Compare Fresh grocery store opening at Hempstead's 159 Main retail, affordable-housing development

 

A Hispanic-format grocery store is opening Friday at a $155 million retail and affordable-housing development, which is part of transit-linked revitalization efforts in the Village of Hempstead's downtown.

The store, Compare Fresh, occupies about 17,000 square feet in the recently built mixed-use development, called 159 Main, which was stalled for several years before construction started in 2023.

The new store will fill a void in the area, said José Ureña, who owns the store with his wife, Lisset Ureña.

"The north part of Main Street has for years been underserved grocery-wise, healthy food-wise," he said. "So, by being on the first floor of this particular building, we have easy access for customers to have ... fresh groceries."

The store's offerings include grab-and-go, frozen and dairy products; a large produce section; and full-service meat, seafood, deli and bakery departments, said José Ureña, adding that the store employs 52 full- and part-time workers.

In addition to mainstream American products, the store carries popular Central American products, such as plantains, yuca, banana leaves and frozen tamales, as well as spices, beans and rice, he said.

Of the 58,801 residents of the village, 26,658, or 45.3%, were Hispanic or Latino of any race and 26,439, or 45%, were Black in 2024, according to the latest data from the U.S. Census Bureau.

The Ureñas own another Hispanic-format Compare Foods grocery store that opened in Brentwood in 2022.

The Ureñas' stores are affiliated with Associated Supermarket Group, a Port Washington-based company that provides services to independently owned grocery stores in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic.

ASG provides distribution, marketing, store financing and/or other services to 291 stores in eight states, including 11 banners operating on Long Island, such as Best Farms Market and Uncle Giuseppe's Marketplace.

ASG owns several grocery store banners, including Compare Fresh, Compare Foods, Met Foodmarkets and Pioneer.

Revitalization efforts include incentives

Conifer LLC, a Rochester-based real estate company that specializes in building and managing affordable housing in New York, New Jersey, Maryland and Pennsylvania, developed the 159 Main St. project with Community Development Long Island, a Melville-based nonprofit developer and manager of housing.

Construction was completed in November 2025, said Joseph Simone Jr., superintendent of Hempstead's building department.

The 228 studio, one- and two-bedroom apartments are split between two buildings totaling 323,198 square feet on 2.54 acres. Also, the development has 22,600 square feet for ground-floor retail, including Compare Fresh.

A Chinese restaurant and two small stores will take the rest of the commercial space, José Ureña said.

Eligible apartment applicants must have household incomes between 30% and 90% of the area median. It is unclear what percentage of the units are leased. Conifer did not respond to a request for comment Wednesday.

Because 159 Main is a few blocks from LIRR and bus stations, it is considered a transit-oriented project.

The project received more than $136 million in county, state and federal financial incentives, Conifer told Newsday in November 2024.

The Town of Hempstead Industrial Development Agency granted mortgage recording and sales tax exemptions, a 30-year payments-in-lieu-of-taxes agreement, or PILOT, on the residential portion and a 20-year PILOT on the commercial portion of the project in 2022.

Conifer initially proposed the project in 2016, but under then-mayor Don Ryan, developers proposing housing and other projects ran into challenges getting them added to the village's agendas.

Ryan discouraged the approval of those developments, particularly when they required tax incentives.

That policy changed under Mayor Waylyn Hobbs Jr. after he was elected in 2021.

Financial incentives are needed to attract developments to Hempstead, Hobbs said.

"The PILOTs that we have supported have also come with community benefits," such as developers paying fees to support improving parks, streets, sewers and other areas across the village, Hobbs said.

The 159 Main St. project was the first development built in a 26-acre overlay zone that the village created in 2012 to speed up the approval process for developers wishing to build commercial and residential projects downtown, Simone said.

The second project in the zone, Estella Housing, built at 150 Bedell St., across from 159 Main, was finished in June 2025 by Georgica Green Ventures and Concern for Independent Living, Simone said. The $72 million development, which also received county, state and federal financial incentives, brought 96 affordable-housing units.