Town of Brookhaven News and Notes

Hell hath no fury like when senior citizens are denied their weekly bingo game. This was the message the Town of Brookhaven board received at last week's meeting. 

The seniors, coupled with large groups of other people at the meeting to be heard on various issues forced the Fire Marshall to close the meeting because the hearing room was filled to its 346 person capacity.

Dozens of senior residents from Birchwood at Spring Lake in Middle Island were at the meeting to show support for their private community and to protest the ban on their weekly bingo game. The game was shut down earlier in the month after a town inspector visited the game held in the community's private clubhouse and discovered the permit for the game was expired.

One of the speakers had a hard time holding back her anger as she addressed the Board.

"The weekly bingo game was just for seniors who don't have much else to do because of some of their ages and limitations," said Sandre Feuerstein, the vice president and assistant chairperson of  Birchwood's senior citizens group. "The Town should reinstate bingo in the meanwhile until the paperwork for the permit is straightened out instead of being attacked by a storm trooper like we were."

Only a few items on the agenda were directly related to Sachem:

• Road work is continuing in the area as three new work permits were approved. One was issued to Lake Shore Plaza, LLC, for work on Cenacle Road in Ronkonkoma; another was issued to Hawkeye LLC for work on Eleventh Street, also in Ronkonkoma and one was issued to Scheff Family Realty Co., LLC/The Burmax Co., Inc. for work on Barrett Avenue in Holtsville.

The Board still has yet to decide whether or not to consider a change of zone on a number of Lake Ronkonkoma properties which were originally presented at the June 8 meeting.

The following zone changes were discussed:

• The zone changes are for a property located on Hanrahan Avenue in Farmingville from A residence 1 to J Business; 
• an application by the Portuguese Soccer Club for a change of zone and amendment of Restrictive Covenants on a property in Farmingville from J Business 4 to J Business 2; 
• and a request to remove a No Parking sign from the front of a home on Oakdale Avenue and Granny Avenue in Farmingville.

The other reason the meeting drew such a large crowd was because of the proposal of a new shopping center in Middle Island. Breslin Realty applied for a zone change for the vacant K-Mart property on Middle Country Road so a developer can build the new Artist Lake Plaza center.

Several members from Birchwood's Civic Association addressed the board in support of the new center while many other residents spoke out against it out of concern for nearby Carman's River. Environmentalists fear the river may be in danger of pollution from ground water roll off during construction of any kind and asked the Board to do more research on that possible threat before granting Breslin's request. However, the board voted in favor of the zone change.