Nonprofit finally seals deal with $11.5M purchase of coveted Aquebogue property for conservation

The recent $11.5 million acquisition of a 100-acre former duck farm in Aquebogue that was long sought for conservation is a crucial link in efforts to provide climate change resiliency and protect water quality and wildlife, local officials and environmental groups said.

Efforts to purchase Broad Cove, which is on the waterfront of Flanders Bay, date to the 1960s. The Peconic Land Trust announced recently that the nonprofit had acquired the property, which once housed the Celic Duck Farm.

John v.H. Halsey, president of the Southampton-based nonprofit, said New York State, Suffolk County and local environmental groups had made many efforts over time to acquire the land — one of the largest privately owned properties near the Peconic Estuary. Ultimately, a 2020 inquiry from the land trust to the property owners put the sale in motion.

Halsey said the owners, Walo LLC, were entertaining serious offers for the property when the nonprofit stepped in. The land trust was given a short window of time to ask donors for help raising the money.

"We had very little time, but this was a one-in-a-million piece of property," Halsey said. "It’s so important to the Peconic Bay Estuary from a resiliency standpoint through the lens of climate change."

The COVID-19 pandemic stalled all negotiations on the property, which may have given the nonprofit more time to secure funding, Halsey said. Through private donors, the land trust eventually secured six lines of credit to close the deal and $500,000 for carrying costs, according to Julie Wesnofske, the nonprofit’s project manager.

The property will eventually be available for passive recreation, while also providing climate change resiliency, wildlife habitat and water-quality protection in that area of the estuary.

With the property zoned under tourism/resort campus, developers have eyed it for building. In 2016, a proposal from Red Cedar Meadows LLC was made to town officials for a 500-unit resort and spa on the site. The proposal ultimately fell through.

Suffolk Legis. Al Krupski (D-Cutchogue) told Newsday he had met with the property owners during one of the county’s deal proposals that fell through. With the parcel now protected, Krupski said he hopes it will be kept in its natural state with some public passive access.

"This is such an important parcel. There’s so few that are like this left," Krupski said. "And it ties into all the preserved county park land there and Indian Island County Park, so it makes for a nice big preservation area there."

Richard Amper, executive director of the Riverhead-based Long Island Pine Barrens Society, told Newsday that environmental groups had been worried for many years that the environmentally-sensitive property would be developed, and he felt local officials had not paid enough attention to protecting it in years past.

"We were worried for a long time that that land would be lost to development, and now it seems they’ve got it right," Amper said.