Renee V.H. Simons (born 1949) is a former Fortune 500 executive and the president of SANS Sag Harbor, an award-winning nonprofit organization that successfully organized and advocated for the New York State and National Register of Historic Places registration of the historically Black beachfront enclaves in the Sag Harbor communities of Sag Harbor Hills, Azurest, and Ninevah Subdivisions.
Simons holds a Master's degree in Education Planning from Fordham University and an MBA from Columbia Business School. [1] Her BA is from Hunter College.
Simons began her career in 1978 as an assistant brand manager with General Foods Corp. [1] She also worked as a brand manager for Dixie/Northern Products at James River Co., then as a brand manager for Seven-Up Co., for 7-Up and Diet 7-UP. [1] She then became a group director for Phillip Morris and several brands of cigarettes. [1] Simons was then promoted to director of sales promotion for all Philip Morris USA cigarette brands in August 1991. [2]
She also was a senior vice president at JPMorgan Chase. Her roles at Fortune 500 companies included advertising, marketing, corporate communications, technology and media management and banking. She held executive level positions at The Advertising Club of NY, [3] Covenant House-New York, and was a board member at various corporations. [4] She was president of the Harley Simons Group (a New York Domestic Business Corporation) and a director of the Taproot Foundation. After retiring from professional life, she volunteered at the Sag Harbor Partnership, where she is on the board of directors, [5] and became the President of SANS Sag Harbor, the non-profit that operates the Eastville Historical society. [6]
On July 10, 2019, the National Park Service officially added SANS (the Sag Harbor communities of Sag Harbor Hills, Azurest, and Ninevah Subdivisions) to the National Register of Historic Places. [7] [8]
The East Hampton Star reports that Simons, as president of SANS Sag Harbor, a nonprofit that advocated for the historic designation, [9] called the designation an "honor," and recounted the history of the subdivisions: "The SANS communities were created to provide privately-owned, safe, and nurturing neighborhoods for family resort recreation and a sense of extended families. During this initial period, African-Americans were excluded by covenants and practice from most public recreation locations in the greater New York areas." [7]
Newsday reports that Simons successfully led the effort to have SANS listed on the New York State Register of Historic Places in March 2019, [10] and that Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-New York) advocated for the inclusion of the community on the National Register of Historic Places, stating, "As one of the last remaining African American beachfront communities in the country, the SANS Historic District holds important historic value that must be protected." [11] When the New York State Board for Historic Preservation nominated SANS for the national register, Simons stated, "Today's efforts once again underscore . . . the existence of African-American contributions in the long history of America." [9] In March 2019, Simons told The Wall Street Journal , "There’s a lot of pride to be recognized this way" and "It codifies the history. I thought it was very important to establish the importance of the area versus being a footnote." [12]
Sandra E. Garcia, writing for The New York Times Style Magazine in October 2020, recounts a history of the SANS community and reports that Simons, who has a home in Sag Harbor Hills, helped lead fundraising efforts for the national and state landmark applications. [13] Garcia also writes, "there are 195 buildings in the subdivisions — which, alongside several other sites and structures, collectively go by the acronym SANS — all erected before circa 1977 across the 154 acres that lie north of Sag Harbor village’s Hampton Street, which still divides the predominantly white community from the historic Black one." [13]
The Sag Harbor Express reports that Simons promoted the landmark application effort through meetings, fundraising and petition drives, [14] and she reached out to the National Organization of Minority Architects (NOMA) for help with the process, which sent 25 volunteers. [15] The Montauk Sun reports that the organizing efforts included obtaining a grant from The Robert David Lion Gardiner Foundation and conducting an Intensive Cultural Resource Survey to produce the required documentation for the applications. [16] Simons discussed the efforts with The Wall Street Journal in 2017, stating, "If we don’t say anything we’ll lose the essence of this neighborhood," and "Children won’t remember what it took to be here." [17]
Sag Harbor is an incorporated village in Suffolk County, New York, United States, in the towns of Southampton and East Hampton on eastern Long Island. The village developed as a working port on Gardiners Bay. The population was 2,772 at the 2020 census.
Wainscott is a hamlet in the Town of East Hampton in Suffolk County, New York, United States, on the South Fork of Long Island. As of the 2010 United States Census, the CDP population was 650. For statistical purposes, the United States Census Bureau defined a census-designated place (CDP) for the 2000 census that roughly corresponds to the same area.
The Hamptons, part of the East End of Long Island, consist of the towns of Southampton and East Hampton, which together compose the South Fork of Long Island, in Suffolk County, New York. The Hamptons are a popular seaside resort and one of the historical summer colonies of the northeastern United States.
Southampton, officially the Town of Southampton, is a town in southeastern Suffolk County, New York, partly on the South Fork of Long Island. As of the 2020 U.S. census, the town had a population of 69,036. Southampton is included in the stretch of shoreline prominently known as the Hamptons.
The Town of East Hampton is located in southeastern Suffolk County, New York, at the eastern end of the South Shore of Long Island. It is the easternmost town in the state of New York. At the time of the 2020 United States census, it had a total population of 28,385.
