Carrying signs reading "No Favors for Developers," "Kill the Secret Deal" and "Stop the Eisler Sellout", environmentalists demonstrated in front of Town of Oyster Bay Hall on Monday against a proposed development project on Jericho's Underhill property.

The protest targeted Town of Oyster Bay Councilwoman Bonnie Eisler for what environmental and civic leaders called a "secret deal" to permit development of a 102-unit housing project on the 81-acre parcel that lies in a state-designated Special Ground Water Protection Area and represents Long Island's number one priority for preservation.

"We must make responsible elected officials understand that the Eisler scheme is inadequate, irresponsible and not permissible under law," said Donald Pupke, president of the Society to Preserve Underhill - a coalition of Island-wide environmental and civic groups. "The Eisler plan, negotiated with the developer behind closed doors, favors development over preservation, fails to appropriate the needed resources and won't pass legal muster."

Eisler explained that she has been meeting with landowner Roger Tilles and developer Gerald Monter, to resolve the battle, but nothing is in writing and this process is in a very preliminary stage.

According to Eisler, the current deal would allow approximately 46 acres to be preserved and roughly 30 acres would be available for the developer to build about 102 units on. "That land is contiguous to a 25 acre park the town already owns so we would have over a 70 acre park if this deal goes through," said Eisler. "As of right, Tilles could build 57 homes there now without a town board hearing. This is allowing them to build 45 additional units in a smaller area. This was the thinking - in order to preserve open space we should allow cluster development and leave as much open space as possible than to have as of right over property."

After she met with the developers to discuss their options, Eisler requested a meeting with Joe Lorintz, former president of the society to Preserve Underhill, as a representative of the Society. According to Eisler, this meeting was scheduled before anything was on paper and it was done to get the Society to Preserve Underhill's opinion on the details she discussed with Roger Tilles. "I explained to [Lorintz] that I thought this was a great compromise," said Eisler. "Instead of coming back and saying let's see what we can work out, they have decided to blow up the process."

According to Lorintz, he received a call from Eisler's office at the end of August to arrange a time for the two to meet. "I met with her on Aug. 26 and she presented this proposal and said that this was the best proposal," said Lorintz. "She also said that there were no further negotiations and if we chose not to go along with it, it would most likely not be successful. Since the process was completely closed out, we will never know if this is really the most money that we could have collected and whether or not it was the best outcome in terms of preservation. I told her we would let her know if we thought it was a good idea."

After meeting with Eisler, Lorintz discussed the details with the Society to Preserve Underhill and it was determined that the society would not support Eisler's proposal.

Environmentalists claim Eisler's plan would preserve less than half of the 81 acres and would pay developers millions of dollars for land they are required to set aside as open space in connection with their high-density housing project. Environmentalists are asking Governor George Pataki to authorize $10 million from the State Environmental Protection Fund to match $5 million each from Nassau County and the Town of Oyster Bay. "The original $20 million commitment would allow more of Underhill to be preserved and would prevent taxpayers from lining the pockets of developers who are required to set aside open space in exchange for the extra building density they are being granted," Pupke added.

According to Eisler, the town would pay Tilles approximately $300,000 an acre, which is the fair market value of the property. The society disputes Eisler's calculations and claims that Eisler's deal includes paying approximately $500,000 an acre, much more than the appraised price.

"If [the society] can bring more money to the table, I will not throw rocks at them - I would be delighted," said Eisler, who worked with the supervisor's office on this issue. "I wish we could save the entire property, but I would rather save 46 acres than nothing. [Environmentalists and local civic groups] were not excluded - they were brought in before any writing was done. I wanted their input before it was in writing. You can't negotiate with 100,000 angry people at the table. That is why I didn't include them in the negotiations."

According to Eisler, time was of the essence to strike an agreement with Tilles. "We had a seller, Tilles, who was willing to sell us a portion of the land. He is willing to sell us that portion of the property at the appraised price and no more," said Eisler. "If you don't have a willing seller you can wave $20 million that you got from the state at him and he still won't sell. He is not going to sell that amount of property because in his mind, no matter what the appraisal says, he thinks it is worth more. The Underhill Farm, the property across the street, sold for over $700,000 an acre. If you don't have a willing seller and you aren't going to condemn the property, you don't have a lot of choices. The best that we could do was negotiate."

Dozens of citizen groups oppose the Eisler proposal and support increased preservation at Underhill employing a larger acquisition formula, which has been discussed for nearly three years. "Nassau County has received no open space money from the State's $1.75 billion Clean Water/Clean Air Bond Act," said Pupke. "How dare Councilwoman Eisler let the state off the hook by abandoning the additional $5 million needed to preserve Underhill."

Eisler has been meeting with Town of Oyster Bay Supervisor John Venditto throughout this process and did so as recently as last week. "The supervisor told the society to come back and give us their suggestions," said Eisler. "He is giving them a few days to come back and see what happens from there."