Where Island Park's nightlife once thrived, $45M luxury housing rises in a flood zone

John Vitale felt overwhelmed as he surveyed the wreckage Superstorm Sandy had wrought on the portfolio of restaurants and bars he spent decades building in the Barnum Island section of Island Park. 

At Paddy McGees, the waterfront restaurant he named in tribute to his grandfather, windows were blown out, furniture destroyed and part of its deck was swept onto Austin Boulevard in the aftermath of the October 2012 storm. 

In the months that followed, Vitale chose a new direction for the roughly 10 acres he owned in the area: waterfront housing to replace the bars and nightclubs that once hosted a generation of partiers.

“I thought it would be a better business model, and I wasn’t going to rebuild restaurants from scratch [in] essentially a seasonal neighborhood,” said Vitale, who is 71. “I knew Island Park had a need for it.”

Now, Vitale has increased his investment, making a $45 million bet that affluent renters will flock to the developer’s latest project — The Bridgeview, a 117-unit luxury building on the former site of catering hall Bridgeview Yacht Club.  It follows the Channel Club, a rental building on the former Paddy McGees site, which was fully leased within six months of its 2019 opening.

Local officials have backed Vitale’s vision with millions in tax incentives aimed at creating new housing and mitigating future flood risk. But environmental experts question the wisdom of significant public and private investment in a flood-prone area. Vitale’s transformation of the former South Shore nightlife hot spot to a cluster of luxury rentals raises a complex question: How much should communities invest privately and through public subsidies to build housing on land prone to flooding?

“You're almost welcoming heartbreak when you intensify land use in a known flood zone,” said Richard Murdocco, an adjunct professor in environmental policy and planning at Stony Brook University.

There's also the question of affordability — one-bedrooms will start at $3,500 and two-bedrooms will average $4,300, according to preliminary estimates. For Richard Schurin, 59, an Island Park resident for 25 years, that won't deliver the type of housing he believes Island Park needs for young people, such as his two sons in their 20s.

“They couldn’t afford a $4,000-a-month apartment, and the apartments are not designed to keep them in the community,” said Schurin, a member of the Island Park Civic Association. “It’s really designed for the wealthier people. … There’s tons of these rental developments, and they’re all intended for people who are selling their houses, who have a lot of wealth and who want to stay in the area.”

But Vitale said the prices reflect the cost of construction and he expects to have plenty of willing renters when the apartments open next fall, capping his more than a decade spent reinventing the waterfront in Island Park. 

"I envision Island Park heading in the right direction," he said. 

Partiers’ haven

The Bridgeview is rising fast beside the Long Beach Bridge. In late November, construction crews were busy framing the building’s second and third floors. When it opens, the new building will offer renters a heated pool with a sun deck and an outdoor lounge with barbecue grills and TVs.

For Robin Levine, 70, the new luxury buildings are a major change from the industrial neighborhood she used to travel to with friends in the 1980s. She remembers watching droves of people arrive by land and by sea to the Channel 80 nightclub to dance and mingle. She notices fewer options for docking-and-dining on Long Island these days.

“It’s sad to see Long Island changing into a whole bunch of development places even though it will probably be better for the neighborhood,” said Levine, who now lives in Glen Cove.

Vitale shares her love of waterfront dining but said Sandy and the floods that followed, as well as sky-high insurance costs, spelled the end for his popular restaurants and bars Paddy McGees, Coyote Grill, and last year, the Bridgeview Yacht Club catering hall. Jordan Lobster Farms, which Vitale co-owns, is his lone restaurant that remains. 

Vitale, who grew up in Elmont, opened Paddy McGees in 1985, naming it for his grandfather Anthony LaRocca, who picked up the nickname Paddy McGee from an Irish coworker at Fulton Fish Market in lower Manhattan.

At its peak in the 1980s and ’90s, the area’s bars, nightclubs and restaurants could draw up to 4,000 people on a weekend. The season kicked off on St. Patrick’s Day and lasted until it was too cold to drink and dance outdoors.

Now, Vitale hopes to bring new residents to the area, including young professionals and retirees seeking to downsize from houses.

To address the flood risk, the developer raised the site to about 7 feet above sea level and will keep all mechanical equipment about 12 feet above sea level. Residents will live 20 feet above sea level. The Bridgeview's lobby will be equipped with flood vents, and a transformer that can operate while submerged will power the building. 

