Frank Camarano is an East Meadow Hometown Hero

Although the Hometown Heroes section of the Long Island Herald finished its run this week, the East Meadow Herald would like to recognize one more local hero who has earned much praise among the community: Frank Camarano. 

Camarano, 58, is the board chairman of the East Meadow Chamber of Commerce and a member of Kiwanis. He’s also the vice president of the Nassau Council of Chambers of Commerce.

He stores donations from Kiwanis’s food drive at Evolve Health and Fitness in East Meadow, where he’s the manager.

While his gym was closed and into its reopening in September, Camarano has been reaching out to local members of the community to ask how they were doing and if they needed any assistance or PPE.

For the fourth year, he led a holiday beautification project in which the chamber installs illuminated snowflakes on the utility poles lining East Meadow Avenue.

Camarano was born in the Bronx in 1962, but his family soon moved to Franklin Square, where his father, Frank Sr., grew up. Frank Jr. went to Villanova University, where he studied psychology, graduating in 1984. He became an electrician and stayed in the Philadelphia area for another 10 years before moving back to Franklin Square.

Frank Sr. and his partner, Mario Kokkonis, bought North Shore Fitness in Great Neck in 1994, and Frank Jr. managed it. Nine years later, they built a second location in East Meadow, at the intersection of Hempstead Turnpike and East Meadow Avenue, and Frank Jr. moved to the community.

He ran a rebar construction company by day, and worked at the gym at night. He and his father sold the Great Neck gym in 2005. Nine years later they converted the North Shore Fitness in East Meadow to a World Gym. Then, in late spring, they converted it again into Evolve Health and Fitness.