just after the 50th Anniversary of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, I interviewed our Bill Ayres, in the New York City headquarters of WHY Hunger, and in the tranquil beauty of his beloved Heckscher Park in the Village of Huntington, L.I., not far from his home. We peacefully strolled around the Park’s lake, when I asked him about the influence of Dr. King on his life’s work:
“In 1963, I was in the March on Washington, I was a kid, in the seminary. Then I marched with him lots of times, heard him preach in the church, read all his stuff, and, I knew that racism was an evil; poverty was an evil and that they were all very much connected…”
Ayres attended the Immaculate Conception seminary in Huntington for six years in the early 1960’s where he began reading Dr. King’s “stuff”, as he described it.
“The inspiration for me in all of this is, of course, the social teachings of the church and the Gospel of Matthew, and lots of other places. King is kind of the one who put that into action. Paulo Freire, a Brazilian educator driven out of after a military coup in 1964, wound up in Boston College and taught with a friend of mine up there and at UN. I met him a few times and heard him speak. He had this whole thing that the root cause of hunger is poverty and the root cause of poverty is powerlessness—I repeated this mantra to Harry Chapin a couple of times when I first met him. That’s always been our theme.”
We stopped walking as Bill’s kind, gentle-blue eyes, underscored that point:
“It’s the powerlessness that comes from on top, from oppression; racial oppression, sexual and, economic injustice. That’s where we came from and that’s where we’ve always been.
Serving Catholic parishes in conservative Long Island towns like Babylon and Seaford, Father Bill Ayres, did not look the part of the “radical priest,” despite, his deep, Catholic Worker beliefs. I asked him if he ever met the Berrigans, the “radical priests” of the 1960’s, arrested on many occasions for protesting the War in Vietnam, and destroying draft board records.
“Interesting. I met them, but didn’t know them. After I was ordained there was a priest friend of mine, who was a friend of the Berrigans. And Berrigan invited him and me to meet Thomas Merton. I never got there. Berrigan couldn’t go and we cancelled the whole thing. It’s one of those missed opportunities. I was on marches with the Berrigans; I was part of the anti-war movement. I would have loved to have met Merton. His book, The Seven Storey Mountain, influenced me to become a priest. He was a convert; He was a big influence on lots of people including me. A remarkable man.”
Thomas Merton’s writings and teachings influenced not only Bill Ayres, but generations of progressive Catholic activists to move well beyond the fundamentalist strictures of the hierarchy of the Catholic Church establishment.
It was the Church’s unyielding restrictions against priests marrying that drove Bill Ayres from the organized priesthood. After 13 years of serving two Catholic parishes, Bill met and fell in love with his wife, Jeannine, to whom he was married for almost 50 years. But while, Ayres may have formally left the priesthood, his life of service to others never left him. His congregation grew to a national size when he met Harry Chapin by interviewing him on Ayres’ radio program “On The Rock,” in 1973.
Serendipitously, Chapin’s great-aunt through marriage was Dorothy Day, one of the heroic figures in Bill Ayres life:
“If You look on my desk, I have a picture of Dorothy Day. I used to go down to her gatherings on Friday night on Christopher Street. (In NYC) I was very influenced by Dorothy Day; she was one of my role models, radical Catholic, sort of who I am. Harry and I talked about her, “Well, you know, I’m related to her,” he said, “and he was proud of it”.
It was Bill Ayres who alerted me to the remarkable book by Day’s granddaughter Kate Hennessy, “Dorothy Day: The World Will Be Saved by Beauty,”which, in intimate and exquisite detail, illuminates the life that the revolutionary Catholic worker lived, and how much she accomplished for others.
And it was Bill, ever the teacher and mentor, who took from his personal bookshelf, a the dog-eared, underlined, hard-copy of a book—a guide for social action, really—which meant a lot to him—and gifted it to me. It was his copy of Paulo Freire’s“Pedagogy of the Oppressed, “ a blueprint for honoring—and acting for– the humanity in all of us.
