LI briefs: Hearing on Middle Island housing project set for Wednesday

MIDDLE ISLAND
Hearing on housing project set for Wednesday

A temporary restraining order blocking construction of a Middle Island development aimed at providing low-cost housing for veterans remains in effect after a hearing that had been scheduled for Friday in Riverhead was postponed, officials said.

Arguments are scheduled to be heard Wednesday before State Supreme Court Justice W. Gerard Asher. He had granted the injunction last month at the request of the Pine Barrens Society of Long Island.

Developer Concern for Independent Living plans to build a 123-unit housing development on Middle Country Road, with up to 60 units set aside for veterans.

Pine Barrens Society officials have sued Concern for Independent Living and the Town of Brookhaven to stop the project. The society claims the town improperly used the approval from a previous project at the location to authorize the housing development.

Town officials have denied they did anything improper.

The society also has said the project should not be built because it is within the state-protected Pine Barrens region. Town officials also deny that claim.
-- CARL MACGOWAN

PORT WASHINGTON
Bench to honor mother lost to cancer

A commemorative bench honoring Lori Schiffer, a young mother who died of breast cancer at age 36, has been approved by the Town of North Hempstead board for placement in Merriman Park on Pine Street in Port Washington.

The bench, which will bear Schiffer's name on a 3-by-8-inch plaque, was approved by a unanimous vote at last Tuesday night's meeting. It is expected to be installed in the park in the spring.

Schiffer, an intellectual property attorney and mother of two boys, Jonah, and Nathan, died on May 14, 2013.

"I appreciate everyone going through these efforts -- especially for the boys who were so young when their mother passed away," Schiffer's husband of seven years, Michael, said in a telephone interview last week. "It will be something solid they can hold on to."

North Hempstead residents who want to remember someone with some sort of special connection to one of town's parks can apply to the parks and recreation department, according to department consultant, Jerry Olsen.

Michael Schiffer, an advertising and media attorney, said that a group of his wife's friends from the area had the idea for the bench.

He said his wife Lori enjoyed Merriman Park, a five-minute drive from their house.

"She grew up in the Flower Hill area between Manhasset and Port Washington, and we moved to a house near where she grew up," Michael Schiffer explained. "The kids were taught to ride bikes there."

After his wife took a leave from work after learning she had cancer, she found a support system at Merriman, he said.

"She met a lot of great people there who were helpful to us through her sickness and even helpful to me [now]," Schiffer said. "We continue to take our kids there and continue to meet up there."

"It's [the tribute is] very moving and touching to me," said Lori Schiffer's mother, Helen Goldstein, in a telephone interview last week. The Flower Hill resident added, "Lori was heroic, a terrific mother, daughter, attorney and community member -- she was all of that."

Olsen said applicants for commemorative benches pay $1,100 for the recycled plastic and iron benches if they are approved by the board.

There are about a dozen memorial benches throughout the town's parks.
-- LISA IRIZARRY

RIVERHEAD
Lease in the works to build solar farm

Riverhead officials say they hope to soon negotiate a lease with a company recently approved to build a 50- to 60-acre solar farm at the town-owned Enterprise Park at Calverton.

The Long Island Power Authority last month greenlighted a proposal by Nashville-based Hecate Energy LLC to build a 7.5-megawatt solar-energy array at the site.

Riverhead officials had been counting on the project to help plug a budget hole this year and to anchor a 94-acre energy park envisioned for Enterprise Park at Calverton, or EPCAL, the 2,900-acre industrial site the town is seeking to develop.

"This is a solid base hit," Supervisor Sean Walter said of the approval in a phone interview last month. "The town has been trying to do something with the remaining property at EPCAL for a long time."

Walter said he hopes to negotiate a lease within six months. Riverhead's 2015 budget was balanced, in part, with $500,000 in hoped-for revenue from the project.

Councilman George Gabrielsen, who has spearheaded the town board's effort to develop an energy park at EPCAL, said he could not discuss lease negotiations because of a confidentiality agreement with the company, but said it improves the town's budget prospects.

"It's definitely a big relief," Gabrielsen said.

Hecate did not respond to an email requesting comment.
-- WILL JAMES

Treated wastewater going to golf course

Suffolk County plans to use treated wastewater from a Riverhead sewage plant to water the county-owned Indian Island Golf Course.

County officials announced the program Thursday, saying it will conserve water and reduce the flow of nitrogen into the Peconic Estuary.

Suffolk Legis. Al Krupski (D-Cutchogue) said in a statement that the project is "the first of its kind in Suffolk County" and will use "reusable, safe wastewater."

County Executive Steve Bellone said the program "is another example of County and local government coming together to help preserve the Peconic Estuary."

Suffolk officials said it will also reduce the amount of water the county needs to tap from Long Island's aquifer.

Beginning next year, the Riverhead Sewer District plant, located next to the golf course, will pump 350,000 gallons of water per day -- almost half the daily volume treated by the plant -- into the course's irrigation system during months when the course is watered.

Sewer District Superintendent Michael Reichel said the wastewater will be treated "to the limits of technology" and be "better than the water they're pumping from the ground." He said municipalities often reuse wastewater in arid states, but the practice is rare in New York.

The infrastructure needed for the irrigation program is part of a $24 million upgrade of the plant expected to be complete next year, Reichel said.

Scientists in recent years have blamed nitrogen pollution from human waste for causing algal blooms harming Long Island's marine ecosystems. The Riverhead plant empties into the Peconic River, which is on the state's list of impaired water bodies due to nitrogen pollution and low oxygen levels.
-- WILL JAMES

MOUNT SINAI
New drop-off spot for clothing donations

A Mount Sinai recreation center has been added to a list of locations where Brookhaven Town residents can donate clothing for needy adults and children.

The town Youth Bureau will collect coats, scarves, hats and gloves at the Rose Caracappa Senior Center, 739 Rte. 25A, town officials said Friday. Clothes will be collected through Feb. 13.

Town officials had previously announced that clothes could be donated at four other sites: Brookhaven Town Hall, 1 Independence Hill, Farmingville; Brookhaven Town Highway Department, 1140 Old Town Rd., Coram; Henrietta Acampora Recreation Center, 39 Montauk Hwy., Blue Point; and New Village Recreation Center, 20 Wireless Rd., Centereach.

For more information, call 631-451-8696 or 631-451-8011.
-- CARL MACGOWAN

LONG BEACH
Report due on city emergency services

Long Beach officials will hold a special meeting Tuesday to release a report on the city's emergency services.

The city manager's office paid $55,000 for the Washington, D.C.-based ICMA Center for Public Safety Management to study the most efficient way to handle emergency services while the city is without a hospital.

Consultants will present options for the city to improve response times and best use emergency equipment and facilities after the Long Beach Medical Center closed because of flooding from superstorm Sandy.

The study was completed by the ICMA, which conducts consultations and training to more than 9,000 local government officials across the world.

The meeting is set for 7 p.m. on the 6th floor of City Hall, 1 W. Chester St.
-- JOHN ASBURY