This article ran in the Democrat and Chronicle on September 29, 2019.
by Caurie Putnam 

For Michele Walsh Myers, Tuttle North, on the campus of The College at Brockport, will forever be a place of bittersweet emotion. It was in that building on Sept. 11, 2001, that Myers, a native of Seaford, Long Island, was at her graduate student work study job when she heard that a plane crashed into the north tower of the World Trade Center in Manhattan.
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Eighteen years later, Myers teaches in Tuttle North as a full-time lecturer in the kinesiology, sports studies and physical education department. It is also where the Stephen Siller — Tunnel to Towers Brockport 5K Run & Walk, which Myers directs, will begin and end Sunday, Oct. 6.

“I’m so glad to be able to bring the event to Brockport because this is where I was when Sept. 11 happened,” Myers said.

Since 2002, the race has been held in cities around the nation in memory of Stephen Siller, 34, a New York City firefighter who died Sept. 11, 2001, after putting on his gear and running through the Brooklyn Battery Tunnel to the Twin Towers.

The nonprofit Stephen Siller Foundation, which founded the race, has raised over $125 million in support of first responders, veterans and Gold Star families. It remembers the 343 FDNY members, 71 police officers (from 10 different agencies) and thousands of citizens killed on Sept. 11, 2001 — several of whom Myers had a personal connection to.

“My alma mater, Seaford High School, lost five in the tower attacks,” Myers said. “Two of them I went to high school with and grew up with — New York City firefighter Timmy Haskell and his brother Tommy, a battalion chief with FDNY’s Ladder 132. It made the attacks more personal and gave me the drive to do something to make sure the victims were never forgotten.”

Myers organized a Tunnel to Towers races in Rochester from 2016 to 2018, but when she got hired full time at her alma mater last year, she was asked by her department chair, Cathy Houston-Wilson, also a Long Island native, to consider moving the race to Brockport.

“The support I’ve received from the kinesiology department, the college, village of Brockport, mayor, campus and village police departments and the Brockport Volunteer Fire Department has been overwhelming,” Myers said. “It means a lot to bring the race here and to include the students and the monument.”

The Brockport Volunteer Firefighters Association maintains a September 11 th monument in front of Brockport Fire Department’s Station 4 on 237 S. Main St. A part of Main Street will be shut down on race day so that participants can run by the monument.

About 70 Tunnel to Towers races are held annually; typically on or around Sept. 11. Myers chose early October so she could get more students from the college involved after they were settled in for the first semester.

The Brockport Student Government has given 100 registration fees for students to participate. Myers is also seeking 343 volunteers from the college and community to hold signs along the race route that bear the photos and names of each of the 343 FDNY members killed on Sept. 11, 2001.

To register for the Tunnel to Towers Brockport race ($25 advance; discounts for certain ages) at 9 a.m. Oct. 6, visit crowdrise.com/t2tbrockport2019. Same day registration is $30. To volunteer, email Brockport@tunnel2towers.org or fill out the online race registration form (there is a free volunteer option listed). For race updates and road closures, visit Tunnel To Towers Brockport on Facebook.

Contact Caurie at caurie@urgrad.rochester.edu with news from west-side towns. She’s on Twitter at @CauriePutnam and on Facebook at facebook.com/ BrockportBlog/.​

In less than a year and a half, Nate Riexinger of Hamlin lost a good friend and the brother of a bandmate to suicide. It was too much for him to handle from afar.

“I wanted to do something about it,” said Riexinger, a 2019 graduate of Brockport High School and drummer for the band Element 36. “I wanted kids to know there are people who care. The skate community is a huge family and we wanted to link them in.”

Riexinger, along with Kyle Matthews, a longtime friend and a student at The College at Brockport, teamed up to organize the Skate to End Hate. The wellattended music and skateboarding event was held on Sept. 8 at the Sweden Town Park to benefit the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention’s Western New York Area chapter.

“During the process of setting this up, the stepfather of a very good friend also took his life,” said Matthews, who also runs Infamous Street Co., a clothing brand. “It just showed the need for this event. Nate and I wanted to show everyone there are people in the community that won’t look away and will help.”

Among the vendors, music, food and raffles was a table staffed by volunteers from the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. It was busy throughout the seven-hour event.

“We are seeing a huge range of people here from all ages and backgrounds,” said volunteer Donna Besler of Canandaigua. “Everyone from skaters who are here to support the cause, to people who have lost loved ones to suicide to a gentleman who was suicidal himself. We were ready and able to support him and give him resources.”

Volunteering with the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention is a personal mission for Besler, who lost her own son Brennan Tatem to suicide on Nov. 23, 2014. He was a 19-year-old sophomore at Pepperdine University in Malibu, California.

“He was an actor and athlete,” Besler said. “He was a handsome and brilliant young man on the outside, but on the inside he was struggling and we didn’t know the depth. Events like this are so important to break the stigma and allow kids to openly and freely talk about their inner challenges without people judging them.”

That accepting vibe was what Riexinger and Matthews were going for when they first conceived the Skate to End Hate in late May immediately following the death of Chase Marshall, 14, of Farmington. Chase’s brother Zachary is also a member of Element 36.

Riexinger and Matthews, who hope to make the Skate to End Hate an annual event, dedicated the inaugural event to the memories of Marshall and Hannah Testa, a friend and classmate of theirs at Brockport High School who died on December 15, 2017, at the age of 16. Both the Marshall and Testa families  have shared publicly with media that their children died of suicide.
​The most recent data from the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention shows that in New York state, suicide is the second leading cause of death for people ages 15 to 34.
The toll-free National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is (800) 273-8255. The 24/7 lifeline offers free and confidential support for people in distress, resources for the caller or loved one calling about them, and best practices for professionals. An online chat is also available at suicidepreventionlifeline.org/chat/.
Local chorale looking for NYC performers
In August 2017 I told you about the Amadeus Chorale Youth Singers being invited to perform at the 2017
Christmas Spectacular at Radio City Music Hall in Manhattan. Darla Bair, of Sweden, the chorale’s founder and artistic director, reports she will bring a group of adult singers this December to open for the Rockettes. If you’re interested in performing or attending as an audience member (you must be 16 and up) visit travelwithdarla.com.
Contact Caurie at caurie@urgrad.rochester.edu with news from west-side towns. She’s on Twitter at @CauriePutnam and on Facebook at facebook.com/ BrockportBlog/.