The South Fork of Suffolk County, New York is a peninsula in the southeastern section of the county on the South Shore of Long Island. The South Fork includes most of the Hamptons. The shorter, more northerly peninsula is known as the North Fork.
The Montaukett ("Metoac"), more commonly known as Montauk are an Algonquian-speaking Native American people from the eastern and central sections of Long Island, New York.
The Montauk Point Light, or Montauk Point Lighthouse, is a lighthouse located adjacent to Montauk Point State Park at the easternmost point of Long Island in Montauk, New York. The lighthouse was the first to be built within the state of New York, and was the first public works project of the new United States. It is the fourth oldest active lighthouse in the United States. Montauk Point Light is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. In 2012, it was designated as a National Historic Landmark for its significance to New York and international shipping in the early Federal period.
The Montauk Branch is a rail line owned and operated by the Long Island Rail Road in the U.S. state of New York. The line runs the length of Long Island, 115 miles (185 km) from Long Island City to Montauk. However, in LIRR maps and schedules for public use, the term Montauk Branch refers to the line east of Babylon; service from Jamaica to Babylon is covered by separate Babylon Branch schedules, while the line west of Jamaica is currently unused for passenger service. A select number of Montauk Branch trains operate via the Main Line during peak hours.
Sans or SANS may refer to:
Sag Harbor Village District is a national historic district in Sag Harbor, Suffolk County, New York. It comprises the entire business district of the village. It includes 870 contributing buildings, seven contributing sites, two contributing structures, and three contributing objects. It includes the First Presbyterian Church, a National Historic Landmark building designed by Minard Lafever.
The Hamptons Collegiate Baseball League (HCBL) is a summer baseball organization located in The Hamptons in the U.S. state of New York. It is a seven-team league consisting of the Sag Harbor Whalers, Southampton Breakers, Westhampton Aviators, North Fork Ospreys, Shelter Island Bucks and most recently, the South Shore Clippers. The HCBL is a member of the National Alliance of College Summer Baseball and is sanctioned by Major League Baseball.
Sag Harbor Union Free School District is a public school district located primarily in the Town of Southampton, with a small portion in the Town of East Hampton, on Long Island, in Suffolk County, New York, United States. It services the villages of Sag Harbor and North Haven, the majority of the hamlet of Noyack, as well as portions of the unincorporated communities of Sag Harbor and Sagaponack.
Bridgehampton Union Free School District is a public school district located in the Town of Southampton on Long Island, in Suffolk County, New York, United States. It is roughly co-extensive with the hamlet of Bridgehampton, but also serves parts of Noyack, unincorporated Sag Harbor, and unincorporated Sagaponack.
Amaza Lee Meredith was an American architect, educator and artist. Meredith was unable to enter the profession as an architect because of "both her race and her sex" as an African-American woman, and worked primarily as an art teacher at Virginia State University, where she founded the art department. Sex and race wasn’t the only factor that was challenging at the time. Amaza Lee Meredith lived authentically as an African-American Queer artist despite at the time heterosexual norms. She is best known for her residence, Azurest South, where she and her partner, Dr. Edna Meade Colson, resided together. Moreover, she co-founded the Azurest Syndicate Inc., a vacation destination for black middle class Americans on Sag Harbor, New York. As an educated black woman, Meredith is a rare example of a financially and socially independent black woman living in the time of Jim Crow Segregation Laws.
St. David African Methodist Episcopal Zion Cemetery is a historic cemetery located in the Eastville community of Sag Harbor, New York. It is anchored by the AME church, the Eastville Historical Society House on NY 114 and the St. David Cemetery. The site has around 100 graves, including that of Reverend J. P. Thompson, the first pastor of the St. David AME Zion Church.
Sag Harbor Hills, Azurest, and Ninevah Beach Subdivisions Historic District (SANS) is an African American beachfront community in Sag Harbor, New York. Founded following World War II, the SANS community served primarily as a summer retreat for middle-class African American families during the post-WWII and Jim Crow era. African American families were not allowed at beachfront resorts, pools or beaches, and SANS began as a place of refuge from racial strife. The historic district is bordered by Hempstead Street, Richards Drive, Hampton Street, Lincoln Street, Harding Terrace, Terry Drive and the eastern end of Haven's Beach in Sag Harbor. It was placed on the National Register of Historic Places on July 10, 2019.
The Northwest Alliance is a New York state based organization of citizens formed in the early 1980s whose goal was to gain protection of two unoccupied parcels of East Hampton, Long Island, comprising The Grace Estate, Barcelona Neck, Northwest Creek, Little Northwest Creek and Northwest Harbor.
Sagaponack Common School District is a public school district located in Sagaponack on Long Island, in Suffolk County, New York, United States. It is roughly co-extensive with the village of Sagaponack, which is part of the town of Southampton.
During the decades of segregation in the United States, African Americans established various resorts. The resorts were self-contained commercial establishments. Varying resort accommodations included rooms for rent, meals and fine food, cocktail bars, dancing, sporting facilities, and beaches. Also in some cases entire communities were known as resort areas for African Americans. The Negro Motorist Green Book helped guide African Americans to accommodating and safe places, including Idlewild, Michigan, which was among the most well known.