Riverside sewer district

Riverhead's ultimate goal was to have the new Riverside Sewer District treat wastewater from the county complex in Riverside, which the Riverhead Sewer District has been handling since 1969.

The developer of the Riverview Lofts apartment building in downtown Riverhead has proposed a 40-unit rental apartment complex with ground-floor retail space in Riverside.

The stopgap funding measure enacted this weekend does not contain any congressionally directed spending for fiscal year 2025, including a $5 million grant submitted by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer for the Riverside sewer district facility.

The nearly $1.7 trillion funding bill keeps the federal government operating through Sept. 30 eliminated all member "earmarks" for specific projects.

Riverhead Town has retained an attorney to sue the Town of Southampton over its proposed sewer district for the hamlet of Riverside — a facility that is essential to developing mixed-use housing in the hamlet, as called for by a plan approved by Southampton nearly a decade ago.

Teachers at Phillips Avenue Elementary School are planning to demonstrate outside the school tomorrow to raise concerns about Southampton Town’s plan to site a sewage treatment plant in Riverside near the school.

Trouble is brewing between the two towns that straddle the Peconic River. The bone of contention: Southampton Town’s plan for revitalization of the Riverside hamlet, adopted nearly 10 years ago.

Supervisor Tim Hubbard offered Southampton officials Riverhead’s help to revise its Riverside development plans, including partnering on a market and demographic study. He also asked that the proposed Riverside sewer district take in the county facilities there.

The wastewater treatment plant is essential to the implementation of the Riverside Action Plan, a revitalization plan adopted by the Southampton Town Board in 2015 and codified in a zoning overlay district that same year, that calls for high-density mixed-use development in portions of the hamlet.

The future of Riverside hangs in the balance and the owners of one 20-acre parcel the town needs to build the sewage plant critical to the hamlet’s revitalization plan aren’t negotiating, civic leader says.