Bill Ayres’ all-encompassing humanity can leave you in quiet awe, and I was sure he must have had the same effect upon Harry Chapin, whom he met while still a practicing priest. I asked him if Harry believed in God:
“There’s an interesting thing here,” Ayres said. “ I’m a Catholic priest here and he’s this rock and roll guy. An interesting partnership. He loved it. He just thought it was a wild thing. He called me “Wild Bill” because I did all this crazy stuff. But he said to me, ‘you know, I’m not a believer; I come from a bunch of agnostics; I grew up in the Episcopal Church, I sang in the Episcopal Church. But I’m not really religious. ‘
“However, he evolved. And, part of the evolution was that he saw the goodness in the people who were running these food pantries and soup kitchens. And he had this great line, “I believe in the believers.”
“ Just a few months before Harry died, we were having this conversation about religion. He said , “I believe in God.” Big breakthrough. “But I don’t believe in a god of fear or vengeance. I believe in a god who loves people. I believe in a God that gives lots of hugs.” Harry liked to hug people. He and I talked about Jesus over the years. The whole thing is love and justice; it’s what’s it all about.”
Bill Ayres’ book, from which I frequently seek inspiration, hope and guidance, is his simple, soul-refreshing teaching tool which he wrote with his radio soul-mate, Pete Fornatale, entitled “All You Need Is Love..and 99 Other Life Lessons from Classic Rock Songs.”The book is dedicated to Harry Chapin, especially for Chapin’s use of his music, song and story-telling gifts to help “millions more to have food in their stomachs, dignity in their lives and hope in their spirits.”
It’s what Bill Ayres devoted a lifetime of service to doing, and practiced every single day.
Honoring Bill’s Legacy
Bill Ayres believed that ending hunger required more than providing food. It required healing, justice, and the power for communities to shape their own futures.For five decades, that conviction guided Bill’s work as WhyHunger’s co-founder, Executive Director, and Ambassador. He helped build an organization committed not only to meeting immediate needs, but to confronting the root causes of hunger and investing in lasting, community-led change.Bill taught us to listen before acting, to lead with hope, and to keep going even when the road ahead loomed long and difficult. A gift in Bill’s memory will carry that work forward by helping WhyHunger connect people with nutritious food, invest in grassroots solutions, and advance the human right to food for all.You can honor Bill’s extraordinary life by helping continue the work to which he devoted it.
Please donate to WHY Hunger to recognize the lifelong work of Bill Ayres, Harry Chapin, Sandy Chapin and the entire Chapin family in fighting hunger and poverty.
THE LIFELONG LEGACY OF BILL AYRES (reprinted from this week’s publication of WHY Hunger, the official publication of the international anti-hunger, anti-poverty organization co-founded by Harry Chapin & Bill Ayres, in 1975.)
William J. Ayres lived a truly remarkable life, leaving behind a profound legacy of love, compassion, community and enduring hope. Born on January 14, 1941, Bill credited his grandmother with teaching him to keep an open heart and to “try and see the good in everyone.” That early foundation set him on a lifelong path of seeking justice and serving others.
In 1963, Bill joined a quarter of a million people at Dr. King’s March on Washington, D.C., an event that forever shaped his understanding of race, justice, poverty and power. Over his lifetime, he participated in many more protests and marches for social justice. He attended St. John’s University for two years before studying philosophy and theology at the Seminary of the Immaculate Conception in Huntington, N.Y. He remained a devoted St. John’s Red Storm basketball fan, attending games into his eighties.
(Photo By Moya McAllister)
Deeply moved by his faith, Bill answered the call to become a Roman Catholic priest in 1966 and served in two parishes over 13 years, embracing a life of service. In 1968, the Diocese of Rockville Centre on Long Island asked Bill to host a local Sunday radio show, launching a long and storied career on the airwaves. As host of “On This Rock,” Father Bill Ayres played rock music, interviewed guests, told stories, and seamlessly wove in lessons about faith, justice and compassion. Bill soon brought that same unique blend of storytelling and purpose to television when Charles Dolan gave him a platform on his pioneering Cablevision network.
When he fell in love with his future wife Jeannine, Bill left the active priesthood to build a life with her. His ministry of compassion and service didn’t end; it simply took a different form. Together, Bill and Jeannine raised two beloved daughters, Michelle and Suzanne Ayres, and their cherished granddaughter, Jaida Blatt.
