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Politics & Government

Wayne to Commemorate 9/11 With Special Walk

Wayne residents to walk in association with Stephen Sillers Foundation Towers to Tunnels Walk.

Wayne will be taking part in the Stephen Sillers Tunnels to Towers Foundation, and will hold a walk to raise money to honor fallen soldiers on Sunday, Sept. 11.

Sillers was a 34-year-old member of the New York City Fire Department Company 343. On 9/11, he was heading to his home on Staten Island, where he lived with his wife and four children, when he heard about the terror attack, Mayor Chris Vergano said.

Sillers stopped and tried to get back in the city, but was blocked. He parked his car and carried 80 pounds of equipment on his back and met up with the men of Company 343. He died in the towers.

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Vergano said he received the idea from Maria Balarin, whose son Austin ran in the Towers to Tunnel Walk in New York City in 2010, dressed in his Wayne Junior Firefighter Uniform. The 16-year-old Wayne Valley High School student said he was touched by Sillers's story and it inspired him to get involved.

The goal of the walk is to “show solidarity with the ... firefighters and other first responders who died in New York on 9/11 and the nearly two million servicemen and women who have continued to fight in Iraq and Afghanistan.”

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“My son ran in this last year and I thought it would be great to bring it to Wayne this year,” Maria Balarin said.

The 3.1 mile Wayne walk begins at Wayne Valley High School then heads up Joseph Place via Michael Drive and towards the 9/11 Memorial on Nellis Drive by way of Dwyer Road.

“This council full behind this activity and we anticipate that it will be an annual activity in town,” Council President Joseph Schweighardt said. “Let’s never forget.”

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