A Town Saving Project – Smithtown School District Vote unanimously to sell NY Avenue Building to build a Residential Community, that will Bring Young families back to Smithtown and revitalize our downtown areas.
In February of this year, announcements were made that Smithtown School District planned to sell it’s NY Avenue property for transit oriented development or TOD. Due to a steady and freighting decline of student enrollment, the School district felt it would make sense to market the property for starter homes, which young parents could afford. Shortly after the announcement, Long Island Business News reported that the majority of Smithown’s town board completely supported the TOD project. In the same article, the Long Island Association CEO, Kevin Law gives his approval for the project, calling the location “one of the best sites anywhere on Long Island for a significant transit-oriented development” in addition to helping with struggling small businesses in downtown Smithtown.
Smithtown’s Planning Director, David Flynn was quoted as being concerned about sewer access by local papers, after plans to sell the building were made public. The school district made this concern a priority when looking for a buyer. Fast forward to ten days ago, when the board of Education announced they had unanimously approved the sale of the property to renown developer, Southern Land Company. The plans include one- and two-bedroom apartments, some small business space and a sewage treatment plant, which is something this town desperately needs. The residential community could literally save Smithtown from losing an entire generation to surrounding towns, not to mention provide the platform for a sewer infrastructure that is vital to maintain healthy drinking water quality, our environment and small businesses.
While Southern Land Company is fully prepared and excited to work with the community to address all concerns and requests, our town Supervisor has decided he knows nothing about the project, despite previous quotes from town officials made public throughout local media outlets.
We as a community, owe it ourselves to hold our elected officials accountable for Campaign promises for a downtown revitalization. In the last election cycle, when endorsements were made for now Councilwoman Lisa Inzerillo, promises were made by the Supervisor to preserve our environment and downtown business areas. Here we have an opportunity for a developer to foot the bill for a sewage treatment plant in downtown Smithtown, along with a beautifully designed plan that would bring our young families back. So why has Supervisor Vecchio decided to start his mudslinging and propaganda tactics against it?
We know from inside sources that Councilman McCarthy was eagerly anticipating this project as an incredible opportunity for growth in our town just last month. Councilwoman Inzerillo made campaign promises, telling the Times of Smithtown she would “use my influences to require our town planning and development staff to aggressively pursue state and federal grants designed toward revitalizing our downtown areas.” Councilman Ed Wehrheim has been a proven supporter of bringing back our youth in addition to the slew of businesses he’s gotten to lease store space in Smithtown. And finally, if you look on Smithtown’s Town Government website you will see that Councilwoman Nowick has been “passionate about promoting downtown revitalization” and funding sewer studies. It will be very interesting to see who keeps their integrity and promises when it comes down to working with the School District and Southern Land Company.
How you can help:
If you want lower taxes, Smithtown needs a TOD development project like this. It’s all connected… More students enrolled in school means more funding from the state. More businesses in town means more sales tax that will help alleviate the burden of our real estate taxes. We have already lost one generation of young families over the course of the last 15 years. We can all work together to bring our town back to the future, by holding our elected officials accountable. Make some calls to the Town Council, our Supervisor and finally our planning department who can help with zoning and our Master plan. Make some noise Smithtown!