Glen Cove City Council to meet over group home proposal

The Glen Cove City Council will hold a special meeting next Tuesday to consider a controversial proposal to open a residence for people with eating disorders in an upscale neighborhood across from the Nassau Country Club.

Mayor Timothy Tenke announced the special session — which will begin at 6 p.m. at City Hall — during the regular council meeting Tuesday night.

Tenke said after the meeting he has yet to decide how he’ll vote on the proposal and would discuss the matter with council members in the next week.

Monte Nido & Affiliates, based in the Southern California beach city of Malibu, submitted an application to Glen Cove to open the residence in a three-story, Colonial-style house the company is under contract to buy for more than $2 million.

Residents opposed to the plan said at a four-hour public hearing Feb. 7 that the facility could reduce property values, would lead to increased traffic, and would be out of character in a residential neighborhood with historic homes, especially with the 10 to 12 parking spaces Monte Nido plans to add on the 1.26-acre property.

Monte Nido representatives pointed to studies elsewhere that have shown such group homes do not depress housing values. Clients of the residence would not have cars on-site and staff would arrive at staggered times, the representatives said, adding that vegetation would shield the parking spaces from public view.

Two Nassau County women recovering from eating disorders and three experts on the afflictions spoke at the hearing. They urged the council to approve the application because of the intense need for a residential facility on Long Island for those with disorders such as anorexia nervosa, bulimia and binge eating.

The only residential facility in the state for adults with eating disorders is a 14-bed Monte Nido house in Irvington in Westchester County. The Glen Cove residence also would serve up to 14 people.

Monte Nido attorney Kathleen Deegan Dickson has said the proposed residence is covered under the 1978 state Padavan law, which limits a municipality’s ability to bar some types of group homes. If the city tries to block the proposal, Monte Nido could appeal to the state, she said.