Town Board approves use of public land for Heatherwood project staging

The Town Board on Tuesday approved a license agreement with 203 E Main LLC, the company developing Heatherwood’s five-story, mixed-use building at 203-213 East Main Street allowing it to use town-owned land near the construction site as “staging areas” for the project’s construction.

One staging area, for materials and equipment, is an approximately 15,000-square-foot portion of the south end of the East End Arts Council property.

The other staging area, for construction employee parking, is an approximately 12,700-foot portion of the riverfront parking lot in the area directly south of the buildings at 65-95 East Main Street. The town has the right under the agreement to relocate the construction parking staging area to either of two areas of the First Street parking lot, north of East Main Street. See staging area maps below.

The town will be paid a total of $300,000 for the temporary, exclusive use of the designated portions of the properties, according to the agreement. The term of the agreement is 18 months, which may be extended for six months at no additional cost, if both parties agree.

The town agreed to accept dirt/fill from the project site as payment of the license fee, in lieu of cash, with a credit of $35 per cubic yard of material. The developer agreed to stockpile up to 1,500 cubic yards of the material on the project site for inspection, sampling and testing by the town. The town may accept or reject the materials based on the analysis of the town engineer in consultation with the town’s geotechnical engineering consultant. The developer is responsible for removing and disposing of any materials deemed unacceptable by the town.

The town plans to use the materials it accepts in payment for the use of the staging areas to raise the elevation of the lower town square, as set forth in plans for the town square project as a flood mitigation measure. Deputy Town Attorney Annemarie Prudenti told Town Board members at the March 27 work session that soils accepted by the town will be placed in the area “where the lower deck is going to go, and eventually it’ll be graded to the height required for flood mitigation.”

Prior to the board taking up resolutions on its agenda Tuesday, the town heard comments from Riverhead architect Martin Sendlewski about the proposed staging area license agreement.

Sendlewski, who is a member of the town’s parking advisory committee, suggested that the town parking lot on the corner of Roanoke Avenue and Third Street be designated as the construction parking area, rather than either a portion of the riverfront parking lot or a portion of the First Street parking lot. Parking in those areas is already in demand and is going to get “pretty tight,” Sendlewski said. The riverfront parking lot is a “choice area” for parking, he said. The Third Street parking lot is consistently underutilized, he said.

Sendlewski also said the portions of the First Street parking lot designated by the agreement as alternative construction parking areas are not owned by the Town of Riverhead but are owned by Town of Riverhead Parking District, which is a separate legal entity. Any agreement for the use of parking district land should be made by the parking district, he said. The district is governed by the Town Board, Sendlewski noted, but an agreement affecting parking district land should be separate and executed by the supervisor as chairman of the parking district.

Sendlewski also asked if the parking district would be paid for the use of parking district property.

The board voted unanimously to approve the agreement. Before the vote, Council Member Bob Kern expressed concerns similar to Sendlewski’s about using the downtown parking areas designated in the agreement. Kern suggested designating other areas for construction worker parking “as opposed to downtown, so we free up the space for the people downtown.” He said filling up downtown parking spaces with construction workers’ vehicles “doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.” The town has other “empty space” that could be used, he said.

Kern asked Prudenti to respond to those concerns. Prudenti said the town was entering into a license agreement, a type of agreement that gives the licensee “no property rights.” The town can amend the agreement, Prudenti said. Kern said he doesn’t want to “wait and see” until warmer weather and downtown gets busier.

“Heatherwood has demonstrated their willingness to work with the town, so I don’t foresee that being a problem,” Prudenti said.

“I foresee it potentially being an issue as the town square is developed and we have our construction employee parking, when potentially the reuse of 127 comes along that will create probably a greater need to relocate off of a downtown site,” Prudenti said. “We have the Second Street property, we have the Roanoke property. We have Town Hall parking here. We have the TOD site,” she said, listing other downtown parking lots where workers on the town square and the Petrocelli building at 127 East Main Street could potentially park as those projects are built.

“So it it’s going to be a constant and continual adjustment for the town while these development projects are going on,” Prudenti said.