Updated: Town Removes Avalon Bay Vote From Agenda; Protest Rally Still A Go

The Huntington Town Board has taken a resolution regarding the approval of a zone change to benefit Avalon Bay off tonight's final meeting agenda.

"There seemed to be a lot of confusion about the process and we don't want people to feel the decision was rushed through because it never was," said town spokesman AJ Carter.

In fact, he said, the reality is exactly the opposite.

At the board's May 17 meeting, the board approved a resolution that would extend the period to consider the zone change for 90 days to give it more time to look at comments resulting from a March 9 public hearing.

"Under the town code, once the board holds a public hearing on the measure, it has 90 days to act on the proposal. It was clear by the May 17 meeting that the town had not had the opportunity to fully review and assess the comments made at the March 9 public hearing, and to work with Avalon Bay on addressing many of the concerns that were raised at the hearing," Carter said.

He said that the board expected to be ready to vote sometime within that 90-day extension.

"It was envisioned that the review would be completed some time before the second 90 days elapsed," he said. "All that resolution did was create another 90-day window within which the town would act."
He said the board decided Tuesday to take the resolution off today's meeting agenda in response to the public outcry.

Residents have planned a protest outside of Town Hall at 6 p.m. prior to the board's scheduled 7 p.m. meeting when the resolution appeared on the preliminary agenda. They say they it will still take place.

"Obviously the town board did not want people to feel they had rushed through it, especially when there have been significant changes made to the plan," he said. "Two major things were that they've cut the number of units from 530 to 490 and added another $725,000 in terms of public benefits including $500,000 to the town's Economic Development Corporation to help build the planned community center as well as funding to the Family Service League and the Friends of the Huntington Train Station and others still to be determined."

The resolution will likely be on the board's July 6 meeting agenda, Carter said.

Carter provided Huntington Patch with the following fact sheet regarding theproposed Huntington Station Transit Oriented District and Avalon Bay's Proposed Devleopment

Through discussions with the Town of Huntington, Avalon Bay has made significant changes to the proposal.

      The most significant change is a reduction in the number of proposed units from 530 to 490. This reduced the density to 18.5 units per acre.

      The revised plan calls for one less building than the original, a reduced number of parking spaces and an increased amount of open spade in the development.

Three-fourths of the units (368) will be rented or sold at market rate.

Avalon Bay changed the mix of the 122 income-restricted units.

      Under the new proposal, eight percent of the units (39) will be set aside as affordable, nine percent (44) as workforce and eight percent (39) as moderate. For the rentals, affordable is defined as persons earning 50 percent of the median income; workforce is 80 percent of median income; moderate is 110 percent of median income.

      Estimated monthly rents for a one-bedroom unit would be $1,018 for an "affordable" one bedroom, $1,629 for a "workforce" one-bedroom and $1,961 for a "moderate" one-bedroom. Estimated sales prices for income restricted two-bedroom units would be $183,250 (affordable) and $275,000 (workforce). There are no "moderate: for-sale units.

Avalon Bay has agreed to provide $2.25 million in benefits to the Huntington Station community in return for the rezoning, a substantial increase from their original proposal.

      Those benefits include:

• A $1.5 million donation to the Huntington School District.

• A $500,000 donation to the Town's Economic Development Corp., which will be used either to underwrite a portion of the costs of developing the EDC's proposed commercial building at the intersection of Northridge Street and New York Avenue or to fund another economic development project in Huntington Station.

The Huntington School Board voted overwhelmingly to support the project.

      At its July 6, 2009 meeting, on a resolution sponsored by board member Richard McGrath, the School Board, by a 6-1 vote, entered into an agreement with Avalon Bay providing for the $1.5 million payment to the District.

There is no requirement that Avalon Bay accept Section 8 vouchers in lieu of rent payments.

      Supervisor Frank Petrone notified Huntington School Board President Bill Dwyer of this fact in a June 14 letter.

The final plans for the project have not been submitted, much less approved. When submitted, they will undergo the normal review process for all development submissions.

      While Avalon Bay has submitted artists' renderings of how they envision the project could look, they have not submitted any formal plans for review. When submitted, the plans will be subject to all restrictions in Town Code on such issues as building height. The proposed Transit Oriented District code limits buildings to three stories with a maximum height of 45 feet.

The Transit Oriented District will allow construction of much-needed housing for both empty nesters and young persons just entering the workforce.

      According to the Long Island Index, Long Island has been producing significantly lower shares of multi-family units compared to other suburban community in the region: only 22% of all building permits issued on Long Island since 2000 have been for multi-family units, compared with 37% in the region excluding New York City. The Long Island Index notes that many of the problems associated with housing on Long Island—including its high cost and lack of rental units—can be traced to low rates of multi-family unit production to meet changing housing demands of young people and senior citizens.