[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 101 (Friday, July 16, 1999)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1575]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                             LEON EASTMOND

                                 ______
                                 

                          HON. EDOLPHUS TOWNS

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                         Friday, July 16, 1999

  Mr. TOWNS. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor an important New York 
small businessman, Leon Eastmond who is the owner of an honorable 
seventy year old New York City based corporation specializing in 
manufacturing boilers, steel storage tanks, fuel tank maintenance. His 
company EASCO Boiler Corporation performs excavations of underground 
fuel oil tanks and his employees are trained in procedures for handling 
hazardous materials including contaminated soil, working in confined 
spaces and cleaning up oil spills.
  EASCO currently covers the five boroughs of New York City and both 
Nassau and Suffolk counties maintaining a fully stocked warehouse 
facility to serve their customers with state of the art combustion 
equipment with parts and service available twenty four hours a day, 
three hundred sixty five days a year.
  Leon Eastmond is an amazing businessman, but he doesn't limit his 
help to his company or his employees, but instead, seizes every 
opportunity to make young people aware that self employment is an 
exciting option. He has joined the Fernando Mateo Institute and has 
given talks at Evander Childs and George Washington High Schools. He 
has been a guest lecturer at the Graduate School of Business at 
Columbia University and has met with their Minority Student Club on 
several occasions.
  Leo realizes that it is important for young people of all races and 
socio economic levels to meet success oriented black and other minority 
adults. Mr. Eastmond believes if we start young enough, people will 
learn to share information and network across all color lines. He truly 
serves as an inspiration. This is a person who was born and raised in a 
system that did not deal him a full deck of cards, but he has made the 
most of it. Moreover, in an effort to help young people turn their 
lives around, Leon has talked with young adult inmates at Rikers Island 
and given them hope that there are business people willing to offer 
them a job and a ``Second Change.'' He now has one former inmate 
working as a welder's helper.
  Mr. Speaker, Leon Eastmond sponsors six Little League Softball teams; 
the Black Leadership Commission on AIDS and contributes to the United 
Negro College Fund, the New York Urban League, the Special Olympics, 
Promesa, the United Jewish Appeal and the Alvin Alley Dance Company. He 
has a PhD. In life and I commend Mr. Eastmond's achievements to my 
colleagues' attention.

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