By JOSEPH KELLARD
But Bill Cohn, a Mineola attorney representing the department store chain, said he is working to keep the hearing on the case open, forgoing an appeal to the New York State Supreme Court for the time being.
Kohl's has proposed a 14,500-square-foot addition to the north side of its 90,000-square-foot building, which requires 1,346 parking spaces. But the store can only provide 1,170 spots under the plan, since the expansion would eliminate a number of parking spaces from the existing lot. Cohn said the extension is needed mostly for additional storage and some retail space with more aisles.
The zoning board's decision comes in the wake of a meeting of Kohl's representatives and residents of Harris Drive - which runs parallel to the store's property at 3600 Long Beach Road - who oppose the plan. At a Jan. 9 hearing, board Chairman Gerald Wright told both sides that they should get together and compromise on the specifics of the proposal, and they met at the Oceanside home of Nassau County Legislator Jeff Toback (D-Oceanside), who has acted as the opposition's attorney.
Cohn said that Kohl's offered the opposition several concessions, but he said he would offer these and other "findings of fact" in a letter he is crafting to the board in an effort to keep the hearing open. "We are asking that the record remain open because it is not completed," Cohn said. He declined to tell the Herald what Kohl's concessions were.
Cohn said that the "findings of fact" had not previously been submitted to the board because the two sides could not agree on a date to meet prior to the Jan. 9 hearing. "We just weren't able to get a date with those residents," he said.
But four Harris Drive residents said that when they finally met privately with Cohn and the shopping center property owner, Jeff Serota, at Toback's house, Kohl's refused to compromise on their main concerns. The residents said they asked the store to reduce the size of its addition by 20 to 30 percent. "That was so that the wall of the building would not be right near the property lines," said resident Barry Kubit. "Immediately, they nixed the idea. Right away there wasn't a compromise."
The residents said that while Kohl's offered to plant trees along the property line that abuts the store's parking lot, the company turned down their request to install a fence along with the trees. They also said the store refused their suggestions that it relocate a noisy trash compactor at the rear of the building farther from their homes, build the extension on top of the existing building and curtail the truck traffic in the lot behind their homes.
Kohl's shares the Marshall's shopping center with Waldbaum's, Bed, Bath & Beyond, Michael's and Staples. Residents complained that traffic around the shopping center, particularly the trucks making deliveries to stores, is already heavy enough. They said they fear that the expanded store would bring more truck traffic to the neighborhood, and reduce the value of area homes.
"They weren't cooperative at all," said Ray Montemuro, a 40-year resident of Harris Drive, of the meeting with Kohl's and Serota. "They wanted it one way: their way."
Kubit said that among the other concessions he hopes Cohn will include in his letter to the zoning board are sound-proofing materials for the walls of the new building, to help absorb some of the truck and compactor noise.
The Harris Drive residents also argue that Kohl's proposal would mean a shortage of parking spaces that would force shoppers to park on the street near their homes, specifically near a pedestrian passageway that links the department store's parking lot and Lawrence Avenue at the corner of Harris Drive. Montemuro said that Kohl's customers already crowd his street with cars during routine sales days at the store.
Cohn said that if Kohl's plan were approved, Serota would close off access to the pedestrian walkway. Yet despite the congestion on their street, some residents are not keen on that idea. Kubit said that while he would like to see the walkway closed to discourage on-street customer parking, he also wants to keep it open. "It is a convenience for the community here," he said, "and we wouldn't want to alienate them. To me, closing that off would be a last resort."
Cohn has said that the Nassau County Planning Commission reviewed the application for the parking variance and had no objections to the proposed expansion. "And [the] inspector found there were hundreds of empty spots, so that the parking with the new addition will be adequate," he added.
Toback said he thinks it is a good thing that residents put so much time and effort into a case that is important to them, providing a good lesson in civic activism, but he believes this case is likely to drag on, and include a potential appeal of the zoning board's decision by Kohl's. "The board's decision is perhaps Chapter One in what may be a long process," the legislator said.
Comments about this story? JKellard@liherald.com or (516) 569-4000 ext. 287.
