There was hardly an empty seat to be found at Village Hall in Manorhaven on Thursday night, when the Board of Trustees held its monthly meeting. It lasted well over two hours, but the trustees made few decisions.
Instead, most of the time was given over to more than two dozen citizens who came to voice their opinion on three local matters: a law to combat overcrowding, changes to the winter parking laws and the referendum on mayoral term length.
With an estimated population of more than 6,600 people crammed into one-half square mile of land, overcrowding has become a problem for the village. To combat this, a new law will make it easier to authorize an investigation by code enforcement officers. Having two kitchens, separate entrances or multiple garbage cans could be grounds for an investigation. This did not sit well with Susan Gottehrer, the director of the New York Civil Liberties Union’s Nassau chapter.
“The law puts on residents the heavy burden of having to prove their own innocence,” she told the trustees.
Another attendee said the whole law was wrong for regulating where people could and could not live.
“This is how Nazi Germany started,” she said.
Other attendees pushed back against that statement. When a Manorhaven resident said the law was not discrimination, many in attendance applauded. But while there was some agreement that illegal occupancy has contributed to overcrowding, many felt that overdevelopment was as much to blame.
The law “is just putting a Band-aid over the real problem,” one resident said.
There were also some comments about the village’s winter parking plan; specifically, how often residents should move their cars for streets to be cleared of snow. Traditionally, residents could only park on one side of the street from December through March, and the board was considering only doing this during snow emergencies. The trustees were seeking more public comment because the board was divided on what to do.
“For the first time in the 15 months I’ve been mayor, the board does not have total agreement on an issue,” Mayor Jim Avena said.
Despite a shortage of street parking, several members spoke in favor of alternate street parking, saying it was the best way to keep the streets clear of snow.
Finally, there was the contentious issue of term length for the mayor. The referendum on whether the term will last four years instead of two received a final round of criticism by a couple attendees before residents go vote on Tuesday.
Avena opened the discussion by asserting that the Manorhaven government was not trying to rig the referendum, saying that he had been accused of doing so by former Deputy Mayor Lucretia Steele.
“I resent that comment, that somebody could accuse this government of rigging an election,” he said.
Steele denied making such an accusation.
He went on to say that as mayor, he needed more time to oversee the completion of projects and that planning for elections every other year was too distracting. But some residents felt that the current system worked fine, and felt that the community should have been given more time to consider the issue.
“Wouldn’t it been better if we the people, not the board, have a longer time to discuss and digest this?” a woman named Barbara, who did not give her last name, asked.
Editor’s Note: A previous version of this article omitted attribution for a statement about possible rigging of the referendum. It was Mayor Jim Avena who said former Deputy Mayor Lucretia Steele had accused him of attempting to rig the referendum.
