Eastern Suffolk BOCES moving to Great River; shuttered Sequoya Middle to become multipurpose center

Eastern Suffolk BOCES will relocate one of its offices to Great River, making way for a new, multipurpose educational facility at the Holtsville school they currently lease.

The Patchogue-based educational cooperative signed a 20-year lease for 32,808 square feet in Sunrise Business Center at 3500 Sunrise Hwy., said Andrew Wiener, head of commercial leasing for The Feil Organization, which owns the office park.

Roughly 125 Eastern Suffolk BOCES staffers will move into the new building by June of next year, according to a spokesperson for the cooperative, which serves 51 Long Island school districts.

Eastern Suffolk BOCES will relocate from the Sequoya Middle School building, which it has leased from the Sachem Central School District for 10 years, said Chris Vaccaro, a spokesperson for Sachem. The Holtsville middle school shuttered in 2015, along with two other schools, due to declining enrollment, Newsday reported. 

Sachem will reopen the school building as a multipurpose education center in July supporting a variety of programs, including early childhood education, Sachem's alternative high school program and its district offices, Vaccaro told Newsday.

"While the relocation was born out of necessity, we see it as an opportunity to build for the future and support continued growth," Eastern Suffolk BOCES Chief Operating Officer David Wicks wrote in an emailed statement to Newsday.

The Feil Organization will build out Eastern Suffolk BOCES new offices, conference rooms and bathrooms on the first floor of building 200 — "the whole nine yards," Wiener said. Sunrise Business Center also holds a gym, cafeteria and on-site childcare, Wiener added.

The location was a good fit for Eastern Suffolk BOCES because of its ample parking and proximity to major thoroughfares for employees to get to the office, said David Pennetta, an executive managing director with Cushman & Wakefield, who brokered the deal with Stephen Cadorette.

Eastern Suffolk BOCES will neighbor the Suffolk County Department of Health Services and Northwell Health's dermatology and obstetrics and gynecology offices at Sunrise Business Center.