For 40 years, he hosted “The Bill Ayres Show” on WPLJ-FM, a late-night call-in radio show where he played music and offered advice to young people. Bill became the longest-running continuous host on the station before broadcasting his final live show in May 2019.
Radio brought together Bill’s love of music, storytelling, faith and rock ‘n’ roll. He was the first person to interview Bruce Springsteen on network radio. That encounter sparked a lifelong friendship and partnership with Springsteen, Jon Landau, and Barbara Carr that was rooted in a deep commitment to harnessing the power of music to end hunger.
Then, a serendipitous series of radio interviews, first with musician Tom Chapin and later with his brother Harry, changed the course of Bill’s life yet again.
(Photo by Diane Maple)
After Bill and Harry connected on-air about their shared outrage over the growing crises of hunger and poverty, they decided to meet for dinner. Around the kitchen table, Bill, Harry and his wife, Sandy Chapin, sketched out a plan to make a lasting difference. In 1975, they founded the anti-hunger and social justice organization now known as WhyHunger.
A gentle visionary with steadfast conviction, Bill fiercely believed that hunger is solvable. He knew that making nutritious food a human right for all required digging deep to address hunger’s root causes. He also knew that local communities held the wisdom and power to solve it, if we could only learn to listen and follow their lead.
Guided by these principles, Bill and Harry created the first Hungerthon in 1975, a 24-hour radio show that raised funds and brought national attention to hunger, alongside radio DJ Pete Fornatale and general manager Mel Karmazin at WNEW-FM.
Now in its 41st year, the Hungerthon campaign has raised tens of millions of dollars through radiothons, concerts and community action. Its national broadcasts have become synonymous with the Thanksgiving season, airing across the nation on SiriusXM, iHeartRadio New York, and CBS Radio New York/Audacy New York.
Bill’s belief in the power of music to drive change extended far beyond Hungerthon. He forged an innovative partnership with Hard Rock International and helped galvanize the “Imagine There’s No Hunger” campaign with Yoko Ono Lennon to expand access to healthy food for children around the world.
(Photo by Diane Bondareff)
Together, Bill and Harry held numerous benefit concerts and opened a national policy office in Washington, D.C. Their advocacy drew steadfast bipartisan support from former Board Member Senator Patrick Leahy, D-VT, and Congressman Ben Gilman, R-NY, and helped lead to the creation of the first Presidential Hunger Commission, the first National Hunger Hotline, school meals, and millions of dollars in federal food and nutrition aid. Working side by side, Bill and Harry also helped start Long Island Cares and the Center for Food Action New Jersey.
When his dear friend Harry died tragically in 1981, Bill saw a promise that still had to be kept. He devoted the rest of his life to securing WhyHunger’s future and expanding its impact, serving as its Executive Director until his retirement in 2015. That year, as WhyHunger celebrated its 40th anniversary, Bill received the organization’s Lifetime Achievement Award.
At WhyHunger’s 50th anniversary gala in 2025, Bill helped present the inaugural Bill Ayres Social Justice Award to CNN’s Laura Coates. This annual award honors individuals like Bill who are driven by moral conviction to unite communities, amplify marginalized voices and fight systemic injustice.
In 1998, Bill co-authored All You Need is Love: And 99 Other Life Lessons From Classic Rock Songs with his dear friend and radio colleague, Pete Fornatale. And in 2021, he wrote The Journey into the Mystery: Finding God in Your Everyday Life, which was formatted by his daughter, Suzanne Ayres.
Bill leaves us with an indelible legacy and a powerful example of what it means to live with purpose. His warmth, care and generosity left a mark on everyone he met. He taught us to listen before acting, to lead with hope, and to keep going even when the road ahead looms long and difficult. Those of us who knew Bill, worked alongside him, or called him a friend were lucky to be part of his story and to witness what an open heart, a bold vision, and a relentless commitment to justice can make possible.
Our hearts are with his wife, Jeannine, Bill’s family and friends, the Chapin family, and the extraordinary community of people he brought together around this mission.
