By Hank Russell
New York State Assemblyman Fred Thiele (D-Sag Harbor) appeared at LIMBA (Long Island Metro Business Action) at the Candlelight Diner in Commack on June 21 to speak on the topic “Economic Opportunities on the East End.”
Thiele, who announced that this is his last term as assemblyman, said the East End economy is “real estate-based” with many houses being bought as second homes. He said the East End economy is “booming” since the pandemic. “People say it’s seasonal, but I don’t know what season it is because people are living there year round.”
With home sales soaring the pandemic, revenues from the Community Preservation Fund — which is a 2% mortgage recording tax on each home sale with the money going towards the preservation of the East End’s water quality and open spaces – help preserve over 13,000 acres of land and generated more than $2 billion in revenues since it was first implemented 25 years ago.
In 2019, the year before the pandemic, the CPF generated $77 million. That was a dropoff from years past, according to Thiele, due to the elimination of the SALT cap. Two years later, it nearly tripled to $221 million. “that has been the basis of the [East End economy],” he said. “It’s a real estate-based economy. Based on the June traffic – which feels more like July or August – everyone’s expecting a good season.”
However, there is a lack of affordable housing on eastern Long Island. Thiele considered this to be “one of the biggest problems on the East End” because “nobody can afford to live on eastern Long Island.” This has resulted in staffing shortages at hospitals, schools and local businesses. “They don’t want to make that drive to the ‘trade parade’ [on County Road 39] from western Suffolk to eastern Long Island.”
His focus turned to the SUNY Southampton campus. While some parts of the campus are thriving — there are 400 graduate students studying health sciences, environmental sustainability and fine arts — other parts have abandoned and condemned buildings, including the windmill, some of the dormitories and the former administration building.
Thiele said there is “a lot of potential” to transform these buildings into affordable housing, in addition to plans to building a state-of-the-art hospital onsite to replace the 100-year-old Southampton Hospital. He also noted this housing proposal has been approved by the local community.
To get it going, Thiele said, it would require state legislation. He said he is also looking into sending out an RFP for a public-private partnership to develop the property.
“There is a potential to build a self-sufficient community with housing,” he said. “To Stony Brook’s credit, they are developing a plan for the overall campus.”
If the hospital and housing goaks are attainable, Thiele said, he will call on the LIRR to run more trains to the East End. “We’re trying to get more cars off the road,” he said. “County Road 39 is a nightmare.”
Five years ago, Thiele convinced the LIRR to run a train from Speonk to Montauk. Since then, two more trains are running eastbound during the morning and westbound during the afternoon.” That train has been incredibly popular,” he said. “People tell me, ‘We love it, we want more of it.’”
The only problem is that there is only one track. If there were an additional track, trains could run every half-hour instead of every two hours.
The towns also have funding to provide last-mile transportation. A bus picks up the commuters and drops them off at their places of employment. This means no more long commutes by car and public transportation is within walking distance of where they live.
“People need to get to work in a timely fashion and should try to live where they work,” he said.