Bristal owners active political donors

Dan Glaun

Engel Burman, the development company whose applications for extended tax concessions from the Nassau County Industrial Development Agency for its upscale Bristal senior facilities were dropped after weeks of outcry from local officials, has made $128,000 in political contributions to county and state candidates since the 2010 elections, according to campaign finance records.

Campaign finance reports filed with the state board of elections show a bipartisan array of donations from Engel Burman and limited liability companies run out of its Lynbrook office, including tens of thousands to both Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s campaign account and the Nassau County Republican Party.

Engel Burman, which is in the process of repurchasing several assisted living facilities it sold to other housing companies in 2007, has contributed to Nassau County Executive Edward Mangano, but is not a Mangano loyalist. 

The company’s LLCs also gave $24,000 to former Nassau County Executive Tom Suozzi’s (D) campaign between 2007 and 2009, when Suozzi lost to Mangano. 

The Bristal at North Hills had first applied to the county IDA for a PILOT, in 2002 when Suozzi was county executive. The agreement was approved and in 2008, the IDA reduced PILOT payments on the property.

Engel Burman also gave over $66,000 to Suozzi’s unsuccessful 2006 Democratic primary campaign against Eliot Spitzer for governor of New York.

The company filed a petition in November for a 10-year extension of its North Hills, Massapequa and Westbury facilities’ payment in lieu of taxes, or PILOT, agreement with the IDA  – a request that set off tumultuous weeks of debate before being dropped in December. 

School board officials from Herricks and Great Neck, as well as North Hills Mayor Marvin Nattis and Nassau County Legislator Judi Bosworth, criticized both proposed agreements, which would have cost the districts and village millions in property tax revenues.

The IDA withdrew the original application after the officials’ protests, but in January the company submitted a revised application for only the North Hills and Massapequa facilities that was scheduled to be heard by the IDA, once again setting off angry protests from public officials.

Engel Burman and the IDA did not return requests for comment.

“There’s got be a fix in. I’m really upset about it. It’s not a meritorious application,” Natiss said after the IDA scheduled a hearing on the revised request.

“This whole thing smells,” Natiss added. “It’s greed.”

The IDA then dropped the PILOT extension entirely after opponents met with Nassau County Executive Edward Mangano and Comptroller George Maragos, and is now only entertaining a transfer of the agreement from the current owners to Engel Burman. The Bristal tax concessions are set to expire next year.

“The county executive had a conversation with the mayor of North Hills and the county executive asked us to look at this more carefully and we did,” said IDA executive director Joseph Kearney.

Mangano appointed Kearney to head the agency in 2010. IDA chairman Timothy Williams and vice chairman John Coumatos were appointed by Mangano in 2012, while Secretary Gary Weiss was appointed by Suozzi, Mangano’s predecessor.

Engel Burman operates seven Bristal assisted living facilities in Nassau and Suffolk Counties, and one facility in White Plains. The company also owns retail and residential buildings, both on Long Island and in Massachusetts and Florida, and has a portfolio of over 50 industrial buildings in Nassau and Suffolk.

Engel Burman and its LLCs have given to Mangano and his Republican allies in recent years, including $4,500 in Mangano’s campaign since 2010 and $14,100 to the Nassau County Republican Party’s political committee.

Over that time frame, Engel Burman and its LLCs also gave $32,000 to Cuomo’s campaign. 

Looking back past the most recent elections shows more investments in Democrats. In addition to supporting Suozzi, the company contributed $48,000 to former Gov. David Paterson’s (D) campaign in 2008 and 2009. 

Paterson, who was Eliot Spitzer’s lieutenant governor and assumed office after Spitzer’s resignation in the wake of a prostitution scandal, eventually elected not to run for election in 2010.

Individual partners in the company have contributed as well. 

Engel Burman President Jan Burman and partners Scott Burman and David Burman each gave $5,000 to Suffolk County Executive Steve Bellone (D) in 2011. Jan Burman also contributed $5,000 to former Suffolk County Executive Steve Levy’s war chest in 2010. 

Levy, a Democrat for most of his political career, ran an unsuccessful campaign for the Republican governor’s nomination in 2010.

Jan Burman’s latest contribution, made in January, was a $4,950 donation to the New York City mayoral campaign of former City Comptroller Bill Thompson in 2009 when Thompson unsuccessfully challenged Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

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