Hearing on Plum Island Sale

The federal government’s plan to sell Plum Island, a former animal disease research center off Orient Point, will be subject of a public hearing on Monday.

The New York State Assembly’s environmental conservation committee opposes the sale of the 840-acre island, and is urging the federal government to instead create a National Wildlife Refuge there. The public hearing is meant to attract testimony on steps that can be taken “to preserve Plum Island as open space in light of the pending sale.”

The hearing will take place in the auditorium of Brookhaven Town Hall, at 1 Independence Hill in Farmingville at 11 a.m.

In a June 16 letter to Senator Charles Schumer, State Assemblyman Steve Englebright, the committee’s chairman, as well as Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr. and 20 other members of the State Legislature, protested Congress’s plans to sell the island and use the proceeds to decommission the Plum Island Animal Disease Center and set up a new government research facility in Kansas. The committee argued that two factors will render the sale disadvantageous: the high anticipated costs associated with decommissioning the research facility and Southold Town’s 2013 rezoning of Plum Island for conservation and research purposes.

Mr. Englebright and his colleagues also said the sale of Plum Island “runs counter” to past dispositions of federal property, including those in the Northeast that led to the creation of several National Wildlife Refuges, and “is incongruous” with efforts on Long Island and in New York State to preserve parkland over the last 30 years.

Those wishing to make remarks during Monday’s public hearing must sign up in advance by filling out an online form available at the New York State Assembly’s website, assembly.state.ny.us, or by printing out the form and mailing it in.