Thursday, October 1, 2026
It’s been eight years since developers Efrem Gerszberg and Robert Weiss purchased the Woodmere Club, sparking controversy and a series of lawsuits. Now the expensive legal battle will continue, over the 120-acre property.
Gerszberg and Weiss purchased the then 109-year-old club for over $9 million in 2017, and assumed its nearly $15 million in debt.
Last June, Gerszberg and Weiss made an alternative proposal from the original 284-single family home plan. The current alternative plan includes 160 age-restricted condominiums that lays within the portion of the property in the Village of Woodsburgh, and the dedication of property to the Town of Hempstead to create a turning lane on Broadway and a sidewalk on Meadow Drive as well as a 75-foot landscape buffer and a 300-foot setback off Broadway. The new plan that was approved by the Five Towns Civic Association, Woodsburgh Mayor Jake Harman and Lawrence Mayor Samuel Nahmias.
“The Town [of Hempstead] has not taken any official action to either approve or disapprove the 160-unit-age-restricted condominium plan, because no formal application for any such plan has ever come before the Town Board,” Town officials said in a statement. “As this is the subject of a litigation, the Town cannot comment further on the matter.”
The current plan also includes, fifty acres of club property would become a conservation alliance, where development would be prohibited.
Operational control of the club would be transferred to Woodsburgh, and a 50-foot-wide buffer space of adjoining property would be turned over to some of the club’s neighboring communities.
The plan received overwhelming public support, and prospective buyers were already lining up to reserve condos, according to the developers.
“The Five Towns asked for open space and no single family homes,” Weiss wrote in an email. “We presented a beautiful age restricted condo plan that would provide 80 acres of open space dedicated to the community.”
“Just as important, the alternative plan would settle our seven year long lawsuit and save Five Towns residents from a possible tax increase disaster,” Weiss wrote. “Even with unanimous support from the Lawrence and Woodsburgh Mayors and residents, Hempstead politicians rejected the deal. We did our part.”
The owners are pressing forward with a $300 million lawsuit against the town, and aim to restore their property rights in order to follow through on their original proposal, made in 2019, to build 284 homes on the property.
“The prospective development of any portion of the property where the Woodmere Club is located is the subject of a genuine commitment on the part of local villages and the Town of Hempstead to the best interests of neighbors in surrounding communities and the minimalization of short-term disruptions and long-term traffic and other community impacts,” Nahmias wrote in an email.
U.S. District Judge Allyne R. Ross is hearing the developers’ lawsuit against the town, in a case that has already survived a motion to dismiss.
“My support for the 160-unit-age-restricted condominium plan is rooted in the feedback of constituents who have overwhelmingly indicated a preference for this plan as opposed to other alternatives which have advanced,” Nahmias wrote. “Residents have clearly indicated to me and other village officials that the ‘condominium plan’ is preferred because they believe that it will have fewer adverse impacts on the community in both the long and short term.”
According to the developers, Nassau County has been added to the lawsuit, with the approval of the villages of Woodsburgh and Lawrence, as well as an order from Ross.
“The fact is, on November 30th 2024, the Mayors of Woodsburgh, Lawrence and the developers met in person with Hempstead leadership and in formal settlement discussions presented the 80 acre open space & age restricted condo plan,” Weiss wrote. “Despite both Mayors advocating for a settlement, Hempstead has gone radio silent which can only be seen as a clear rejection of the plan and the desire to litigate. The public will not be fooled with the ’misinformation’ cliché.”
This story has been revised from the version in the March 27 Nassau Herald.
Have an opinion on the Woodmere Club situation? Send a letter to
mberman@liherald.com.
