Looking to up quality of process that's often a slog
The Nassau Hub in Uniondale, seen in June 2021, has undergone multiple state environmental reviews over the years but remains a stretch of vacant asphalt. Credit: Kevin P. Coughlin
For decades, Long Island's many layers of municipal governments have used the requirement of state environmental review before a project could be cleared for development as both a tool and a weapon.
When it works well, the State Environmental Quality Review Act, or SEQRA, allows government leaders to address legitimate concerns like traffic and water quality and, when appropriate, secure community benefits. The community plays a role, the developer listens and makes necessary changes, and the project, ultimately, is built.
Unfortunately, that's not how the SEQRA process, as it is known, often works in practice. Instead, local leaders will use environmental reviews as a delay tactic, stretching approvals for as long as a decade — or longer. In other instances, even when the review findings favor the development proceeding, elected officials will find a nugget within the extensive documentation to stop it dead.
On Long Island especially, legitimate environmental issues end up becoming cover-ups for the real reasons why a community might reject new housing. A SEQRA review's discussion of traffic or noise will become code for residents who express concern about changes to the "character" or "integrity" of their communities. A thoughtful analysis about density or the number of units a particular proposal offers will turn into residents' unfounded worries that their bucolic suburb will soon become their dark and dangerous version of Queens.
Some properties, such as the Nassau Hub in Uniondale, have undergone multiple state environmental reviews over the years — and the end result has been the same every time: vacant stretches of asphalt.
In her state budget proposal, Gov. Kathy Hochul is proposing some limited changes to the SEQRA process — tweaks she hopes will speed it up for some and alleviate the red tape for others. Hochul suggests capping part of the process at two years for all developments, albeit some permitted extensions. And housing projects that include "no significant" environmental impacts, have fewer than 100 units, comply with existing zoning and are connected to water and sewer might not need a full environmental review.
Such a first step could ease the bureaucratic maze of building on Long Island in some instances. It might even propel development forward in a few cases, especially where the will is already there. But most housing proposals in Nassau and Suffolk counties likely won't qualify for an exemption. More often than not, building housing here requires some type of zoning change. In Suffolk, many new housing proposals require new sewer expansions or alternative arrangements. And the housing proposals that could make a real dent in Long Island's housing crisis are larger than 99 units. To have an impact, a larger threshold is needed.
Then there's the time limit. While capping a SEQRA review at two years seems like a relief, it also could backfire — especially if elected officials decide they'd try to just say "no" when they can no longer extend a review further and deal with any legal challenges later.
Hochul included the SEQRA reforms as part of her so-called "Let Them Build" agenda. But if area residents and local leaders don't want "them" to build, they'll stop it another way. They'll find a new weapon — like zoning, or infrastructure, or the refusal to award needed tax breaks, or demands for extensive community benefits — and hang their "no" on that.
Columnist Randi F. Marshall's opinions are her own.
Randi Marshall is a member of the Newsday editorial board.
