I guess all the residents of Glen Cove have now received the initial Glen Isle Waterfront Newsletter from resident Brandon Palanker. I would guess following the reaction to the presentation in July 2006 and the subsequent reaction from the public at large we will now see a full PR approach that this project is the answer to the financial difficulties in the operation of the City of Glen Cove. The newsletter is full of action words and bullet phrases claiming doom and gloom and that the answer is the development of the waterfront by Glen Isle Partners, LLC. There are no details and if the 30,000 residents want any facts they can contact the new Glen Isle Community Informational Office that is coming soon.

Obviously this is a project that has been sitting on the drawing boards for some length of time, with all kinds of agreements and understandings between the developer and the city, but the public was not brought into the picture until after things were put into place. Now there is a full-blown PR effort by the developer to try and put a favorable light on this project. I don't think that there are too many residents, including ourselves, who know what the impact will be on the City of Glen Cove. We are being told that the increased tax base will provide our city with the financial resources needed to pay for our services, without impacting the quality of life. The claims are easy to make without facts and for some of the true residents of the city it seems that we have been down this road in the past. This is what was presented to us with the Downtown Urban Renewal, Brewster Street extension, three assisted living building complexes, development of a downtown office complex, development of the downtown triangle and expansion of all kinds commercial, apartment and residential projects. The financial picture of our city has continued to spiral out of control and this year we are being asked to pay an increase of 28.7 percent. (Can anyone name one budget item that has been reduced?) Again we are being told, through a series of projections, that the development of the waterfront by Glen Isle will be the answer to our financial problems.

It seems that there continues to be very few facts about the agreements between city and developer, as well as what effect the input from the residents will have on any of these agreements. I am sure that we will be inundated with all types of economic and social related projections. Based on the fact that we had to have outside auditors to finally determine the financial condition of the city, perhaps it would be helpful to have some unvarnished eyes score at all the data we are receiving from either the developer or the city. There continues to be a lot of rhetoric and PR on this project, but what is needed is a good healthy dose of facts.

Lynda and Joseph Panetta