Politics & Government

Judge: Town's Land Sale Referendum Can Go Ahead

UPDATE: Venditto responds; urges residents to vote 'Yes,' the DPW land sale is OK with them.

A referendum to decide whether the town's sale of "surplus" land now being used by its DPW can be put to a public vote on Aug. 20, a Nassau judge has ruled.

State Supreme Court Justice F. Dana Winslow decided Monday that the wording of the referendum petition met the state's legal requirements and was not collected in a fraudulent manner. On Friday, Winslow determined there were sufficient signatures on the ballot from valid voters.

The decision means that a vote on the referendum could go forward on Aug. 20.
The referendum would allow voters to OK or shoot down the Town of Oyster Bay's decision to sell a brownfield property it owns to Simon Property Group.

“The court did the right thing today by allowing the referendum to proceed," said Kyle Sklerov, a spokesman for Long Island Jobs Now, an advocate group for the mall's construction. "The public will now have the opportunity to learn all the facts surrounding the town’s non-competitive land sale to Oyster Bay Realty LLC."

But in a statement issued after hours Monday, Supervisor John Venditto said he was "satisfied that the courts have spoken and the process can go forward:

"On one hand, the Suffolk Supreme Court has made it clear that the town has acted lawfully, appropriately and reasonably," Venditto told Patch. "On the other hand, Nassau Supreme Court has set the matter down for a permissive referendum on Aug. 20, giving our residents a full and fair opportunity to vote yes and once again stop Taubman’s misguided efforts to build a regional, mega shopping mall in the heart of the Town of Oyster Bay."

The fight stems from an 18-year-old battle between two mall developers and their supporters over the former Cerro Wire site. Since Cerro's departure in 1986, the Taubman Company, a national developer of high-end shopping malls, has been trying to build a mall on land it owns off Robbins Lane.

Their proposal has been met with opposition by Simon Properties, another mega mall developer which owns the Walt Whitman Shops and Roosevelt Field malls. Simon wants has agreed to buy the land adjacent to Taubman's property, a barren field the town uses its DPW complex.

Observers and news reports over the years indicate the battle has been bankrolled by the developers over the control of mall development on Long Island and beyond. Oyster Bay has opposed the mall from the beginning.

Sklerov described the town's sale as a "dark-of-night sale (that) will now get a much needed dose of sunlight."

Venditto countered: "A permissive referendum is supposed to be used by concerned residents. This is hardly the case here," he said. "Taubman is perverting the permissive referendum process solely and wholly to advance its mall agenda, against the will of the Town and its residents, without regard to our quality of life.

Venditto rebuffed the "dark of night sale" accusation:

"The Suffolk County Supreme Court, where Taubman chose to bring its lawsuit, found that the town acted appropriately, lawfully and reasonably," Venditto said. "I would urge all residents to be guided by a court of law, and not by Long Island Jobs Now, a shill group for Taubman."


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