Residents organize to fight HALB developer

Raise funds to hire lawyer and experts ahead of builder’s request for zoning variance

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With developers seeking to build two 12-story luxury condominium towers at the site of the Long Beach Hebrew Academy likely to apply for a variance from the city’s Zoning Board of Appeals in the coming months, a group of residents have banded together to try to shut down the proposed project.

Long Beach Neighbors Against Overdevelopment — an organization comprising residents, building board members and civic leaders — formed last month to fight Wittek Development and Sackman Enterprises’ proposed 154-foot-tall buildings along the boardwalk at 530 W. Broadway, which is currently zoned for a maximum height of 40 feet.

Residents have cited overcrowding and limited parking as chief concerns, along with spreading the city’s emergency services too thin. But the developers included a parking garage in their plan, and told residents at a Westholme Civic Association meeting in May that such “world-class architecture” would increase property values throughout Long Beach, and that tenants of the towers would patronize local businesses and add an estimated $3 million in spending to the city each year.

Lifelong resident Dina Fiore said the new group is not opposed to smart development, and that it is concerned about bigger issues than just overcrowding and parking. The zoning board’s decision would set a precedent for the future of the city, she said, which she fears could start to look like Miami Beach.

“The people who are in this are second-, third-, fourth-generation Long Beach people,” Fiore said. “… These are people who really care about where they live.”

At various civic association meetings over the past several months, residents have voiced their opposition to the plan. But the Neighbors Against Overdevelopment have formed an organized resistance — fueled by a Facebook page and monthly meetings at Long Beach Catholic Regional School — and have raised funds to obtain legal representation in order to “build the record” with experts articulating the group’s concerns.

“To have this type of organization behind an opposition is not common,” said the group’s attorney, Charles Peknic, of Long Beach-based Peknic Peknic & Schaefer LLC. “It’s not common for a neighborhood and the neighbors to organize this effectively and this quickly.”

Former State Assemblyman Jerry Kremer, a former Long Beach resident — and a Herald columnist — who is serving as counsel to Ruskin Moscou Faltischek P.C., the Uniondale-based law firm representing the developers, said his client had not yet submitted an application for a variance. Kremer and the developers met with members of LBNAO and Peknic’s firm last week, Kremer said, and though there is a “continuing dialogue,” there has been no change in the developer’s plans.

“I think that the developers continue to try to listen to the people in the community, assuming their suggestions are fair and responsible,” Kremer said.

Last year, the zoning board approved a variance that allowed iStar Financial to move forward with a project that included 522 apartments in twin 160-foot-tall buildings on the city’s Superblock. Many residents opposed the project, and last month the Nassau County Industrial Development Agency denied iStar’s request for a 20-year, $109 million tax abatement.

LBNAO members said the zoning board’s approval of iStar’s variance spurred them to take action this time around, and Fiore said there have been an average of 175 people at the organization’s meetings.

“I do commend the residents who are deeply involved in this, and I wish that we had this type of organization when the iStar debacle started, because we were blindsided by the iStar deal,” said Sam Pinto, president of the Eastholme Civic Association. “We have to get more engaged in the development — and what some are calling overdevelopment — in town, and we have to start paying attention.”

The “organized opposition” — as Peknic called the group of residents — has sold raffle tickets to help cover its legal costs.

Along with the legal representation comes a team of experts, who plan to speak in support of the neighbors at the zoning board meeting at which Wittek Development seeks the variance, which many expect will be in September. Peknic said the experts would address the environmental impact of the project, as well as the effect it would have on emergency services and neighbors closest to the project.

“The neighbors and the citizens of Long Beach are working as hard as they can to let both the city officials and the zoning board know what they think of the project,” Peknic said. “I think that we will be presenting credible evidence for the zoning board to base its decision to deny the project, and the neighbors and myself have full confidence in the zoning board that they will do the right thing for the city of Long Beach, its infrastructure and the people who reside there.”

But Greg Kalnitsky, the city’s assistant corporation counsel, said that although he had received calls from members of the group seeking information about the proposed development, the issue can not yet be addressed. “I think it’s very premature to be talking about going to the zoning board when they haven’t even put in an application to go to the zoning board,” Kalnitsky said. “The city denied the building permit, and that’s all that’s been concretely done.”

Should a variance be applied for and granted, Peknic said, his client plans to move forward with a lawsuit.

“The zoning board is not the enemy — we don’t want to come across as being at war with them,” Fiore said. “…Hopefully, it won’t go to [a lawsuit] on either side, and we’ll be able to come to an agreement at some point in time that works for everybody.”