LI town proposes developers pay for schooling kids

Daily Point

Huntington seeks to give school districts a financial boost from new housing proposals

Huntington Town is looking to codify an unusual arrangement that would require any proposed mixed-use development that includes housing and receives a payment in lieu of taxes, or PILOT, to develop a separate financial arrangement — which would come on top of any PILOT with the school district — an arrangement that would "provide funding ... based on the financial cost of providing educational services to the additional public-school students generated by the project."

Initially, town officials had hoped to make the law townwide, applying to any development of any size that includes housing. But earlier this month, they revised the proposed law change to apply — for now — only to the Melville Town Center Overlay District, the new zone that covers a wide swath of land south of the Long Island Expressway and east of Route 110.

But Councilman Dave Bennardo told The Point Tuesday that he hopes the effort will soon expand to again cover the entire town.

"That would be my goal," he said. "Let's see how it works. Let's live with it for a development or two."

The legislation, which is slated for a public hearing at the town board's July 14 meeting and likely will be voted on at a separate meeting after that, emerged after a deal came together between Steel Equities and the Half Hollow Hills school district before the town board's approval of Steel Equities' $130 million Melville Crossing development, which is planned for the corner of Corporate Center Drive and Maxess Road.

That individual deal led Bennardo to seek a way to require such an arrangement on a broader basis.

The proposal, which may be the first of its kind across Long Island, gives developers and school district officials the opportunity to come to an agreement on their own, but if they don't within 60 days, the legislation holds developers to a financial arrangement formula in order to gain site plan and other approvals from the town board.

The formula includes a per-unit price, based on the length of the PILOT and the size of the apartments, ranging from $0 for a studio apartment in a five-year PILOT to $3,500 for a three-bedroom in a 20-year PILOT. Installments would be paid annually, on an escalating basis, Bennardo said.

The payments are meant to compensate the districts for new students, he said, arguing that the existing school aid formula does not properly account for added enrollment.

But the town already is facing pushback on its proposal, particularly from business and development groups, including the Long Island Builders Institute and the Association for a Better Long Island.

In a letter earlier this month, LIBI chief executive Michael Florio and ABLI executive director Kyle Strober pointed to broad school enrollment declines. A recent analysis by The Point showed that the Half Hollow Hills district experienced a 15.2% decline in enrollment over the last decade. 

"This resolution would be worthy of consideration if not for the fact that data shows most mixed-use development projects generate very few additional students and local school districts are experiencing continually declining enrollments," Strober and Florio wrote.

Strober and Florio also cited other concerns, including questioning whether the Huntington proposal was legal under state law, which regulates PILOT agreements made with industrial development agencies.

"We believe that passing such a law will drastically reduce much needed housing projects in the Town of Huntington and does not conform with NYS law," they wrote.

Bennardo told The Point that he does not think the proposal will limit development opportunities in the new overlay zone, though he said it might limit which builders choose to work in the Melville corridor.

"It'll bring us the most responsible community-minded developers," Bennardo said. "It's a natural filter."

And Bennardo, a former schools superintendent and principal, said the proposal was worth a potential legal challenge.

"If taking care of kids in communities is an issue, I'm happy to talk to the state or the courts about it. To me, you don't retreat from a good idea just because someone hints that it might end up in court. That's why they make courtrooms," Bennardo said. "I think we're on the side of the angels on this one."

— Randi F. Marshall randi.marshall@newsday.com

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Final Point

Will Trump's double endorsement in CD3 matter?

For a second time, President Donald Trump waded into the New York CD3 Republican primary to back Mike LiPetri, a former state assemblyman, over Greg Hach, an Air Force veteran and attorney.

Monday night, Trump posted on Truth Social that he was once more urging Republicans to vote for LiPetri in Tuesday's primary. The post appeared between posts railing against The New York Times, praising his winning pick in Colombia's presidential election, and bashing a "crazy pro-algae (likely paid) protestor" wearing a pink frog costume outside the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.

Trump's full-throated and lengthy endorsement of LiPetri doesn't mention Hach. Instead, Trump lambasts incumbent Democratic Rep. Tom Suozzi as a "Radical Left Lunatic, who wants Open Borders, Men playing in Women's Sports, Transgender for Everyone, Defund the Police, and your Guns, forget about them, he wants to take them away ..."

LiPetri, though, according to Trump, will "Grow our Economy, Advance American Energy DOMINANCE, Cut Taxes and Regulations, Promote MADE IN THE U.S.A., Keep our Border SECURE, Stop Migrant Crime, Ensure LAW AND ORDER, Support our Military, Veterans, and Police, Defend our always under siege Second Amendment, and Ensure PEACE THROUGH STRENGTH."

And as with all Trump-backed candidates, LiPetri "WILL NEVER LET YOU DOWN!" the post concludes.

Keep in mind that Trump has already endorsed LiPetri, back in February, a point LiPetri doesn't fail to mention in social media posts and political ads.

So, could Trump's 11th-hour pre-primary re-endorsement of LiPetri, the only one made on his page, be construed as a tremor of uncertainty about the outcome of the primary? Nationally, the GOP has made it a priority to keep and grow its slim majority in the House. CD3 might seem like a good target since LiPetri, who was the Republican nominee for CD3 in 2024, lost to Suozzi that year by just 3-plus percentage points.

But first, LiPetri has to win the Republican nomination by out-MAGAing Hach.

In a statement to The Point, Hach said Trump's endorsement was misguided. "President Trump has been badly advised in this primary — just ask Rudy Giuliani who fully supports me in the race," Hach said. "Voters who really want to defeat Tom Suozzi in November know to vote for me."

Both LiPetri and Hach tout their MAGA credentials online, and LiPetri got big props from Vice President JD Vance during his appearance in Bethpage last week. Hach, who received the former New York City mayor's endorsement last week, points to his devotion of all things MAGA and Trump, which includes a photo on his campaign site of a Trump-signed Make America Great Again hat in a glass case.

The other Nassau congressional district, CD4, also features a Republican primary but no Trump endorsement of either Hempstead Town Receiver of Taxes Jeanine Driscoll or Air Force veteran Marvin Williams. That could be a sign that the GOP isn't worried about Driscoll's chances since she is backed by the Nassau GOP and several Republican officials. But another view would be that neither Driscoll nor Williams have a chance of unseating incumbent Democratic Rep. Laura Gillen, so the GOP isn't expending energy and resources in a meaningless primary.

If LiPetri loses to Hach, will Trump give Hach his "Complete and Total Endorsement" against Suozzi in November?

— Mark Nolan mark.nolan@newsday.com

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