The developer has taken the right steps to  mitigate  the building's risk but municipalities should consider what areas are best suited to development when they incentivize new construction, said Robert Freudenberg, vice president of energy and environmental programs at the Regional Plan Association. 

“This is a place that floods frequently and more frequently as time goes on," he said. "At an entire municipality level, I think the question has to be, what’s the long-term plan for Island Park?”

The Bridgeview is on Barnum Island, an unincorporated part of Island Park within the Town of Hempstead. Hempstead Town Supervisor John Ferretti and Island Park Mayor Michael G. McGinty, who presides over the neighboring incorporated village, did not respond to requests for comment. 

The Vitales aren't alone in seeking to capitalize on water views.

B2K Development recently built apartments and luxury condos facing the ocean at The Breeze and The Boardwalk in Long Beach; The Beechwood Organization opened condos at Marina Pointe in East Rockaway in 2019; and on the other side of Island Park, Avalon Communities opened Avalon Harbor Isle in 2022.

Dylan Vitale, 38, John’s son and a partner in Vitale Properties, said the development’s new bulkhead and mitigation measures will protect residents from floods that could inundate other homes in Island Park.

“Everyone who's going to be living there will already be a story above any other ground floor type of residence,” he said.

He said their work has already been validated by FEMA’s National Flood Insurance Program, which lowered its cost for flood insurance by about 90% at The Channel Club apartments compared with the roughly $100,000 in premiums it paid at Paddy McGees.

“We took a lot of measures to be storm resilient,” Dylan Vitale said.

But some locals have broader concerns about if tax breaks for luxury housing are warranted in Island Park.

Town support

The area holds special meaning for Schurin, the concerned Island Park resident. He met his wife at Channel 80 and attended many weddings and bar mitzvahs at  the Bridgeview Yacht Club catering hall over the years.

While he appreciates the Vitales’ commitment to the area, Schurin said he doesn't believe the Town of Hempstead should have granted tax breaks to the project through a payment in lieu of taxes agreement. He said the property tax savings deal isn't warranted given the proven success of Vitale's neighboring Channel Club apartments.

"There’s no risk. He’s building the same thing," Schurin said. "He doesn’t need a PILOT in my opinion.”

In 2023, the Town of Hempstead Industrial Development Agency awarded the developer a nearly $335,000 mortgage recording tax exemption and a nearly $2.2 million sales tax exemption for The Bridgeview apartment project . The developer also entered a 20-year PILOT agreement, in which the property owner will pay an average of nearly $462,000 a year in lieu of taxes, or more than four times the former catering hall's tax bill of about $112,000. That’s an average of $3,945 per unit. 

In the 19th year of the agreement, The Bridgeview will pay $1 million in PILOT payments, or about 10 times what the catering hall paid, John Vitale said. That will generate additional tax revenue for the town and schools, he said. Without those benefits, the project would not be feasible, he said, because his company would owe hundreds of thousands in tax payments for years before tenants begin paying rent.

“Without an IDA, none of these projects would be built,” John Vitale said, citing the cost of construction and the need to gradually ramp up fees while the development is built and leased. “They would just make no economic sense.”

Glenn Ingoglia, an Island Park attorney and former president of its chamber of commerce, said the apartments are appealing for homeowners who want to downsize without leaving the area.

“It’s definitely something I would consider in the future,” said Ingoglia, who decades ago worked as a clam shucker at Paddy McGees and as a cook at the Bridgeview Yacht Club. “It’s taxing on a homeowner when you own a house, just fixing everything. You’re never done.”

Michael Scully, a real estate broker at Century 21 Scully Realty in Island Park, said while he's sad Island Park has lost the club as a gathering place for celebrations, he’s glad the area is moving forward more than a decade after Sandy.

“People are investing in the community rather than leaving it,” he said.

But the threat of flooding will remain. Dylan Vitale said property management will alert residents to potential storms that could cause street flooding in case they want to move their cars. So far, it has only had to do so as a precaution for The Channel Club once or twice in six years. 

Even after Sandy and years of smaller floods, John Vitale said selling was never an option. He had invested too much acquiring the properties and building the shopping center, he said, to hand off the waterfront to another developer.

“I wasn’t going to let somebody else build my dream,” he said.