Letter: Reject new zoning for Islip Pines
Serota Properties proposes this 136-acre Islip Pines development for the intersection of Sunrise and Veterans Memorial highway in Holbrook. (Feb. 12, 2012) Credit: Serota Properties
As former Islip Town supervisors, we have been following the ongoing controversy over the application to change the zoning for the Serota property on Sunrise Highway ["Panel OKs Islip Pines project in Holbrook," News, July 6]. We urge its defeat.
In 1975, after more than three years of serious study and consultation with civic associations, business groups and residents, the Islip Town Master Plan for Zoning was approved unanimously by the town board. The purpose was to foster rational, sensible development and to prevent more of the hodgepodge development that occurred after World War II.
If the Serota application to rezone from industrial to mixed use were granted in its present form, it would clearly undermine the master plan, seeming only to serve to maximize the profits of the owners with little or no regard to proper planning.
We are lifelong residents of the Sayville-Bayport area, with its walkable downtown commercial districts. If granted, the Serota application would bring more traffic congestion and retail shops, which could adversely affect the viability and charm of Sayville's Main Street.
Families have moved to the South Shore for its high quality of life, and rezoning the Serota property as proposed would be an extension of the bad development to the west from which these families have been fleeing.
Peter Fox Cohalan
Frank R. Jones
Editor's note: The writers were Islip Town supervisors, respectively, from 1971 to 1979 and 1987 to 1993.
