Southampton Supe Eyes Grant Money for Dune Road
The Town of Southampton is working to come up with $5.1 million to elevate Dune Road from Hampton Bays to Quogue. Parts of the road can be impassable during high tides.
The town has been planning for the better part of six years to raise a 5.1-mile stretch, from the Shinnecock Inlet in Hampton Bays to the Village of Quogue, by two feet. Supervisor Jay Schneiderman said the county has offered a $3 million grant, but the deal is far from done, as the town has to come up with the rest before the county will commit the money. Quogue Village is undertaking the elevation of its portion of Dune Road, another 1.2 miles, at a cost of $1 million.
The previous town administration had already budgeted $1 million for the project, and with property owners along a stretch willing to kick in some money, there remains a gap of about $500,000. Mr. Schneiderman has proposed going out to bond for the shortfall, and the rest of the town board is mulling it over.
“We know this has to be done,” he said at a recent work session. “The big challenge to elevating Dune Road has long been how do we pay for it?”
County Executive Steve Bellone’s office told the supervisor that $3 million from a Community Development Block Grant that had been specified for disaster recovery had been freed up. One of the grant’s criteria is that the money be used in an area that the census tract identifies being more than 50 percent low to moderate income.
Lower income is not exactly what comes to mind when thinking about Dune Road, with its water views and proximity to the ocean, and Alex Gregor, the town highway superintendent, objected on that basis at a work session with the town board last Thursday. “I look at Dune Road, I see the average house is $5 million. It doesn’t make me feel that comfortable putting a grant that’s supposed to be for poor and impoverished people on a millionaire’s road.”
He said he had found $2.7 million in roadwork that is needed in lower-income neighborhoods of Flanders, Riverside, and Northampton.
Frank Zappone, the deputy supervisor, who sat in on the work session, told Mr. Gregor that the road is part of a community, defined by the census bureau, in which 58 percent of its residents fall into the lower to moderate income bracket. Also, Mr. Zappone said the road not only serves those who have a house along it, but the entire community.
Mr. Schneiderman said he was surprised by Mr. Gregor’s stance, and added that income threshold was only one of the criteria that have to be met. He said he was not sure if the areas Mr. Gregor mentioned that were in need of $2.7 million in roadwork would even be eligible for the grant money. He also said residents of the erosion control district may be contributing as much as 10 percent for the project.
“You’re using the mainland people to give credibility to get this grant,” Mr. Gregor said.
“I’ve been under the assumption that this was a priority project for you,” Mr. Schneiderman said. Mr. Gregor responded that he was trying to balance “the needs of the many against the few.” With 450 miles of centerline road throughout the town and only $2.1 million to spend annually, he said it is difficult to consider spending so much on only five miles of road.
Mr. Gregor also questioned whether the town even owns the road, pulling out copies of a 1964 deed that he said transferred ownership to the county. Mr. Schneiderman asked James Burke, the town attorney, to research the matter.
While the rest of the town board mulls over the funding possibilities, Mr. Schneiderman said he felt the time was right to pull the trigger. “Do we wait for the next major hurricane, which may or may not come? We know we’re going to have flooding chronically,” he said.
With permits from the Department of Environmental Conservation already in place, work could begin as early as this fall if the board decides to move forward with the project.