Town leaders come to Baldwin

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Baldwin and South Hempstead residents discussed a myriad of topics with Town of Hempstead officials last week, including potholes, unsafe driving, Superstorm Sandy recovery and potential development in the area.

Councilman Anthony Santino, whose district covers South Hempstead and Councilwoman Erin King Sweeney, whose district includes Baldwin, held a town hall meeting on March 26 at Baldwin Middle School for residents to ask questions to various department heads and to raise any and all concerns they might have.

Several community speakers brought up the much-discussed site at the northwest corner of Grand Avenue and Merrick Road. In December, town officials sent a letter to the company most recently awarded the rights to develop the site notifying it that its services had been terminated. That marked the third time a company was awarded the opportunity to develop the site and failed to make its vision a reality since 2007.

Santino explained that the parcel is made up of many property owners and each would have to agree to sell their land for a development project to move forward. “The problem is you have one or two property owners in there who think this is going to be their golden parachute,” he said, “and were holding very high, inflated prices.”

One resident suggested that the town negotiate with the various property owners, purchase the land and create one parcel that it could then resell to a developer. Santino said the town would run into the same problem that the development companies have and couldn’t risk spending taxpayer money without a sure fire development deal.

Robert Weisser, of Baldwin, was adamant that something needs to happen at the site and implored TOH officials to think outside the box. “We really can no longer afford to be doing the things we have been doing,” he said of the site. “We need to be able to produce something so that Grand Avenue and the other commercial sections of the town can develop.”

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