About The Future of Long Island

For Newsday’s Long Island at the Crossroads series in 1978, a range of experts and other residents put forward solutions to some of Long Island’s biggest challenges. Here’s a look at them, and how they worked out.

GOVERNMENT

1978 IDEA: Eliminate unnecessary layers and waste among the Island's 666 government entities and special districts
STATUS NOW: Long Island still has more than 300 special taxing districts for garbage, water and other services in addition to other levels of village, town and county governments.

1978 IDEA: Create a separate federal judiciary district for Long Island.
STATUS NOW: The region still shares a district with New York City but now has a federal courthouse in Central Islip.

1978 IDEA: Consider a regional government or agencies to handle Islandwide problems such as economic development, jobs creation or pollution control.
STATUS NOW: Few examples exist beyond the Suffolk County Water Authority and the Pine Barrens Commission, which makes decisions on development in more than 100,000 acres of woods above aquifers that supply the region’s drinking water.

EDUCATION

1978 IDEA: Save money by consolidating some school district functions among Long Island’s more than 130 districts.
STATUS NOW: There are 124 public school districts now. The regional BOCES districts share a number of functions; other districts have combined some purchasing but the overall savings are small.

1978 IDEA: Develop high-tech complexes for research and jobs at Stony Brook University, Brookhaven National Laboratory and Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory.
STATUS NOW: Local incubators include Stony Brook University’s Long Island High Technology Incubator and the Broad Hollow Bioscience Park at Farmingdale State College, where anchor tenant OSI Pharmaceuticals left last year. An Advanced Energy Research & Technology Center is being built at Stony Brook. Hi-tech manufacturing jobs on Long Island:
1980: 36,000
2007: 52,000

TRANSPORTATION

1978 IDEA: Expand service to make Islip-MacArthur the primary local airport. At the time commercial traffic there was mainly 12- or 20-seat commuter planes, with a handful of jetliners. Then, 250,000 passengers flew out of the airport each year.
STATUS NOW: Long Island Mac Arthur Airport offers service on Southwest Airlines and US Airways. The airport now sees 30 jetliner departures per day. Last year, 1.95 million passengers flew out of MacArthur.
1978 IDEA: Ease truck traffic burden by developing "piggyback" rail freight service. At that time, 106,600 vehicles traveled on the Long Island Expressway on an average day.
STATUS NOW: Proposed rail-to-truck intermodal facilities proposed, but generally resisted by host communities. In 2009, 170,000 vehicles used the LIE on an average day.
1978 IDEA: Remove transportation "dead-end" by building bridge to Connecticut and developing a nearby deepwater seaport
STATUS NOW: Bridge idea failed to take hold, and a later proposal for a tunnel to Westchester has not yet gained traction. Port idea unrealized.

ENERGY/ENVIRONMENT

1978 IDEA: Produce energy with solar panels, waste-to-energy facilities and safe nuclear plants. In 1980, average LILCO bill, $49.06, or $142.56 adjusted for inflation, according to LIPA.
STATUS NOW: Solar is established on a small-scale with bigger projects in the works; Covanta and the Town of Islip want to expand their incinerators. But nuclear power has been out of the picture since the Shoreham plant was shut in the 1980s. In 2010, average monthly LIPA bill was $156.86
1978 IDEA: Preserve groundwater supply by recycling water; use heated water from power plant cooling systems for aquaculture of oysters and clams. Hard clam harvest in 1976, more than 700,000 bushels.
STATUS NOW: Many small sewage treatment plants discharge effluent to groundwater; hot water aquaculture plan no longer in vogue.

HOUSING

1978 IDEA: Legalize some illegal rentals to provide affordable housing for the young and seniors
STATUS NOW: Most Long Island towns have legalized some form of accessory apartments but illegal units still persist
1978 IDEA: Build more rental units and mid-rise apartments in downtown areas. Number of renter-occupied housing units in 1980: 166,906, or about 20 percent of all occupied housing.
STATUS NOW: Some have been built and more are planned. Renter-occupied housing units in 2008: 156,781, or 17 percent of all occupied housing. Rentals may have dropped because of the government-led push for home ownership, especially in the past 15 years, said Seth Forman, chief planner with the Long Island Regional Planning Council.

TAXES

1978 IDEA: Reduce property taxes, possibly by exempting a portion of house assessments or imposing a legal limit on government tax increases
STATUS NOW: Long Island remains more reliant on property taxes for revenue than the rest of the state, according to the Long Island Index, a study of Long Island trends, published annually by the Rauch Institute. Property-tax relief efforts like the state's STAR program have done little to reduce the local burden because taxes here are so high.

QUALITY OF LIFE

1978 IDEA: Encourage development of sophisticated emergency medical services and private health care maintenance organizations.
STATUS NOW: Among Long Island's many hospital emergency departments, three now are certified as regional trauma centers, offering the a more sophisticated level of emergency care. That designation was not used here in 1978. Those centers are Stony Brook University Medical Center in Suffolk and in Nassau, North Shore University Hospital in Manhasset and Nassau University Medical Center. Changes in health industry mean that most hospitals are part of larger systems.
1978 IDEA: Preserve and improve parks, beaches and other natural or recreational assets. Acres of open space preserved in Nassau and Suffolk as of 1978: 1,450 (all in Suffolk)
STATUS NOW: The amount of parkland has increased but money to maintain these areas waxes and wanes with economy. Acres of open space preserved as of 2008: about 60,000.

IDENTITY

1978 IDEA: Form a regional leadership structure with people from government, business, media and the arts
STATUS NOW: Regional groups still largely segmented by focus: business, government, culture, etc.
1978 IDEA: Develop "Long Island" consciousness by teaching local history in schools, branding "LI" sports teams and institutions and promoting regional tourism
STATUS NOW: We have the Long Island Ducks and the Islanders hockey team; the Long Island Convention and Visitors Bureau actively promotes the area as a destination

CULTURE

1978 IDEA: Develop a centrally located regional arts center, with performance spaces both large and small.
STATUS NOW: The Staller Center for the Arts at SUNY Stony Brook opened in 1978; Others include Tilles Center in Brookville, home to the Long Island Philharmonic; the Westhampton Beach Performing Arts Center. Museum Row in converted hangers across from Mitchell Field in Garden City now house The Long Island Children's Museum, the Cradle of Aviation, The Nassau County Firefighters Museum and Education Center, and the historic Nunley's Carousel.
SOURCES: New York State Department of Transportation; New York State Department of Environmental Conservation; Nassau-Suffolk Hospital Council; 2008 American Community Survey; U.S. Census; Long Island Pine Barrens Society; Town of Islip; Long Island Regional Planning Council