More than 100 people attended the first public meeting of the Cross Street Alliance on Wednesday night, with the objective of pressing the case for making the Cross Street School a community center for Williston Park but with no clear path to do that.
Leaders of the group say they are not trying to interfere with the deal that the Mineola Board of Education has in place to lease the Cross Street School to the Solomon Schechter School of Glen Cove next fall in the first phase of its school consolidation plan. But former Williston Park trustee Crista Mills said the residents would be ready with proposal if the Schechter pact falls through, as some anticipate it will when the results of a traffic study recently commissioned by the Mineola School Board are revealed.
“We’re seeking a consensus. First of all, it is a plan B,” Mills said at the meeting in the Williston Park American Legion Hall. “If the Schechter deal falls through because of the traffic study, we should be ready with a plan B.”
There is a presumption that the traffic study will reveal that the 36 buses the Schechter School expects will transporting 250 or more students daily will cause unacceptable traffic tie-ups on Hillside Avenue and present safety hazards for students at the nearby St. Aidan School, and could impede emergency vehicles on Hillside.
“To permit proper traffic flow, you need a loop,” said Fred Otto, a retired bus driver who has volunteered for many advisory boards to the Mineola School Board.
The other vocal concern among residents is access to the playing fields, which the Mineola School Board has granted to local little league and CYO teams over the years.
“I grew up playing on those fields. I don’t want to see them go,” one resident said.
After the meeting, Mills said many of those in attendance expressed told her they wanted to participate in the effort. She said the Cross Street Alliance will organize interested residents into committees to explore viable options to making their concept of a community center at Cross Street into a reality. And she said Mineola Superintendent of Schools Michael Nagler seemed open to a proposal from the group.
“He certainly was open to what we shared with him,” she said. But she told the assembled residents at the meeting that being vigilant about the situation was key to a successful result. “If we want this to happen, we have to stay on top of this.”
One source said Nagler would only be convinced to consider the option of leasing Cross Street for a community center if he was assured that the residents and Williston Park Mayor Paul Ehrbar supported the idea.
Nagler declined to comment on the Cross Street Alliance’s proposal after the last week’s Mineola School Board meeting.
In a column in the current issue of the Williston Times, Ehrbar emphatically stated his opposition to the village becoming involved in the effort.
“The village is not in a position, in any way, to become involved in the leasing/operation of the Cross Street facility,” Ehrbar wrote.
After last week’s village board meeting, Trustee Teresa Thomann, who previously had said she wanted time for the board to be able to “explore options” about Cross Street, said she supported the concept of a community center, but didn’t see an opening for the village.
“I do believe in the community center. But it’s not our property and we can’t negotiate,” she said.
Mills and local sports activist Terrence Kennedy, who co-chaired the meeting, reported that 83 of 100 residents are willing to pay between $25 and $75 more annually in taxes. That was out of 200 residents who returned the hand-delivered surveys, according to Kennedy.
He said the group’s immediate need was to build awareness in the community, and expand the survey.
“There are 5,000 other people in this village who we need to get involved,” Kennedy said.
Both Mills and Kennedy exhorted residents to contact their elected officials.
Mills said does see a possible need for public funds to get the community center started, and said the issue should be put to a vote if the property could be leased.
“I believe the community has the right, if the building becomes available, to make it a referendum,” she said.
Mills recounted that when she was a young woman, she suggested the idea of turning a vacant building on Willis Avenue into a community center, but said her suggestion was summarily dismissed at the time.
“I wouldn’t want the community to miss another opportunity,” she said.
Resident Tom Granger said the group should push the case for a community center, despite the pending deal between the Mineola School Board and the Schechter School.
“We should never give up,” Granger said.
Resident Umberto Magnardi said the community center should be seen as a potential boon to all residents, but made his case for senior citizens.
“These people who are sitting in their homes built this village. They deserve something back from it,” Magnardi said to enthusiastic applause.
Former mayor and village justice Alan Reardon, who is advising the Cross Street Alliance, was present but didn’t speak during the meeting. He maintains that the village should condemn the property by right of eminent domain.
“It could be done. They would have to paid fair market value for it,” Reardon said.
He dismissed concerns some residents have raised about an undercurrent of anti-semitism fueling the initiative for a community center as a way of preventing a private Jewish religious school from establishing itself in Williston Park. A flyer describing the Schechter School as “yeshiva” – which it is noit – was distributed in bulletins at Sunday mass in St. Aidan Church to alert residents to a village board meeting on the subject.
“It’s not about that. It wouldn’t matter who was coming in there, whether it was Episcopalians or Catholics,” Reardon said.
He said he thinks the community center could sustain itself by renting space in the center for meetings and receiving rights fees to permit sports teams from outside the village to use the playing fields.
