Arthur Smyles, owner and operator of Learn and Play day care center, received a primer in protocol and etiquette when his application to double the size of the 14,000-foot Herricks Road facility was put on hold at last Wednesday’s night Village of Mineola board meeting.
Smyles is seeking expansion of an existing special-use permit for the daycare center at 80 Herricks Rd. to take over the adjacent space of a dollar store that he also operates on the property. He said his plan called for increasing the number of licensed personnel, who he described as “teachers” at the site from 40 to 60 to handle what would be an expanded population of pre-K youngsters at the facility.
Village board members expressed misgivings about the traffic the increased size of the facility would create and the safety aspects of the building itself.
“You’re going to have substantially more staff than you have parking spots,” Village of Mineola Mayor Lawrence Werther said.
Smyles replied that, while the site has some “stack” parking, the expansion would not present a problem.
“We don’t have a problem with teachers parking. We have a problem with retail,” he said. At a later point in the discussion, he said some of the day care staff travel by train to work.
Village of Mineola Trustee Paul Cusato said he had recently visited the site, and observed what appeared to be a single roadway for traffic coming into and out of the facility, and asked how emergency vehicles would gain access to the building in case of fire.
Smyles said the building was compliant with state law, but confirmed that the single roadway offered the only access to the facility.
Trustee Paul Pereira told Smyles that he though the information that he was providing was imprecise.
“We expect answers that are concrete, that are definitive. I’m concerned about the parking there,” Pereira said.
Smyles said that parking wasn’t an issue because parents “want to get in and out” when dropping off their children in the morning or picking them up later in the day.
Trustee Scott Strauss said he wasn’t concerned about the amount of time cars spent in the parking lot, but said he was concerned about the volume of cars going in and out.
“If you don’t grant this application, you’re harming your community, simple as that,” Smyles said.
Werther brusquely replied, “Mr. Smyles don’t accuse this board of harming the community.”
Smyles immediately apologized, saying Werther misunderstood him and adding that Mineola “has been very good to me” over the past 40 years.
Strauss asked Smyles if he had ever submitted an evacuation plan for the building to the Mineola Fire Department, and questioned the daycare proprietor’s veracity when Smyles said he had done so.
“I’ve never seen an evacuation plan,” said Strauss, a former Mineola Fire Department chief.
The board recessed for a conference and Werther suggested that Smyles return at a later date – to be set for sometime in April – with an emergency-access plan for fire and ambulance vehicles. He also told Smyles he should provide the board with his application to the state Department of Family Services for his planned expansion – which Smyles said that department was encouraging – along with his license. And Werther said the director of the center should also be present.
In contrast, board members complemented the preceding applicant, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, for its preparation on an application to establish a meeting house at 111 Willis Ave., the former site of a Salvation Army center.
Richard Hedberg, a real estate project manager for the church, said the church’s Sunday worship services would typically last for three hours, and said the church also held infrequent Friday night “socials.” He said he anticipated the adjacent parking lot would accommodate a relatively small congregation that the church, commonly known as the Mormon Church, was seeking to relocate from Lynbrook to Mineola.
“We wanted to be here,” Hedberg said.
The church currently has meeting houses in Little Neck, Plainview and Riverhead, according to Hedberg, who said the Mineola location was geographically preferable to Lynbrook.
Asked about outreach activities, Hedberg said the church’s members organize at what he called “bishop’s storehouses” separate from the meeting centers, where they organize commodities to be donated to those in need.
He said the meeting house could see heavier use during the Christmas season and noted that funerals could be held there. But he said weddings are performed in Mormon temples, with the closest one in Manhattan.
Fernando Fernandez, architect for the church, said he planned to “freshen up” the landscaping and the building housing the meeting house.
The village board voted unanimously to assert that no environmental review of the site would be required and, on advice of village attorney John Spellman, referred the matter to the Nassau County planning board for review.
