Village of Great Neck Plaza trustees again adjourned discussions on an application for a proposed 61-unit apartment complex at 15 Bond St. Wednesday, but said they were closer to making a state environmental report determination.
Village Attorney Richard Gabriele said the village received a letter from its consultant hours before Wednesday’s Board of Trustees meeting stating that the village had all of the necessary materials to make its State Environmental Quality Review Assessment determination.
“The next step would be for the village to evaluate all of the materials it has to reach a SEQRA determination,” Gabriele said. “That probably won’t happen until one of the meetings in June.”
The Village Board had voted in July to become the lead agency on the project to handle the State Environmental Quality Review Assessment, which determines if the project would have any significant environmental impacts on the surrounding area. The engineering firm VHB was hired by the village to oversee the SEQRA review.
While the board said it had all of the materials it needed, attorney Chris Prior, who represents residents from the four buildings surrounding the proposed dwelling, said he was concerned that VHB’s final report made no mention of monitoring wells that two of the surrounding buildings had installed to monitor underground water levels to ensure the proposed building could sufficiently retain stormwater runoff, preventing damage to any surrounding buildings.
Prior said he sent an email on May 2 to the village, the applicant’s attorney, and VHB with updated readings from the monitoring wells his clients paid to have installed.
“It’s the anticipation of the neighbors that VHB is aware of these things and is addressing them and that is what we wanted to make sure was happening,” he said.
Gabriele said that while VHB may not have referenced the monitor well readings in its letter to the village, they did receive the report.
“My concern is that VHB did not take into account the existence of these monitoring wells,” Prior said. “We’ve gone through the expense of doing it so you have that information.”
Village of Great Neck Plaza Mayor Jean Celender confirmed that all necessary materials were received by both the village and VHB, and said the board would prepare to make a decision for next month.
“We do know your requests and what you thought should be studied,” Celender said. “If that wasn’t clearly identified in their letter, then that was an oversight.”
“We will look at everything you have submitted and evaluate everything,” she added.
As well as water drainage issues, residents of the four surrounding buildings — Westminster Hall Apartments, located at 4 Maple Place, The Cartier Apartments, located at 21 Bond St. 22, Park Place and 25 Park Place — have voiced concerns at past meetings about the applicant’s zoning variance requests.
The developers are seeking a height variance that would permit a four-story, 45-foot-high building. Village zoning laws permit only three-story buildings that are 45-feet high.
The developers also asked for a 13-foot-high room on top of the building that would be used as a recreation room.
Paul Bloom, attorney for Effie Namdar of 14 Park Place LLC, which is seeking to build the complex, had said at a previous village Board of Zoning Appeals meeting that many buildings surrounding 15 Bond St. are more than three stories high.
The application was adjourned to the June 15 meeting.
