No outdoor smoking at VGN hookah bar

Dan Glaun

The Village of Great Neck is tightening limits on a proposed hookah lounge on Middle Neck Road, following a weeks-long campaign against the project by neighbors concerned about the health effects of second-hand smoke.

Village of Great Neck Mayor Ralph Kreitzman said at Tuesday night’s board meeting that the owner of the property had agreed to change the lounge’s conditional-use permit to prohibit outdoor smoking of the Middle Eastern water pipes, and read out loud a letter from the owners’ attorney.

“They voluntarily wish to modify the terms of their conditional-use permit eliminating all smoking from the exterior space seating area,” wrote the attorney. “It is hopeful that this gesture may in some way serve to appease some of the concerns raised.”

The board also introduced a revised version of a proposed moratorium on businesses that profit from on-site smoking. The bill would prohibit the approval of new smoking businesses for eight months, as the village studies the issue and considers permanent regulations.

“[The moratorium] would have us, if and when passed, impose a moratorium on issuing building permits or processing any applications for on-site smoking businesses in the village,” Kreitzman said.

The bill is still subject to an upcoming public hearing.

Resident Warren Rosenthal, a tenant in the neighboring apartment building at 1 Wooleys Lane, presented the board with a letter from his pulmonologist, who wrote that Rosenthal suffers from lung disease and that the proposed hookah lounge was a “disgrace.”

“It has already been linked to oral, lung, stomach and esophageal cancer,” wrote Dr. Denise Ruttgeizer, whose Oct. 10 letter was written before the permit change prohibited outdoor smoking. “The secondhand smoke that will be generated on the sidewalk can blow into my patients’ apartment and cause severe health problems.”

The village approved a conditional-use permit for the hookah lounge in July with several caveats, including requiring a re-permitting of planned outdoor seating in October 2014, a prohibition on noise emanating from the building and a requirement that the substance smoked be a tobacco-free fruit blend.

The property’s landlord is Mike Yeroush, a Great Neck-based developer whose company A1 Universal Development Group has worked on dozens of properties in Queens, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Long Island and Upstate New York, according to the company’s Web site.

The village had previously said it could not unilaterally alter the lounge’s permit, though Kreitzman said at Tuesday’s meeting that a new village law allows the modification or revocation of permits if the hookah lounge violates its conditions.

At an early August meeting, Kreitzman said he was sensitive to residents concerns and that the board would be responsive to complaints that the lounge was violating its permit, but emphasized that village attorney Stephen Limmer had told the board it had no legal recourse to revoke the permit or regulate the smoking of non-tobacco products.

Kreitzman suggested that advocates could lobby the state to regulate all smoke as it does tobacco smoke, but said that had the village tried to block the use it could have been subject to a legal challenge it would likely have lost.

The controversy has also spread beyond the Village of Great Neck’s borders.

The Village of Great Neck Plaza is now considering a moratorium on smoking businesses that would give the village time to evaluate permanent regulations.

Village of Great Neck Plaza Mayor Jean Celender said the measure, introduced in September, was spurred by the planned hookah lounge in the Village of Great Neck and would allow the village to discuss possible restrictions on alternative forms of smoking, like hookah pipes and e-cigarettes, that Celender said could pose public health risks.

“It’s a time out to look at this and evaluate what we want to do going forward,” Celender said. “It did raise to a more serious concern that it could be imminent and on our doorstep.”

The measure, if approved, would suspend for eight months the issuing of permits to new businesses that profit from on-site tobacco smoking.’

During that time, Celender said, the village would consider whether to take more lasting action, including the possibility of lobbying Albany for tighter state smoking regulations or implementing a law similar to the Village of Great Neck’s tobacco smoking ban on some public sidewalks.

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