Assemblyman Clinton Calabrese to be Honored at Northern NJ Community Foundation’s Community Changemaker Night

The Northern New Jersey Community Foundation (NNJCF) will honor arts champion New Jersey Assemblyman Clinton Calabrese and four other exemplary community leaders for their contributions to make life better in North Jersey at the organization’s first Community Changemaker Night. The 2025 honorees are New Jersey Assemblyman Clinton Calabrese of Cliffside Park, South Orange Mayor Sheena Collum, Fairleigh Dickinson University-Teaneck Professor and Biology Department Chair Dr. Marion McClary, and Gina Wilson and Lisa De Dominicis, Fund Advisors for the Andrea Tilbian Halejian Memorial Fund.

The celebration takes place on Thursday, June 5, 2025 from 6:00 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. at a cocktail reception that will be held at Forte Ristorante, located at 160 Prospect Avenue in Hackensack, New Jersey. The NNJCF is a 501( c )(3) not-for-profit headquartered in Hackensack, serving North Jersey.

The 2025 award recipients exemplify excellence in the Foundation’s focus areas – green and healthy places, creative communities, and belonging and opportunity – as well as overall community leadership. The NNJCF will honor New Jersey Assemblyman (District 36) Clinton Calabrese with the Creative Communities Award for helping communities through the arts, supporting artists, or enhancing cultural ecosystems. As a dedicated advocate for the arts, Assemblyman Calabrese has played a pivotal role in fostering cultural initiatives in his hometown of Cliffside Park, becoming a founding member of the Cliffside Park Arts Association. Assemblyman Calabrese is a proponent of the arts as a vital contributor to New Jersey's economy. In January 2024, he was a primary sponsor of Bill A3032 Aca (1R), which aims to designate space in the State House or its grounds for the display of artwork from each county in New Jersey. Additionally, he co-sponsored Bill A2825, which directs the Juvenile Justice Commission to establish an arts education pilot program for juvenile offenders, and Bill A3584, which allocates $70 million in federal funds to the Economic Development Authority to support arts and culture organizations adversely affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The festivities will be emceed by Bergen Record columnist and humorist Bill Ervolino performing, in conjunction with a fun, interactive game-show awards ceremony presented by Ryan Huban of Howdy Stranger. Attendees will also have an opportunity to network with other leaders and advocates dedicated to making North Jersey a better place to live, work and be, while enjoying artisanal bites and a selection of wines and beers in a vibrant atmosphere.

The cost per ticket is $130 per person. Special ticket rates are available for parties of three, five, and ten. 

Sponsorship levels, ranging from $125 to $5,000, provide opportunities for individuals and businesses to participate. Digital ads for the event’s digital journal may also be purchased, ranging from $125 to $500, can be purchased that will be featured in a digital journal shown the night of the celebration and also on the Community Changemaker Night’s website. Funds raised from the sponsorships will be used to build alliances, support programs that protect the environment and produce public art. To date, Champion sponsors for the event include Fairleigh Dickinson University, Nishuane Group, and Seton Hall University. For information about sponsorship opportunities and relevant marketing opportunities, visit https://www.nnjcf.org/ccn25/.

A silent auction will also offer a range of products to bid upon. Some of the items available to bid upon include gift baskets with Night Out tickets to one performance at each of the following venues: Barrymore Film Center in Fort Lee, Hackensack Performing Arts Center in Hackensack and an Iconic Coffee gift card, Jersey City Theater Center in Jersey City, Mayo Performing Arts Center in Morristown, Nimbus Dance Works in Jersey City, and South Orange Performing Arts Center in South Orange. Other auction items are a tour of Two River Gourmet Mushrooms in Millstone, with a basket of exotic mushrooms, and a personalized one-hour consultation on landscape design by Teaneck-based Sprout Farms and Gardens.  

For people unable to attend, donations can be made at https://www.nnjcf.org/donation/ or by sending a check made out to The Northern NJ Community Foundation (NNJCF), 1 University Plaza Drive, Suite 128, Hackensack, NJ 07601.

With the motto 'What can we do together, that we can't do alone?", the Northern New Jersey Community Foundation helps communities in North Jersey become better places to live, work, and enjoy by bringing people together to address pressing issues, such as public health, environmental protection, civil society and education. The Foundation works to enhance quality of life in the eight northern counties of New Jersey – Bergen, Essex, Hudson, Morris, Passaic, Sussex, Warren and Union. Founded in 1998, the NNJCF has awarded over $1 million in grants to nonprofit organizations and scholarships to local residents, developed diverse alliances to tackle critical quality of life issues, connected people to valuable resources, and produced catalytic public art and environmental projects to benefit all residents.