Flowers flourish to honor legacy

Garden at Port Chester Schools administration building named after 27-year school board member James Dreves

August 22, 2024 at 12:20 a.m.

James Dreves, who served on the Port Chester Board of Education for 27 years, poses for a photo with his wife Kathy at the administration building on Tuesday, Aug. 20. The district had just hosted a small celebration honoring his legacy by naming a garden after him. (Sarah Wolpoff/Westmore News)

The sense of “passing the torch” is, in best practice, a two-way street—where figures of legacy let a new generation take the reins while future leaders respect the history that paved the way to their new path.

That was a sentiment engulfing the mood on Tuesday, Aug. 20. In a joyous celebration—a ceremony filled with jokes, echoing laughter and the sharing of light-hearted memories—familiar faces of Port Chester Schools’ past joined those currently shaping its future to honor a figure akin to district regality.

Blue skies and mild weather prevailed as around two dozen people gathered to dedicate a new garden to James Dreves, a Board of Education member who served the district for 27 years.

Dreves, who sat on the board from 1991 to 2018, was happily there to celebrate the festivities.

“It’s a tough job,” said Larry Lupo, a former board member who served with the honoree, nodding to Dreves in the small crowd. “I don’t know how the hell you did it. I want to thank you on behalf of myself and all those who came before us and after us.”

Now greeting visitors to the administration building below Port Chester Middle School, a garden has been sowed with a plaque dedicating it to Dreves. After the ceremony, Superintendent Dr. Aurelia Henriquez explained how they removed a few shrubs, mulched the space and added flowers, but the vision is it to beautify it more as time goes on.

“We plan to add to the garden over time, we were thinking of adding special perennials, like some butterfly bushes,” she said. “We were also thinking of having our middle school students work on it as a project.”

    Lou Russo, who stepped down from the Board of Education this year, hugs James Dreves after speaking during the garden dedication. Russo was the community member who formally requested to name a space after the honoree.
 By Sarah Wolpoff   

It’s a garden to honor a local figure who will go down in history, embellished by a piece of literal history.

As part of the renovations, the district added a concrete slab to support a large bell—an antique christened “District No. 4” in 1881. Westmore News archives report the bell originally belonged to the Central School, later known as the Port Chester Junior High School, on Irving Avenue, which was sold decades ago—likely in the 70s. The land was ultimately purchased by developers who constructed the Washington Mews condominiums.

“When I first got here, that bell was just off, tucked away in a corner,” Henriquez said. “It was so beautiful, and I just felt it was a piece of our history that wasn’t being honored. So, I think this is a wonderful way of honoring our history, in multiple ways.”

During the dedication ceremony, Board of Education President Chrissie Onofrio remarked how she remembers him as a pillar on the board “when I myself was a student, and later as a parent.”

Though she never worked with him, plenty had. And those who spoke on Tuesday, in different words similarly defined him by his thoughtfulness, kindness and dignity.

“I think of Jim as a board member and a neighbor, but more importantly, I consider him a friend,” Lupo said. “He’s the one that 25 years ago said to me, ‘you should be a board member.’ And I’m like, ‘are you kidding? Why would I want to do that?’ He did the same with Brian Brady.”

“It wasn’t an option!” Brady, another former colleague on the board, shouted from the crowd.

“What I’d say about Jim is, he was always the voice of reason in the room,” Lupo continued. “He always made sure the big things were getting done—budgets and bonds and all—but he also made sure of the same with the small things.”

He spoke of an ambition Dreves had years ago to get lighting installed in a new sign at King Street School so it could be seen at night. When the district determined it was a project too costly, he personally called Con Edison to get a streetlight moved closer to the building.

“We retired the same year, and one of the things I always say, in no other place I’ve ever worked has the board made a decision and never failed to do it for the kids,” said Maura McAward, the former Assistant Superintendent for Business. “This was the greatest place, and you were a major reason why.”

She recalled Dreves asking “an alarming” question when she interviewed for the job at Port Chester Schools in 1997: When she’s on her way home, and inevitably has the “I wish I said that” moment, what will that sentiment of remorse be?

“He always had a way of making you think a little further forward than what you were, and pushing you,” she said. “And for me, in those 21 years he was always a guiding light.”

Amid the laughter and affinities, Dreves was quick to remind that his days of service were tough ones—a period of severe underfunding and public angst that many in the crowd worked together to overcome.

“It’s wonderful to have all these folks here saying all these nice things about me, some of which are true,” he said, a joke met with chuckles. “I will say, it’s been a wonderful experience here in Port Chester,” but he went on to reflect on hardship.

Dreves remembered needing to step up to the plate fast as a Board of Education member because early in his tenure a budget failed. It took a solid group of consistent doorknockers and compromisers to get the middle school filled for a second time with voters who believed in the schools.

    Shrubs were removed and flowers planted to bring the new garden to life. In another way to honor history, the plot features an old bell from 1881 that originated at the former Port Chester Junior High School on Irving Avenue.
 By Sarah Wolpoff   

And that was just the first of many uphill battles, he said—ones that frankly wouldn’t end until just a few years ago when adequate Foundation Aid funding turned the schools’ trajectory around.

“There were times when it seemed people didn’t care…it’s such a good feeling knowing that the district cares. It really cared about what it did, and I cared about what happened,” he said. “People here today are carrying on, and I hope, if anything, I leave a thought about doing the right thing always. That didn’t always happen, but it can happen now.”

“Without those that came before us, there is no us,” said Lou Russo, the most recent former Board of Education member who finished his final year in May. He quoted Ralph Waldo Emerson: “To be yourself in a world that’s constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment,” feeling it’s a sentiment applicable to Dreves’s nature.

Russo was the one who proposed naming a facility after Dreves—getting the process formally started through official recommendation. After the ceremony on Tuesday, he explained his rationale.

“I served for six years, and thinking about the way I felt after that…to have people like Jim who volunteered for 27 years, just goodness, what an accomplishment,” Russo said. “That’s why I like that quote by Emerson. With all the pushes and pulls you go through serving on a board, he always stayed true to his approach and dedication.”

The synergy of the day was noteworthy, he continued, because in the same summer the district has been planning a garden dedication, another Dreves legacy had just begun through his son.

In July, Craig Dreves started as the new principal of Park Avenue School. “One thing I’ve come to appreciate over the years is when the universe speaks, you just have to tune in,” Russo said. “I think this is one of those moments.”

Craig, in cheery emotion, spoke to his father before the group about pride of his own in carrying their name forward after a lifetime of observing his father.

“I want to take us back to 32 years ago, when I graduated from Port Chester High School and you gave me my diploma. To this day, I remember that. It was such an impactful moment for me, and I look back at it with such pride,” Craig said.

“What I really want to say is how proud I am, what a great dad you’ve been and board member,” he continued. “I’m happy to be here and honor you for all the work you did and to continue your legacy by coming home to Port Chester and giving my heart and soul to this school community that you served with your heart and soul. It’s a real honor.”