Islanders’ Lighthouse Project: Easier Said Than Done

With Election Day a week away, the Town of Hempstead supervisor battle between GOP incumbent Kate Murray and Democratic challenger Kristen McElroy has heated up. Although there has been much anticipation about a possible upset, Murray would have to lose about 15,000 votes that she received during the last election in order for McElroy to be able to pull this off.

One thing going against McElroy is that, despite being from Garden City, that is the same municipality that is up in arms against the Lighthouse Project, which would provide a new home for the New York Islanders. It is  not a secret that much of it has to do with G.C. business owners’ fear that they would lose retail business on Franklin Avenue to the new project.

Pulling out all the stops, and probably making Murray a little upset in the meantime, New York Islanders owner Charles Wang was spotted side-by-side with McElroy fielding questions from reporters at last Saturday’s Islanders-Capitals game at Nassau Coliseum.

Murray holds the cards and is obviously playing political games. Could she have asked Wang for a meeting to discuss downsizing the project just two weeks before the election just to make it look like she was extending an olive branch so she would get re-elected? That’s what I think. I really don’t know if she or the town council really wants this project approved. Any further downsizing and we’ll be staring at a re-paved parking lot with new flower planters.

What people fail to realize is that if any town board receives a proposal, they can send an applicant back as many times as they want until the plans meet their and other town departments’ requirements. In this, the re-zoning phase of approval, Murray and her constituents have had more than eight months to look through the proposal. There is no decision to date and she ensures the public that the Lighthouse Project hasn’t even taken the longest to receive approval, out of any past projects seeking it.

If Wang deep down does not want to move this team and really wants to keep them on Long Island, in that spot, Murray and the board have him in a stronghold and can make him wait as long as they want.

But Wang knows how valuable that piece of land is and how much money can be generated there just due to its location. With the Islanders’ refurbished arena just one piece of the LHP puzzle, wouldn’t it be interesting if the LHP group did strike a deal with another highly marketable area like Willets Point (Queens) or Brooklyn?

Murray could be long gone out of office once the LHP would be built and generating huge revenue in another municipality. But could you imagine how she would feel, knowing all those tax dollars got away? Then what would the leftover coliseum property look like?

If all of this falls through, the only option he would have would be to sell.