Variety Boys and Girls Club, located at 21-12 30th Road, will present its plans for expansion before Community Board 1 on Thursday May 24 at 6:30 p.m.

The public hearing will be at the Ravenswood Community Center, located at 35-40 21st Street.

The 63-year-old youth services organization is seeking to expand to a state-of-the-art, five-story facility. The new building would have brand new amenities and features such as:

• A 400-seat shared education space
• 50 spots for day care/child care
• An 80-seat Universal Pre-Kindergarten space
• Tech-incubator space for community-based nonprofits
• 65-seat planetarium
• 175-year community theater
• Fully-equipped video, audio and film production room
• STEAM research center
• 250-seat event center and conference space
• Working kitchen with pizza ovens and bakery equipment
• 3,000 square feet of retail
• Rooftop garden with sustainable energy learning
• 1,000-square-foot BioBus base and research center
• Entrepreneurial Makerspace
• Double-sized gym and new pool

To help pay for the new $80 million facility, Variety will work with a developer to build a 14-story, 112-unit residential building on its property. Thirty percent of those units will be affordable.

But Variety’s team says it’ll be worth having a new youth and community center that will serve the Astoria and Long Island City communities for generations.

Read more about Variety’s expansion proposal here.

Local author Crystal Wolfe is hosting an “Author Talk” and book signing for her book “Our Invisible Neighbors: Accounts, Causes, and Solutions” on Saturday, June 27.

She will speak at Astoria Bookshop, located at 31-29 31st Street, at 3 p.m.

Wolfe has been a champion for the homeless in the Queens community. She started a nonprofit organization, Catering for the Homeless, to connect food that otherwise be thrown away to the hungry and needy.

She documents in her book the stories of homeless individuals and delves into the root causes of the homelessness crisis. She then delves into some potential solutions to the issue.

Photo courtesy/Astoria NY Film Festival Facebook

The Astoria Film Festival is hosting its opening reception on Friday, June 8 from 8 to 10 p.m. at Zenon Taverna at 34-10 31st Avenue.

The film festival itself will be on Saturday, June 9, with screenings and filmmaker introductions at The Zukor Theater at Kaufman Astoria Studios, located at 35-11 35th Avenue.

After the screenings of the short films, the festival will host an awards ceremony at 4 p.m., followed by an after party at George’s Restaurant at 5 p.m.

Read more about the organizers of the Astoria Film Festival, including local filmmaker Marc Lyons, here.

Purchase tickets to the Astoria Film Festival here.

And to learn more about the films that will be shown, visit their website at www.astoriafilmfestival.org.

Astoria veteran Bob Murphy has been inducted into the New York State Senate Veterans Hall of Fame.

Murphy, who served in the Air Force during the Vietnam War, is the longtime president of the Immaculate Conception Youth Programs (ICYP), a local sports league for kids in Astoria.

He was chosen for the honor by State Senator Michael Gianaris.

“Bob Murphy has a lifetime of committed service to our country and our community,” Gianaris says. “I could not be prouder than to select him for the Veterans Hall of Fame.”

Murphy is a native of Sunset Park. He served in the Air Force from 1966 and 1970.

He has led ICYP since 2003.

The Astoria Restoration Association is hosting this years Astoria Spring Festival! Enjoy food, shopping, and kiddie rides all day long. There will be an opportunity to learn about Fire Safety with the FDNY team!

Vendor Space still available. For more information contact [email protected] or  call 718-444-6028

donateNYC will continue the Sustainability Spotlight Series, which is a series of events that showcase the reuse activities of several organizations in the donateNYC Partnership. The next event, which will occur on Wednesday, May 9 from 3pm-4pm, will be a tour of donateNYC Partner TDF Costume Collection.