Barnum Island Fire District officials reach out to community ahead of conference center construction

Barnum Island Fire Commissioner Anthony Neglia expressed excitement over the potential uses of the community’s planned fire district conference center and attached garage, slated for construction at 4138 Broadway in Island Park, down the street from the Lincoln Orens Middle School.

“I just can’t wait to give something back to the community,” he said of the roughly 2,700-square-foot facility’s possibilities at a Nov. 14 Island Park Civic Association meeting.

At least some residents, however, are questioning whether the Barnum Island Fire District is needed, let alone a new facility. “My position is there’s no need for these stupid special districts,” Island Park resident Richard Schurin said at the Nov. 14 meeting, as he questioned the reasons for its continued existence

“Special districts that don’t provide service, such as a fire district, serve no purpose other than as a source of patronage and waste,” he later told the Herald in a phone interview.

The Barnum Island Fire District does not, in fact, provide fire services. Rather, it contracts with the Island Park Fire Department to do so.

Roughly 15 percent of the next year’s Barnum Island Fire District budget is devoted to expenses not directly related to fire protection and fire hydrant rental, and include legal and auditing services, insurance, printing and personnel fees. Owners of both commercial and residential properties in Barnum Island will pay an average of nearly $93 a year to cover these expenses.

Conference center plans
Neglia did not directly address question about whether the district should exist, saying only that he looked forward to erecting the new conference center.

The planned $1.2 million structure will serve as a place for Barnum Island’s five commissioners, Neglia said. In addition, he, along with commissioners Frank Bettineschi and Nick Giovanelli, said they hoped the building could host Boy and Girl Scout meetings, Narcan training sessions, and CPR and hurricane preparedness classes.

Fire district officials also expressed hope that the building, to be built nine feet above base flood elevation, would be a place to safely store emergency response vehicles and equipment ahead of or in the aftermath of a storm, along with district’s ambulance, which it currently rents out to the Island Park Fire Department. 

“We have to be prepared for whatever happens,” Bettineschi told the small crowd at the meeting.

The board of fire commissioners approved construction of the building in 2012 — when Hurricane Sandy damaged the district’s previous structure — using funds from a $1.3 million reserve earmarked for the project roughly 20 years ago, according to Bettineschi.

After nearly five years and two rounds of bidding in an attempt to reduce costs, the district settled on a design for a modular structure, which was submitted to the Town of Hempstead Building Department on July 14, according to documents provided by the town.

Construction currently awaits approval for a special exception from the Town Zoning Board of Appeals for a 23-space parking lot that would straddle a business and residential zoning district, which Bettineschi told residents is expected to be approved. Lynbrook-based architect Thomas Domanico presented the case to the zoning board on Nov. 29.

At the meeting, however, some residents, like Schurin, expressed skepticism about the project ­— and the possibility of politics at play.

Too much government?
The Barnum Island Fire District is a commissioner-run special district under the umbrella of the Town of Hempstead, providing fire and emergency medical service protection to the 2,487 people and 670 families in 863 homes and 150 commercial properties within its jurisdiction. It does so without firefighters, trucks or a fire department.

Additionally, it rents and maintains Barnum Island’s fire hydrants through a contract with New York American Water.

According to district’s 2018 budget, obtained through a Freedom of Information Law request, and the village’s 2017-18 budget available on its website, roughly $458,000 of the district’s $616,000 budget levied against Barnum Island taxpayers goes to the village for fire protection, while Harbor Island residents pay around $174,000. The village’s total Fire Department budget is $677,000.

Mayor Michael McGinty told the Herald that the village provides in-kind services such as Department of Public Works and administrative services. “You’ll see them on the expenses side,” he said.

Commissioner-run special districts are prevalent in Nassau County, but not in other counties, according to former county comptroller Howard Weitzman, a Democrat who held the seat from 2001 to 2009. In 2005, his office released a report questioning the necessity of special districts after audits of multiple sanitation districts revealed “serious financial mismanagement.”

“Nassau has more special districts than any county in New York state,” he told the Herald in a phone interview, but said that his office never had the authority to audit a fire district because of state regulations.

All special districts were formed at the beginning of the 20th century, he said, as unincorporated areas in western Nassau County grew in population. Villages could provide basic municipal services such as garbage collection and fire protection, and farmers were largely self-sufficient. But as farm tracts were subdivided, and the ability to remain self-sufficient eroded, residents pooled their resources and elected local residents as commissioners to provide the critical services.

By the 1930s, however, the state stopped this practice and mandated that town governments administer their own special districts when the need arose. Harbor Island is an example of the town contracting with the Village of Island Park for fire protection.

Development of the larger Island Park area generally began in the early 1920s when the land was purchased by the Island Park-Long Beach Corporation, according to a series of historical excerpts compiled by Hofstra University professor emerita Natalie Naylor, available at the Island Park Public Library.
In 1926, the Village of Island Park became an incorporated village, excluding the areas known as Barnum and Harbor Island, because of low populations.

“There was nothing there at all, which is why Harbor Isle and Barnum Island did not become part of the village,” said then village public works Supervisor Michael Masone in a 1972 Newsday article outlining the origins of Island Park’s unusual configuration. “I guess the village officials were scared to gamble on that land; today they’re sorry, no doubt.”

According to town records, the original resolution declaring the formation of the Barnum Island Fire District was passed on May 9, 1930, and remains as a legacy organization after the state ban.

“They were grandfathered in,” Weitzman said, but added that the district’s continued effectiveness was an “arguable point.”

“Commissioners will say we provide a face to the fire district, and residents can call them,” he explained.

Additionally, district officials at the Nov. 14 meeting argued that they keep the cost of fire protection down, and Bettineschi later told the Herald that one advantage was the district’s ability to negotiate the prices of contracts.

But “the cold, hard fact is that people get the same service from town districts,” Weitzman countered.

District employees
The district employs a secretary and treasurer, and retains an attorney as a consultant. Hewlett-based attorney Nicholas DeSibio serves as district counsel and is an active member and contributor to the Island Park Lido-Point Lookout Republican Club, according to state Board of Elections records. DeSibio declined to comment for this article.

“Richie’s having a tough time, like many in this community, because of that connection,” resident Michael Scully told the group of commissioners of the specter of politics in municipal services.

Some residents, though, expressed appreciation for the services the district pays to provide. “I’m thankful Barnum Island has a fire district because our taxes are lower,” said civic association board member Patti Ambrosia.

And arguing for his district’s effectiveness, Bettineschi told the Herald, “We provide the best fire protection and EMS service.”