By: JOSEPH KELLARD
Blue Island Development LLC, a Babylon-based firm, seeks to build a 98-unit condo complex on 11.6 acres of petroleum-contaminated waterfront property in the southeast section of Harbor Isle in Island Park. At the public hearing before the Hempstead Town Council to discuss rezoning the proposed property from commercial to residential, several residents suggested striking a compromise with Blue Island, asking that it build single-family, cape-like homes instead. Other residents rejected this compromise, saying they wanted no development, or that they feared the developer might walk away and leave the property in its long-vacant, contaminated state.
In July 2000, Michael Posillico, managing partner of Blue Island, purchased the property, which had been in the hands of Cibro Oil Treatment for more than 40 years until the company went bankrupt in the mid-1980s. Cibro was thereafter excluded from cleaning up the polluted site, a responsibility left for the next landowner. Blue Island vowed to complete the work when it bought the site.
The proposed 98 units -- which would feature 31 boat slips (for condo owners only) and 172 parking spaces -- are expected to each fetch $399,000 to $1 million. Based on trends among buyers of Long Island condos, Blue Island estimates that 70 percent of the condos could be filled by "empty nesters" and 30 percent by young professional couples.
At last Tuesday's hearing, Councilman Anthony Santino questioned Blue Island about 32 of its units that would feature three bedrooms, which would attract families with school-aged children, he said. Santino said every child that moves into the development would raise school taxes for Island Park residents.
Blue Island's attorney, Wayne Edwards, said his client projects that 22 children would live at the condos, and that the people the firm expects to move in often turn the third bedroom into a guest room or study. He added that the new residents would add to the school tax base.
Blue Island expects that the condos would take two years to build after it completed a five-phase, year-long cleanup of the site, two-thirds of which is contaminated with petroleum. The firm emphasized that it had experience in cleaning up and developing similar sites, one being a 22-unit condo complex on three acres of waterfront property once soaked with petroleum in Babylon.
Many of the residents who spoke before the board expressed concern that the 98-unit complex would create an undue burden on Harbor Isle, an island with 420 houses and two narrow, bridged roadways for entering and exiting the area. They echoed one another in their comments on how they either moved to or remain in Harbor Isle because it is a quiet, lightly trafficked community where their children can play on the streets with few worries about cars.
"Adding 98 units is going to overwhelm our neighborhood," said Kathy Hillman, a Harbor Isle resident.
Blue Island's traffic engineer, Kerry Collins, testified that during morning and evening peak hours the condos would generate an average of 50 vehicles, as opposed to 50 trucks each peak hour that a commercial business would likely generate.
Residents expressed concern that the condo's increased traffic would mean more hazardous streets for their kids. Other residents said it would add burdens to areas throughout Island Park, namely Austin Boulevard and the train station, that are already short of parking. Others pointed out that given the incomes of residents able to buy the condos, most of them would likely own two cars, and that 172 spaces are not enough.
Resident Tammy Marino was the voice of compromise, as other residents conceded that Posillico had a right to build and make a profit, but they preferred that he build single-family homes instead.
"If a compromise is to be a successful one," Marino said, "those residents that are demanding single-family homes may not get that demand answered, but their needs and concerns should be satisfied somehow. And Blue Island may not get 98 townhouses, but it needs to be satisfied as well."
"The community wants single-family homes," Hillman said, to much applause from the audience.
But the Harbor Isle community also consists of residents who, even if not necessarily in support of the condos, want development there nevertheless. "Yes, I'd like to have single-family homes, too," said one resident, "but we have someone offering us condos, and that's better than commercial properties. What if [Blue Island] walks away from the project?"
Said another resident to loud applause, "I see no problem with building the condos. I'd rather have them than an industrial use."
A man who lives next to the vacant property said that for years he has seen young people use the vacant area to drink, take drugs and have sex, and vagrants set up tents there. "A lot of people here tonight don't live near the site like I do and have to put up with what I have to see," he said. "So, I'm happy that we have an individual here who wants to develop."
The issue to rezone the former Cibro property is presently before the board, but a town spokesperson was unable to speculate on when a decision would be made.
