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FRPT MEMORIAL LIB
144WMERRICKRD
FREEPORT NY 11520-3726
Remembering 9-11
Scan our QR code on your smart phone to visit our website!
First day at Giblyn Elementary
I DO BELIEVE IN SCHOOL... I DO, I DO, I DO! Jake arrived
for his first day of kindergarten on Tuesday at the Plaza
Elementary School in Baldwin with some trepidation.
photo by Keith Stevenson
GIBLYN SCHOOL IS 501 Giblyn school students joined with Freeport School officials to honor the
school's silver anniversary. photo by sieve Koiodny
Brooklyn Water Works sale approved by NI FA
by Laura Schofer
Despite fears that the Nassau Interim
Finance Agency (NIFA) would block
Nassau County's purchase of a 4.2-acre
parcel of land in Freeport, the directors
approved the deal last week.
NIFA board directors voted two in
favor, two against and one abstained to
purchase the land that once housed the
Brooklyn Water Works on Thursday,
August 30. The Nassau County
Legislature voted unanimously on May
21 to approve this contract that will
keep the parcel as open space.
Nassau County has agreed to pay
owner Gary Melius $6.22 million for the
property, including $4.8 million from
the 2006 Environmental Bond Act and
$1.8 from the county's Open Space
fund. Mr. Melius bought the property
along with the Brooklyn Water Works
building in 1986 for $1.5 million. Years
of political wrangling as well as failed
developments followed and then in
2010 the building came down.
The 4.2-acre parcel is one of the last
tracts of significant open space left on
the South Shore of Long Island. It sits
between the Long Island Rail Road
tracks on Brookside Avenue and the 22-
acre Brookside Preserve.
The property will be maintained by
the South Shore Audubon Society,
where more than 70 different species of
birds have been observed.
Internet chatter early last week had
Freeporters concerned about the final
approval of the sale by NIFA. Freeport
Mayor Andrew Hardwick held a press
conference on Wednesday, August 29, a
day before NIFA was to vote on the con-tract,
to urge residents to attend the
NIFA meeting.
"We thought we had put this to bed," said
Mayor Hardwick. "Residents made a deci-sion
to preserve the land. The people have
spoken. This is our money and our land."
Freeporters at the press conference
said they feared that if the property was
returned to Mr. Melius, he would be
forced to move ahead with his plans to
build an apartment house.
Gary Melius, in a prepared statement
provided to the media at the press con-ference,
said that political maneuvering
would keep the deal from going
through.
"It not only affects me and Mayor
Hardwick, but the residents of
Freeport and the county - especially
those that are concerned with preserv-ing
open space and the environment.
This should not be personal or politi-cal.
It should be noted that under the
Bond Act $77 million was spent on the
North Shore, $12 million on the South
Shore and [to date] $0 in a diverse
neighborhood," he said.
The proposal passed.
Freeport resident David Chauvin, of
the Freeport-Baldwin Water Works
Coalition, a group that opposed the
development of this property, said "We
are relieved and excited. It means so
much to have this piece of open space
returned to the people of Freeport and to
the people of Nassau County."
Legislator David Denenberg, a long-time
supporter and environmentalist,
said, "I am happy the acquisition was
approved, the property will be preserved
and I was able to fulfill a commitment
that did not seem possible when I was
first elected," he said.
But it was Mayor Hardwick who summed
up the feelings of many Freeporters. "I am
pleased with the final results. The property is
now open space, which is what the residents
wanted," he said.
"I want to thank the residents that
came out with good intentions and sup-ported
this from the beginning. It is evi-dent
that the people still have the power
to make good things happen when they
come together."
out your BcighboFs!f?8 Ibeal people's names were in ypui communit)? ae . Mavbiffoucs. i$*ig this week! See inside.
. ,, Homicide in of Freeport'
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Object Description
| Rating | |
| Title | 2012-09-06 |
| Subject | Newspaper |
| Description | This is a Newspaper distributed locally within the Village of Freeport and Baldwin. |
| Creator | Linda Toscano |
| Publisher | L & M Publications, Inc. |
| Contributors | Scanned by Imaging & Microfilm Access, Inc. (Bohemia, NY 11716) |
| Date | 2012 |
| Type | Periodical |
| Format | |
| Source | Freeport Memorial Library |
| Language | English |
| Coverage | United States |
| Rights | This digital image may be freely used for educational uses, as long as it is not altered in any way. No commercial reproduction or distribution of this image is permitted without written permission of the Freeport Memorial Library, 144 W. Merrick Road, Freeport, NY 11520 or email: frreference@freeportlibrary.info |
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