NYS gives $6 million to revamp Hempstead, Riverhead and Mastic Beach

New York State has awarded $6 million toward revitalization efforts in Hempstead Village, Mastic Beach and Riverhead Town, part of a statewide push to rehabilitate vacant and blighted areas.

Hempstead Village received $3 million to be used to demolish a parking garage and build 336 market-rate apartments in its place.

Brookhaven Town received $2 million to redevelop a half-mile stretch of Neighborhood Road in Mastic Beach. And the Town of Riverhead received a $1 million grant to help redesign the riverfront along the Peconic River.

The funding goes to knocking down vacant or blighted structures across the state, including aging parking garages, to help accelerate housing proposals and master developments in neighborhoods that are in the midst of multimillion-dollar transformations.

The Hempstead garage on Cooper Square North is vacant and abandoned, said Danielle Oglesby, commissioner of the Hempstead Community Development Agency. Demolition of the privately owned three-story garage is expected to take place next year.

"It's been a health and safety issue for the community, and we're very happy to be able to receive these funds to get something going there and add some economic development to the area," Oglesby said. "This is really to jump-start development south of Jackson Street within our downtown overlay zone." 

In Brookhaven, the town will rehabilitate 35 vacant and abandoned parcels on Neighborhood Road, state officials announced.

The $2 million grant for Mastic Beach is earmarked for a 750-slot parking garage, Brookhaven Supervisor Dan Panico said.  The garage will be used for a 500-unit multifamily condominium that will be the centerpiece of a multimillion-dollar, town-sponsored redevelopment of Neighborhood Road. The Beechwood Organization, a Jericho-based real estate company, is the project's master developer.

The proposal calls for the purchase of up to 140 downtown properties. It would feature multifamily condominiums, retail and restaurant space and parking, officials have said.

"The parking structure is in the tens of millions of dollars, the overall development is in the hundreds of millions," Panico said Monday. "This $2 million is helpful in that it helps [get] the project closer to the goal line."

In Riverhead, town officials are planning a $70 million renovation of the riverfront along the Peconic River. 

"Every little piece is important," said Dawn Thompson, Riverhead town director of community development.

"The goal is to recreate the riverfront ... as all public space," Thompson said of the larger project. "So it's the town square; it's a place for the community to gather."

The grant will be used for a portion of the demolition and to redevelop a town-owned building at 127 E. Main St. That property will be rebuilt as a hotel on the east side of Riverhead Town Square by Ronkonkoma-based J. Petrocelli Contracting Inc., the town's master developer on the Riverhead Town Square project.

The developer will buy the property from the town, Thompson said. The $30 million hotel will include 74 hotel rooms and 13 condominiums, according to state and town officials.

"It's part of our concept where we wanted that private development there," Thompson said. "It does benefit the town because we get that activation and that commercial use and the jobs and the economic benefit from it."