A proposal for a 500-unit resort and spa on a 100-acre waterfront site in Aquebogue that’s been the object of preservation efforts for many years was presented to the Riverhead Town Board at its work session this morning.
Real estate broker and developer Larry Oxman pitched the plan on behalf of Red Cedar Meadows LLC, which he said is in contract to buy the former duck farm from its current owner.
Oxman identified himself and Riverhead businessman and contractor Raymond Castronovo as principals in Red Cedar Meadows.
Oxman identified himself and Riverhead businessman and contractor Raymond Castronovo as principals in Red Cedar Meadows.
“We’re looking to build what we consider an as-of-right-use,” Oxman told town board members.
The site’s current Tourism/Resort Campus zoning allows intense uses, including a hotel and spa by special permit of the town board. Other uses allowed in the zoning district include bed and breakfasts, country inns, country clubs, recreational clubs and docking facilities.
The Vineyard Resort and Spa, which is still in the concept phase, would include up to 450 guest rooms and 50 “villas,” plus a health spa, banquet facilities, clubhouse and shops, Oxman said.
It would provide tax base and jobs and not put any children into the schools, he said.
Oxman said the upland portion of the 100-acre site is about 90 acres, but the proposal calls for preserving 75 percent of the site. He said “not much of the site” is wetlands.
The property, situated on Terry’s Creek adjacent to Indian Island County Park, was once an operating duck farm owned by Joseph Celic.
Riverhead Town in granted a prior landowner permits to build 500 condominiums and an equal number of boat slips on the site. The permits were invalidated by a state court in the early 1990s in a lawsuit brought by the North Fork Environmental Council.
Suffolk County has attempted to acquire the site for preservation more than once. In 1999, the county offered $8.5 million for the property, but the then-owner announced a deal to sell it to a developer instead.
The county again entered talks with the parcel’s current owner, Stanley Weiss, and with his permission had the property appraised, Legislator Al Krupski said today.
Riverhead Councilman James Wooten, Councilwoman Jodi Giglio and representatives of regional environmental groups spoke in favor of the acquisition at a County Legislature meeting last June.
Wooten said last June the duck farm operation resulted in “pollution and destruction of the environment… This property is a priority for acquisition.
“Broad Cove and any development of this property will, without question, add to existing impacts which affect the property and the waters from the duck farm operation, and risk setbacks to the strides made to restore habitat and water quality,” Wooten said.
Environmental activists called the acquisition critical.
“I can tell you, on behalf of those of us on the East End, this parcel is critical, has been critical, and is a cornerstone of the acquisition efforts in the western portions of the Peconic,” Group for the East End president Bob DeLuca told legislators on June 16, 2015.
North Fork Environmental Council president William Toedter said the site was considered by environmental groups to be “one of the most important properties for preservation in Riverhead Town.”
The Nature Conservancy, Long Island Pine Barrens Society and other groups spoke in support and the legislature authorized the appraisal.
But the owner “felt it was too low,” Krupski said today. “The county made an offer but Weiss did not accept it,” he said. The legislator said he met with the owner to discuss the purchase, but it was a non-starter.
“It’s unfortunate,” Krupski said. “It would complement all the preservation done to date.”
But the question of preservation wasn’t raised during today’s town board discussion, which focused more on how the application should proceed.
Supervisor Sean Walter said he would not support a special permit for the site unless the developers first obtained wetlands permits from the State DEC and site plan approval from the Riverhead Planning Board.
Oxman said he did not want to incur the expense and spend the time necessary to obtain all the other approvals unless he knew he had the town board’s support.
Wooten said during today’s meeting he thought the Vineyard Resort and Spa is “a great concept.”
He credited a prior town board with foreseeing this and zoning for it. “But I want to see some skin in the game before I agree,” Wooten said.
In an interview after the meeting, Wooten said he still believed the site is “a great property to preserve” but said the county, state and town did not have the funding to do it.
“They’re willing to develop only 8 percent of it and leave the rest in its natural state,” Wooten said. “Short of preserving it,
this is the next best thing. We can have our cake and eat it too.”
Long Island Pine Barrens Society executive director Richard Amper does not agree and called Wooten a “hypocrite” for being willing to support the development.
“This has been among the top 10 targets for preservation for 2 decades,” Amper said.
“This site is a major, major example of coastal wetlands, it’s an invaluable treasure that the state, the county and the town have all recognized,” he said.
“This land is more critical than ever given the decline in our coastal waters,” Amper said. “The expansion and extension of the CPF give us a better chance than ever — if government has the will to do it.”
The 2-percent real estate transfer tax authorized by state law in 1998 created the Community Preservation Fund to be utilized by the five East End towns to purchase land for farmland and open space preservation. A proposition on the ballot this November would extend the authorization for the tax until 2050 as well as authorize the use of the fund for water quality improvement projects.
Riverhead, which in years past borrowed against anticipated future CPF revenues, has not had transfer tax revenues for new purchases since the 2008 economic crash.
“Riverhead spent early and excessively and didn’t engage in partnerships with the county and the state as they should have,” Amper said. But with the extension and expansion of the CPF — and the authorization for Riverhead to refinance its CPF debt — the town should see more revenue from the transfer tax again, Amper said.
Giglio suggested the town board hold a public hearing on the special permit before requiring the developer to go through site plan review by the planning board — a process that Oxman said “could easily be in the seven figures.”
Councilman John Dunleavy agreed there should be a town board public hearing to get feedback from the community.
But the supervisor did not change his mind about the sequence he believes the process should follow, with the special permit application coming after the site plan and DEC permit approvals.
That question was not resolved before the conclusion of the meeting.
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