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UPDATE: VA TO LEASE MOST OF MONTROSE CAMPUS FOR

PRIVATE HOMES -- Local Pol: "It's moving too fast, and in

the wrong direction. It should be for veterans and their

families, not big time developers. They see a gold mine."

"Sacred Grove" on Montrose, New York VA campus.

For more about the VA leasing property at Montrose, use the VA Watchdog search engine... click here...
http://www.yourvabenefits.org/sessea
rch.php?q=montrose&op=and

Story here... http://lohud.com/apps/
pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080923/NEWS
01/809230376/-1/newsfront

Story below:

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VA to lease Montrose campus for private homes

By Robert Marchant
The Journal News

The federal Department of Veterans Affairs is moving ahead with plans to build private housing at its Montrose campus and will invite developers to make their sales pitch at a meeting scheduled for next month.

An "industry forum" will be held Oct. 14 at the complex off Route 9A, and the VA has tapped the real-estate service firm of Jones, Lang and LaSalle to manage the bids. The VA announced plans in July that it would turn over more than 100 acres of its 184-acre site over to residential development, maintaining its veteran-service operations on 12 acres.
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The decision to lease most of the land at the VA campus to developers has brought criticism and concern. Local officials and veteran advocates fear that services will be substantially diminished at the Montrose site in favor of high-end housing.

Town Supervisor Linda Puglisi said the formula the VA has planned - 12 acres for veterans' services, 108 acres for future development in the first phase - should be turned around.

"It should be reserved for veterans, not housing," said Puglisi, adding that the timetable for development seemed to be on the fast track. "It's moving too fast, and in the wrong direction," she said. "It should be for veterans and their families, not big time developers. They see a gold mine."

The town would not have any control or oversight over future development of the Montrose campus under the terms of the deal the VA is considering, a 75-year lease with developers. The town administration is concerned about the impact that large-scale residential construction would have on local services.

"Overdevelopment would impact our residents," Puglisi said.

VA spokeswoman Nancy Winter had no immediate comment on the upcoming meeting. VA officials have maintained that the financial deal to lease the land at Montrose would go toward providing better services for veterans.

Freemont Reif, an Army veteran who advises the town on veterans issues, said he was upset about the direction the VA was taking. The loss of some services at the Montrose site, which the VA is aiming to transfer to its Castle Point facility in Dutchess County, would have major consequences.

"The land belongs to veterans. It should always stay for the veterans," said Reif, chairman of the Cortlandt Veterans Advisory Council. "We're going to turn it into $2 million condos? Not on a piece of land we need for people coming back from Iraq and Afghanistan."

Reif said he was planning a rally at the site, perhaps on the date of the development conference, to protest the VA's decisions.

A partnership of developers operating under the name Montrose Elders, which included the Ginsburg Development Corp., had been originally tapped by the VA to manage the redevelopment at the Montrose site, but that agreement has since been terminated, according to Puglisi.

The veterans hospital opened at the Montrose location in 1950.

Reach Robert Marchant at rmarchan@lohud.com  or 914-666-6578.

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