Residents hire lawyer to fight development

Residents of a 50-year-old mobile home park in North Amityville have hired a lawyer to help fight a new apartment and retail development that would displace them, even as a recent report says the project would uplift an unsafe area and bolster town revenue.

A draft generic environmental impact statement prepared for the developer by Nelson, Pope & Voorhis Llc of Melville says the Frontier Mobile Home Park has "unsafe, energy in-efficient, non-code-compliant housing" and cesspools that threaten groundwater.

The new development would address those concerns and "be aesthetically pleasing, while the . . . mobile park has little or no aesthetic value," the report says.

Residents are offended. They accuse the mobile home park's owner, H. Lee Blumberg, of selling them out to a developer, to avoid making town-mandated upgrades. Blumberg, an Amityville attorney, did not respond to requests for comment.

Babylon Town officials said in a statement last week that Suffolk's health department wants Blumberg to address "major health and safety problems" in the park, but that he has chosen to go the development route "rather than simply close it down and evict the residents" or make upgrades, the cost of which would be transferred to residents.

Town officials said they are working to ensure residents "are provided with a safety net and relocation services that they would not otherwise receive."

The town must approve rezoning and variances for the project, which developers hope to begin next year.

Developer R Squared Llc plans to replace the park's nearly 400 homes with 500 apartments and 45,500 square feet of retail space. R Squared, which has offices in Melville and New York, also plans to include a pool, green space and sewers on the 20-acre site. The draft environmental report suggests that increased tax, police and fire department revenue will offset having nearly twice as many residents on the property.

"Some residents would be literally pushed out onto the street because of this," said Charles Hersh, 67, who has lived in the park for 22 years. "We're trying to fight the best we can to delay this or to get compensation for our homes."

Katherine Heaviside, spokeswoman for the developer, said R Squared has no plans to compensate residents for their homes. (Mobile home park residents buy their homes but pay rent for the land on which they sit.)

R Squared has set aside 20 percent of the apartments for affordable housing and has promised park residents priority, as well as six months' credit on their rent, which is now about $635 a month.

They are also offering relocation assistance. But residents say the park's seniors, disabled and young families cannot afford the new rents. Many say their mobile homes are too old or modified to be moved.

Park resident Nelson Cortes, 48, said he has spent nearly his whole life on the Island, but the development will force his family to leave. Officials "say they want to keep people on Long Island, but they're not doing it," he said.

Recently, more than 300 of the park's 500 residents formed a civic association and hired Manhattan attorney Samuel Kramer, whose firm represents residents of a Syosset mobile home park who have battled developers since 2007.

The town has scheduled a public hearing on the report Thursday from 3:30 to 5 p.m., and then resuming at 6 p.m. Comments on the report will be accepted until Nov. 21.

Estimated changes

According to the draft environmental impact statement, the development would increase the following figures, all of which are projected.

Residents: 595 to 1,109

School-age children: 59 to 84

Total tax revenue: $592,318 to $4.3 million

School taxes: $273,914 to $2.2 million

Peak PM weekday vehicles/hour: 138 to 668

Saturday midday vehicles/hour: 95 to 738

Total water use, gallons/day: 54,208 to 118,198

Solid waste, pounds/day: 2,185 to 4,158