The Village of Great Neck Plaza Board of Trustees adjourned discussion Tuesday on a proposed 61-unit apartment complex at 15 Bond St. to allow the applicant to adequately respond to state environmental report questions.
Village of Great Neck Plaza Mayor Jean Celender said she was concerned that questions from a previously submitted environmental report remained unanswered in the applicant’s updated report.
“Some of these comments are not new. They were comments from the last review that were not adequately addressed,” Celender said. “I mean if we need to sit down and have a meeting to go through this to determine exactly what it is you’re gonna submit so there’s no ‘is this adequate or not adequate,’ we’ll have a meeting. I don’t want to keep going through this. It seems to me lunacy.”
In July, the board voted to become the lead agency on the project to handle the State Environmental Quality Review Assessment, which would identify if the project would have any significant environmental impacts on the surrounding area.
The engineering firm VHB was hired by the village to oversee the SEQRA review.
Paul Bloom, attorney for Effie Namdar of 14 Park Place LLC, which is seeking to build the complex, said he and his client answered all concerns, but not as sufficiently as VHB would have liked.
“We got all of our information and all of our responses in on the day we were required to put those comments in. We didn’t delay in terms of our work,” Bloom said. “We may have not provided sufficient information to the satisfactory of VHB but we did provide information for all of the questions and we did it in a timely matter.”
“It’s not as if we ignored any of the points that were raised,” he added.
Celender said she had met with residents from the surrounding buildings to see for herself what their concerns were.
“I think that was a very helpful site visit to be able to see it with the eyes fresh from the resident perspective,” she said. “We are absolutely hearing and listening to our residents. And making sure that the applicant provides answers to those questions and that the analysis is complete and addresses those concerns. And that we can be assured that there’s nothing that’s going to be a significant impact.”
Bloom suggested the board give them one week to provide the additional information requested by VHB.
Celender said she did not think one week was ample time for all parties involved to receive and assess the updated report.
“It’s too tight. I’m not feeling comfortable. Its a lot of material to go through,” she said. “We don’t want to keep going back and forth not having it be complete. Because it’s not in your interest and it just continues to create more paperwork that makes it hard to track what’s been adequately addressed, and what hasn’t.”
Chris Prior, an attorney with Ackerman, Levine, Cullen, Brickman & Limmer who represents residents at four buildings surrounding 15 Bond St., said he would need to submit both VHB’s concerns and the applicant’s responses to his consultants as well.
Prior represents residents at Westminster Hall Apartments, located at 4 Maple Place, The Cartier Apartments, located a 21 Bond St. and the owners of 22 Park Place and 25 Park Place.
Village Attorney Richard Gabriele said the board should adjourn the case to the next meeting to set a deadline for Bloom to submit documentation, but decide on a hearing date once that information is received.
“Put it on the next meeting as a control date with the understanding that it’s probably not going to go forward,” he said. “Why don’t you get your material together as quickly as you want but consistent with answering everything in complete a manner as you can. Depending on when we get that, we’ll send it over to VHB and we’ll set another date for a hearing.”
Bloom said he would contact the village’s Board of Zoning Appeals to postpone their hearing until after the board approves the environmental report.
The developers sought a height variance that would permit a four-story, 45-foot high building. Village zoning laws permit only three-story buildings that are 45 feet high.
The developers also asked for a 13-foot-high room on top of the building that would be used as a recreation room.
Bloom had said at a previous BZA meeting that many buildings surrounding 15 Bond St. are more than three stories high.
The next board meeting is on Nov. 18.
