Mysterious Plum Island up for sale

Long shrouded in secrecy because of the federal animal disease laboratory there, Plum Island opened its doors Wednesday to about 30 conservation advocates and local officials, many of whom would like to see it become a wildlife refuge.

Plum Island is supposed to be sold as part of a plan to build a larger and more secure laboratory in Kansas. Opponents say the sale of the 840-acre island - which will not happen for several years, if it goes through - will not provide enough money to build the new lab. Concerns also remain about whether highly contagious animal diseases such as foot-and-mouth disease should be studied on the mainland.

In the meantime, environmental advocates from both sides of Long Island Sound have cast their eyes on Plum Island's less-celebrated natural features: rare birds, 6 miles of undeveloped shoreline, acres of wetlands and one of the region's biggest seal colonies. Many say the island should be shared with the public, not sold to the highest bidder.

"It's an island geographically, but it's also an island of habitat that isn't developed in a landscape that is overdeveloped," said Carolyn Spilman of Audubon New York, which has done about a dozen surveys there since 2007 to document bird populations. "We've detected about 110 species either breeding, foraging or migrating, which is significant."

The community groups arrived by boat from Orient and Connecticut early in the morning, brimming with questions about residual contamination from the lab's early years and the island's prior military use. A number also brought binoculars, the better to spot rare ducks and other birds, or sleek harbor seals basking on the rocks.

A bus trip in the rain gave visitors a glimpse of the seals and some of the historical buildings there. Most of the time, however, was spent indoors, at briefings by officials from the Homeland Security department, which oversees the lab.

Visitors peppered Doug Ports, the lab's director of operations, with questions about groundwater and pollution from past activities.

Ports said more than $8 million has been spent on environmental restoration projects since 2003, but he offered few specifics. A map dating back to the 1990s that showed dozens of cleanup sites was passed around but no updates were available on their status or sources of the contamination.

"It was interesting, but not as informative as I had hoped," said Adrienne Esposito, executive director of Citizens Campaign for the Environment.

Ports said he hoped for another meeting to address the environmental concerns in more detail.