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GREENBURGH, N.Y. – An environmental service agency hired to identify contaminants at the former Frank's Nursery site has issued several recommendations for remediation to Greenburgh officials.
Any cleanup should be integrated into the site's redevelopment in consultation with the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, said representatives from Woodard and Curran.
The Dobbs Ferry Road site remained undeveloped until 1967. A 50,000-square-foot commercial building was built during the 1970s. Greenburgh officials are deciding whether to sell the town-owned site to a sports complex. Officials hope to finalize plans this month, Greenburgh Town Supervisor Paul Feiner said.
Two companies have pitched bids to buy the site. Game On 365 has proposed buying it for $1.5 million and paying for the remediation. House of Sports offered to buy the site for $3.5 million in January, also saying it would assume the cleanup costs.
“Once we make a decision, we will ask that the group that buys the property to clean up the property,” Feiner said in an email. “I don't anticipate that the town will pay the costs.”
Greenburgh hired Woodard and Curran to investigate the status of an April 2001 oil spill, which included an above-ground storage tank used to store emergency heating oil. Representatives found several potential carcinogens at the site from the spill and historic fill used on the property for development.
Woodard and Curran found several contaminants in the site's soil that exceeded New York State guidelines for commercial and residential properties, including pesticides, PCBs, semi-volatile organic compounds, volatile organic compounds and metals. Several pollutants were also found in the site's groundwater: barium, lead, manganese and semi-volatile organic compounds.
Representatives will work with the New York State Department of Conservation to design a remediation plan but have recommended taking out the storage tank, excavating soils, using asphalt caps to minimize risk of exposure and developing a soil management plan for redevelopment.
Comments (5)
Prediction: After all the noise, the Town Board will make the sale of the property to GameOn 365. They will rationalize the sale as keeping their word, GO365 was the only company interested for a long time, the Town Board was proven to be acting illegally with a lease but wants to "make it up" to GO 365, they don't believe House of Sports is sincere (although publicly offering $3+M cannot be anything but sincere), it would eliminate competition by having one company run two facilities (watch out Pizza & Brew, CVS, Dunkin' Donuts) or simply, this was the best thing for everyone – quick, into executive session! When you are used to acting illegally, you simply won't care about the truth and will do what you want. NY1IMFUN is right: Sell it to the highest bidder!
Greenburgh needs more than a nursery cleanup. We need to clean out the current lifers on the Town Board - all five of them known as
Duck
Dodge
Weave
Obfuscate
and Delay .
"Representatives will work with the New York State Department of Conservation to design a remediation plan but have recommended taking out the storage tank, excavating soils, using asphalt caps to minimize risk of exposure and developing a soil management plan for redevelopment."
Duh.
Apart from whomever "representatives" represents, did anyone expect a permanent quarantine of the premises? Of course the site can be remediated by taking out the storage tank, "excavating" (alternate spelling r-e-m-o-v-i-n-g) soils and using asphalt caps to minimize exposure. This cost taxpayers over $110,000? I say "cost taxpayers" because, despite Feiner telling voters in the Referendum that GameON 365 would be contributing $250,000 toward this cost (an intentional lie to win support for the Proposition), this money would only be an obligation had the Lease been signed which, of course, it was not and only Feiner knew this before the Referendum.
But, now that the money has been spent, what have we learned that we didn't already know?
And even without Woodward and Curran's advice ("Any cleanup should be integrated into the site's redevelopment in consultation with the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, said representatives from Woodard and Curran."), this is also something we knew from the start.
So what was accomplished by all this meticulously filled out paperwork? Well, now it is official and the Town has complied with the requirements insofar as performing soil testing however begrudgingly it was undertaken. That it took two steps to get there is a black mark against Woodward and Curran which never should have undertaken this assignment (knowing what the site was to be used for) without requiring the Town to test the ENTIRE area not just that to be covered by a building. Submitting the very first draft of the Phase 2 which ignored the land areas intended as outdoor playing fields for use by children and then saying they weren't instructed to look at them does not say very much for their professional integrity nor for that of their employers.
So now we at the point of having a "complete" study, no referential statement of what it would cost to mitigate the problems and a Feiner commanded Town Board which is "mulling" over and offer from Game On 365 (those wonderful folks who never intended to sign the Lease) and that of competitor House of Sports which is more than 2 times higher.
And not so difficult to understand is that Feiner refuses to conduct a new auction now that only a sale is to be the outcome. No doubt he hopes that House of Sports can be persuaded to withdraw their offer, leaving only one offer to consider: that from Game On 365. An offer that will provide perhaps crumbs to Greenburgh taxpayers after paying back the existing tax arrears.
Taxpayers as a group should compare their plight to that of last night's goat.
No matter how many times and for whatever righteous reasons they keep butting their heads against Feiner's wall, all they succeed in accomplishing is chewing on their own cud.
Hal Samis
Sell it to highest bidder. Clean it up. Develop it for sports. Let the kids enjoy it.. right now it is an eyesore.