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Trump files lawsuits over Jones Beach project

BY BILL BLEYER | bill.bleyer@newsday.com

March 25, 2008

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Donald Trump went on the offensive Monday for his Jones Beach project, suing the state and accusing officials of sabotaging the project when a new parks chief took office last year.

Earlier this month, Trump had offered to redesign his Trump on the Ocean restaurant and catering hall so it would have no basement, which the state has refused to approve twice in the past four months.

Now, in two lawsuits filed Monday against two state agencies, Donald Trump and partner Steve Carl seek approval of that variance and $500 million in damages.

Trump also accuses state officials of misleading his development team about the approval process and arranging for the last-minute recusal of some members of a state review board to ensure defeat of his application. Those members, however, had voted against the project.

"They gave us a long-term lease and then they failed to honor it when a new administration came in," Trump said. "And after ... five years of studying the basement, they said 'you can't build a basement.'"

Hofstra University School of Law professor Eric Lane said it won't be easy to prove the review board acted arbitrarily. "Trump will have to establish that they denied it because it was him," Lane said. "If they don't like his alternative [for protecting against flood damage], they have no obligation whatsoever to do it."

Ronald J. Rosenberg, an attorney for Patricia Friedman, a civic activist against the $300-million project, called the suit "frivolous and without merit. They were requesting the antithesis of what the [state building] code permits."

Said Trump attorney Steven Schlesinger: "We're highly confident that we will prevail."

Schlesinger said the $500 million in damages represents increased design and construction costs and a loss of anticipated revenue to the developers over the 40-year lease.

The suits against the state Department of State and the Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation were filed in two state courts -- Supreme Court in Garden City and the Court of Claims in Albany.

Besides seeking a variance from the state building code prohibition on basements in a floodplain, the litigation asks the court to prohibit the parks department from declaring the developers in default if they don't complete construction by June 2010 as required by the lease.

State Supreme Court Justice Leonard Austin issued a temporary order that prevents the parks agency from declaring the developers in default, pending a hearing April 15.

According to the suits, Parks Commissioner Carol Ash, who took over at the beginning of last year, manipulated the process "so that she would be in a position to make radical changes or even terminate the lease entered into by the previous administration." State parks spokeswoman Eileen Larrabee said "we are reviewing the material."

The suit contends that state parks is authorized to issue its own permits and approvals, but parks officials already have released documents showing that the developers were told repeatedly that they were responsible for all necessary permits and approvals, including those from other state agencies.

The suit also addresses one of the more mysterious aspects of the state's approval process -- the unexplained recusals by three members of the board of review shortly before from the second hearing this month. "The three secret recusals ... were manipulated by DOS at the behest of state parks" to ensure that the second application would be denied, the suit claims.

Department of State spokesman Eamon Moynihan declined to comment, citing pending litigation.