Activists seek to preserve Plum Island's beauty

More than 50 years of isolation has rendered Plum Island a somewhat sinister place in the public mind, the site of shadowy government experiments cut off from the North Fork by the churning waters of Plum Gut.

But plans to shut down the Plum Island Animal Disease Center have shone a new spotlight on the natural splendors of this 840-acre island, which may be sold by the federal government to help pay for construction of a bigger, more secure laboratory in Kansas.

Even as politicians fight to keep the federal animal research lab on Plum Island open, environmental advocates and some conservation agencies are lobbying to preserve the woods, wetlands and cobbled shoreline that makes up the other nine-tenths of Plum Island - land they say is a critical wildlife habitat in a region with little to spare. Those efforts have intensified in recent weeks, with some hopes buoyed by a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service letter questioning the legal basis for the sale.

Last year the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees the lab, decided to build a new facility elsewhere instead of expanding operations at Plum Island. Congress has declared the property must be sold, according to the General Services Administration, which is handling the sale. GSA is still reviewing potential environmental impacts, and no sale date or price has yet been set.

But funding for a new lab in Kansas has stalled over concerns about whether it's safe to study dangerous foreign animal diseases on the mainland. Opponents of the sale hope the delays will improve their chances of keeping Plum Island in public hands.

"The goal is to put a federal conservation mandate on the island and get out from under the prospect of looking at this like a piece of real estate," said Robert DeLuca, president of the conservation organization Group for the East End, one of dozens of groups in New York and Connecticut pushing to preserve Plum Island.

History, natural beauty

Beyond the lab buildings, and past the historic lighthouse on the island's western edge and crumbling remains of Fort Terry, which was built during the 1890s, lie rolling hills and marshes with stands of red cedar, shadbush and black tupelo. Threatened shorebirds breed on untouched beaches; a colony of bank swallows nests in the bluffs. In fall and winter, seals gather on rocky outcroppings.

"It's beautiful," said Michelle Williams, manager of the Wildlife Service's Long Island National Wildlife Refuge Complex, which consists of seven preserved sites across the Island. "With the exception of the disease center, it's a relatively untouched piece of land that provides habitat to fish and wildlife and plant communities. . . . I think it's a real special spot to preserve."

When federal land is offered for sale, agencies such as the Wildlife Service typically get first crack at the properties. Not so with Plum Island, according to the terms of a 2008 appropriations bill that linked plans for construction of a new Biosafety Level 4 lab with the sale of Plum Island if the government decided to place the facility elsewhere. A Level 4 lab is where diseases such as Ebola and anthrax, which are potentially fatal to humans, can be studied.

The agency's subsequent decision to build a new lab on the mainland in Manhattan, Kan., triggered questions about potential risks to agriculture and public safety. Funding has been put on hold pending an outside review of a DHS safety assessment. That report by the National Research Council, an arm of the National Academy of Sciences, is due out Monday.

Economic arguments

Rep. Tim Bishop (D-Southampton) says selling Plum Island makes no sense because the cost of a new facility - estimated between $700 million and $900 million - would dwarf any proceeds left over once the lab was sold and decommissioned. Bishop said the lab should be retained for government work to preserve local jobs.

Officials in the town of Southold, which controls the zoning for Plum Island, agree. Southold Supervisor Scott Russell said plans are under way for a special zoning designation that would permit research activities but safeguard the island's natural features. He said the town lacked the infrastructure to support additional residential development.

"The notion of a high-end hotel with golf course just isn't a likely scenario," Russell said. "The island, for the most part, is a de facto preserve, and we'd like to see the bulk of that remain the same."

But it remains unclear whether preservation is even an option for the GSA.

Last month, the Fish and Wildlife Service sent the agency a strongly worded letter urging it to consider "a full alternative which preserves the island as a wildlife refuge with clear limitations on the level of human use and development." Citing legal precedents, the letter said federal directives to protect a migratory bird habitat would probably carry more weight than the appropriations bill that calls for the sale.

GSA spokeswoman Cathy Menzies said the agency was reviewing the letter and will respond "as we are doing for all input received" through the environmental review process.

Conservation advocates and agencies on both sides of the Sound want GSA to conduct a full inventory of Plum Island's natural resources. They have also pressed for more detail on pollution from past military use and the lab's early days, when waste was buried or burned.

DHS officials said $8 million has already been spent to clean up dozens of sites, including buildings where hazardous waste was stored, old medical waste landfills and an underground petroleum spill of uncertain size. Contaminants fouling soil and groundwater included pesticides, petroleum, industrial solvents and lab chemicals, according to a summary.

Strategies to block sale

While they wait, preservationists are also testing legal and legislative strategies to block the island's sale. Among them: amending federal laws that protect Long Island Sound so that any transfer of the land must take into account its ecological and cultural value.

"I don't think there's much local support for selling the island," said Randall Parsons, a conservation finance and policy adviser to the Nature Conservancy. "When you put that together with the Fish and Wildlife Service's interest and the grassroots feeling - it seems like it may take a long time - but I really think the perspective we're promoting will prevail eventually."