IDA accepts AvalonBay application

On March 25, a year since the first hearings on the subject, the Town of Hempstead Industrial Development Agency accepted the application of developer AvalonBay Communities for a tax abatement for its proposed 349-unit apartment complex in Rockville Centre.

AvalonBay’s application would have the developer pay a PILOT (Payment in Lieu of Taxes) to the village, town, county and school district—a payment which would be less than the property taxes the developer would otherwise pay. The discussion was tabled a year ago due to opposition from the Village of Rockville Centre. But the village had withdrawn its protest of the application after it reached an agreement with AvalonBay last month.

At 10 a.m.—the scheduled time the vote was to take place—the IDA board began its talk about AvalonBay’s application. Fred Parola, the president of the IDA, informed the board that Superintendent of Rockville Centre Schools Dr. William Johnson had said he would attend the meeting to voice the school’s opposition to the amount of the PILOT (the school district felt that it should be getting more money from the PILOT). However, as the motion to accept the application was made by an IDA board member, Johnson was nowhere to be found.

At 10:08 a.m., the IDA voted to accept AvalonBay’s application. As soon as the motion passed, as if waiting for his cue to make the most dramatic entrance, Johnson entered the room. Not realizing who he was, the IDA board closed the meeting and then reopened it when Parola informed them who Johnson was, just so he could have time to voice his opinion.

Johnson’s pleas were too little, too late, though. “What I’m saying is not that a PILOT shouldn’t happen,” Johnson said, “but that the amount is way off.” Johnson had come to petition the IDA to once again delay its judgment on AvalonBay’s application so the school district could have more time to negotiate an increased payment with the developer.

“The reasons for asking for this delay are twofold,” Johnson wrote in his presentation to the IDA. “One, the school district was left out of any discussions concerning the PILOT for AvalonBay, and two, many of the facts or assumptions that appeared in documents apparently used to support this PILOT as it is currently constructed are, at the very least, disputable.”

Village Comptroller Michael Schussheim, who was present at the meeting, disagreed with Johnson. The superintendent was referring to meetings that the village privately organized with AvalonBay to discuss what was referred to as a Village Services Assistance Payment (VSAP)—a payment AvalonBay would pay to the village, in addition to the PILOT, that would equal what the village would have received from property taxes.

“The school district had every opportunity during the last year to discuss its concerns with AvalonBay directly,” Schussheim said after the meeting. “I would urge the school district, even at this late point, to contact AvalonBay directly in order to address its PILOT-funding concerns.”

Johnson’s other claim—that the development could lead to over 100 new students in the RVC schools—was also heavily debated. AvalonBay’s estimate of the number of school-aged children who would be living in the development was about 10. Johnson, however, looked at the estimated population of the development’s 159 two-bedroom units (477 people, or three per unit), and calculated that meant 159 children.

But both Michael Faltischek, the representative for AvalonBay, and the IDA itself disagreed with Johnson’s math. In their experience, both said, developments like the one AvalonBay will be building are not child-friendly and, generally, when residents have children, they move out into a house which has more room and play space.

The school district will not be left out of PILOT payments, though. It will receive $165,518 in the first two years, with incremental increases each year for the life of the PILOT—15 years. And the school district is still getting more in PILOTs than the village.

But the school district, worried that it will have an influx of students greater than what AvalonBay predicted and the IDA accepted, feels it should be getting more money from the developer. Board of Education President Mark Masin said that, even though AvalonBay’s application was accepted by the IDA, the district would continue to try to negotiate more money from the developer.

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