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(Interesting side note: Newsday listed the Brentwood School District as the 24th largest employer on LI. With the projected addition of 1,800 children from this project, there will be a need for more employees.)
WHO ARE all these people who want to live in this shiny new "city of the future", gorgeous designed buildings, high end shopping and nice restaurants....and send their kids to Brentwood schools? like I said, some currently kid-less millennials might take the bait initially, but eventually Half Hollow Hills is going to win them over, and future waves of young professionals will take heed and not make the same mistake.
otherwise, like I said, it's just a retirement community on steroids.
(PS - the school district says they don't want this, they are bursting at the seams already and say this will bring in 8k new students [my first link above]...let's split the difference and call it around 4.5k new kids - that is a TON...are they going to be building new schools for this?
as I said above, if they were creating a new school district and had an LIRR line, this could maybe work. I don't have a problem with development at all. I was in favor of the Lighthouse. I just don't understand the logic of Heartland at THIS location.
It's the 'all about the Benjamins' logic.
Removing the train tracks from the subject parcel was foolish. Light rail connecting the project to the DP LIRR would have been a major plus seeing that most projects of late involve TOD. Notice how the projects in this article all revolve around train stations:
WHO ARE all these people who want to live in this shiny new "city of the future", gorgeous designed buildings, high end shopping and nice restaurants....and send their kids to Brentwood schools? like I said, some currently kid-less millennials might take the bait initially, but eventually Half Hollow Hills is going to win them over, and future waves of young professionals will take heed and not make the same mistake.
otherwise, like I said, it's just a retirement community on steroids.
(PS - the school district says they don't want this, they are bursting at the seams already and say this will bring in 8k new students [my first link above]...let's split the difference and call it around 4.5k new kids - that is a TON...are they going to be building new schools for this?
The Suffolk County Planning Commission paperwork cited 1,800 which is where I my number came from; I can not hear anything on my computer, so I missed the any audio in the video link . http://www.suffolkcountyny.gov/Porta...taffReport.pdf And yes, I had read that the Brentwood school districted wanted no part of this. They've enough problems as it is!
Stepping away from Heartland for a moment, I want to point out that the dolts in charge over in Port Jefferson Village approved a giant apartment complex which is completely out of scale with everything else in the village. Entering from 25A eastbound, there is what appears to be a wall blocking the view of the village. The train is not within walking distance. Apartments are going to start at $2,300 and go as high as $4,000 per month. (A certain percentage of units are being set aside as 'workforce housing' which has a higher income limit than affordable housing.) How can millenials afford this? It's like what you've stated: retirement community on steroids. These projects have nothing to do with the betterment of life for people on Long Island other than the developers and the politicians who've wet their beak.
Heartland's developer has indicated in the SCPC paperwork that 10% of the units wil be affordable, workforce housing.
Quote:
According to the Long Island Index, almost half of people aged 18 to 34 can imagine themselves living in an apartment, condominium or townhouse in a local downtown area on Long Island. In addition, a majority of empty-nesters and seniors prefer to live in a neighborhood where the homes are close together and local stores are within walking distance, rather than one where homes are spread out and require driving. Heartland Town Square will provide this lifestyle, which is in demand.
Questions were raised during the SEQRA process as to whether the proposed rental units will be affordable. The lack of affordable housing is a problem throughout Suffolk County, particularly in Brentwood. HUD has indicated that housing is affordable if it consumes no more than 30 percent of gross household income. In high cost areas like Suffolk County, this standard can be stretched slightly so that households paying up to 35 percent of gross household income can be deemed to be living in affordable housing. However, as presented in the FGEIS, 40.3 percent of Suffolk County homeowners with a mortgage paid 35.0 percent or more of their household incomes for shelter. In Brentwood, 53.1 percent of homeowners with a mortgage paid 35 percent or more of their household income for shelter. Among renters, 49.6 percent of those in Suffolk County and 42.8 percent of those in Brentwood paid 35 percent or more of their household income for shelter. The workforce housing proposed for Heartland Town Square will help to address this situation through the provision of workforce rentals.
Ten percent of the units proposed for Heartland Town Square will be workforce units. Both the workforce
rental units and the various market-rate ownership units will be affordable to those earning between 100 and 120 percent of the HUD Nassau-Suffolk median income.
Will those less fortunate have to enter through a side street as opposed to the promenade?
Like you, I question this location. It's on the edge of a community which has seen better days and has a poorly regarded school district. Residents will have to rely on shuttle buses which are supposed to be time with the train service as opposed to having light rail on site. The surrounding community and infrastructure will be faced with increased vehicular traffic. For what???
Still the possibility that this may be overturned.
Quote:
The county Planning Commission says the other three towns that border the project -- Huntington, Babylon and Smithtown -- must also be on board with the project's terms. If even one town does not give the OK, the commission says it can vote to overturn Islip's rezoning
Some may not be aware of the extensive tax breaks to developers for building low income housing, it has been abused in the past and been criticized for abuses. The earlier version was the 421-a.
Quote:
It took nearly two years, but Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo on Friday reached an agreement with the New York State Legislature to put back together a long-running affordable housing program, known as 421-a, that gives developers a city tax break in return for building lower-price rental units.
Just do not call it 421-a.
The newly named Affordable New York Housing Program, announced at a news conference in Albany, will annually generate 2,500 units of housing affordable to poor, working-class and middle-class New Yorkers, Mr. Cuomo said. In a change to the nearly 50-year-old program, developers will be required to pay a “fair wage” to construction workers to qualify for the city tax benefits.
Some may not be aware of the extensive tax breaks to developers for building low income housing, it has been abused in the past and been criticized for abuses. The earlier version was the 421-a.
421A is a be a program geared toward NYC. It came about in the 1970's when NYC was in the toilet. The powers-that-be tried luring developers into NYC to build condos, giving the economy a shot in the arm. Outer borough developers have recently taken advantage of it -- look at the buildings that have gone up or are going up in LIC.
One of the stipulations for 421A (renamed Affordable New York) is that 25-30% of units be dedicated to affordable housing for low and moderate income tenants. Wolkoff was looking to reduce the number of Heartland units dedicated to workforce housing to 10% -- which wouldn't qualify the project for a 35 year tax abatement (if it is even applicable to suburban communities.)
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