Tanner was recently honored for her service by the Lindenhurst Republican Club at its annual dinner. She is shown in the photo with Lindenhurst Village Mayor Tom Brennan who awarded her with a certificate of appreciation for her service. Keynote speaker at the event was Westchester District Attorney Jeannine Pirro. When Carol Tanner retired, she got a bunch of bananas. They meant a lot to the woman who had served the Village as a Trustee for 16 years and who once voted in support of allowing Waldbaums to build a supermarket on an old dilapidated site in the Village more than ten years ago.

"I supported that project because I thought it was important," said Tanner who grew up in the Village. "There was a time here when we had a dress shop and a men's shop and a children's clothing store, but things changed, especially when the malls came in, and I believed that having a supermarket would help bring some of that back."

Tanner's decision to support the supermarket was made, but became reinforced by a senior citizen who attended one of the hearings saying she couldn't even buy a bunch of bananas in the Village. That, along with her vote, became Tanner's political trademark of sorts. "I'm proud of it," she said in discussing her role over the past decade and a half.

Tanner, a member of the Beautification Society, Historical Society and Fire Department Woman's Auxiliary, was born in the Village. Her father was a salesman for Kraft foods, which had a factory in the Village at the southwest corner of Wellwood and Hoffman Avenues, a building that is now being restored to house the offices of the Suffolk County District Court. While attending high school she worked in a small department store, Diamonds, which was at the corner of John Street and Wellwood Avenue, and she remembers with fondness the close, friendly community of Lindenhurst Village she knew as a child.

"I am proud of some of the things the Village board was able to accomplish while I was there," she said. "I think we helped to bring back some of that sense of community I remember growing up here and I know my father would be proud of what the Village has done with that old building."

Tanner said that she decided not to seek reelection this year because she believed it was time for the board to look to get "some new blood," and that she was just "getting tired".

"It's time to pass the torch -and the bananas-on to someone else," she said.