Nassau BOCES voters to weigh in on $5.7M in school improvements, Seaford property purchase and Syosset sale
Nassau BOCES is seeking voter approval to make improvements to two facilities, including the Rosemary Kennedy Center in Wantagh. Credit: James Carbone
Voters will decide in a referendum next week whether Nassau BOCES can buy one property and sell another, and if the educational agency can spend millions of dollars to improve two of its facilities.
Nassau BOCES, which serves the county’s 56 school districts, will ask voters Oct. 16 to approve three projects, including the purchase of Seaman Neck Middle School in Seaford from the Levittown school district for $7.2 million.
Owning the building would provide the agency’s existing program there long-term stability and cut the $1 million rental cost it pays each year, officials said. The middle school currently serves 142 students with learning, behavioral, emotional and developmental disabilities.
The agency also intends to sell 2.7 acres of vacant land on Hasket Drive in Syosset for $6.8 million to a company known on the ballot as “150 Oak St Holding LLC.”
BOCES said the approval of the referendum will not incur additional costs for taxpayers or local school districts.
“Minimizing the cost to taxpayers has always been one of the goals of the organization,” said James Widmer, deputy superintendent of Nassau BOCES. “Selling this unused property to buy a building where we've been paying rent makes sense from a fiscal standpoint.”
Angela Marshall, a spokeswoman for Nassau BOCES, said some have asked whether the buyer of the Syosset property plans to build storage for lithium batteries.
“We want to assure people that that is not the intention of the buyer,” Marshall said.
Based on a contract BOCES has with the buyer, contingent on voter approval of the sale and other issues to be cleared, Marshall said the buyer intends to use it as a holding facility for construction materials.
“It’s basically a facility where construction and demolition materials are going to be stored, primarily concrete, rock and asphalt temporarily collected, sorted and then … disposed of offsite,” she said.
The proposed use is permitted under the property’s zoning for light industrial use, BOCES said, noting that no housing units will be built.
The third proposed project on the ballot calls for spending $5.7 million on new construction at the Rosemary Kennedy Center in Wantagh and the Jerusalem Avenue School in North Bellmore. BOCES plans to construct new entry vestibules at the two schools and build a new elevator to provide ADA-compliant access to the North Bellmore facility’s second floor.
This project will be funded by BOCES’s capital fund, which was approved as part of the agency’s budget earlier this year. The state Education Department requires voter approval when construction expands the footprint of a building, Widmer said.
Nassau Board of Cooperative Educational Services has about 2,000 students in 11 special-education programs and 2,100 students in career and technical education programs.
The vote will be held from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. at nine polling places across Nassau County. Residents of any school district in Nassau County are eligible to vote.
For more information, including polling sites, visit nassauboces.org/about-us/newsroom/public-vote.
Dandan Zou covers education for Newsday. Previously, she worked for a community newspaper in Maryland and a personal finance magazine in Washington, D.C.
