MINEOLA, N.Y. (WCBS 880) — With the housing boom showing no signs of slowing down on Long Island, Nassau County Executive Laura Curran is looking to make sure there are also affordable options available.
In an interview with WCBS 880’s Sophia Hall, Curran noted that too many young people who were born on Long Island are being forced to leave because there are no affordable housing options for them.
“all too often we spend a lot of money and a lot of time educating our young people at our wonderful schools here in Nassau County but, all too often, they leave because they can't afford to stay here,” Curran said.
She says there is also a similar trend of retirees moving out of state because they cannot afford to be on Long Island in their old age, either.
Curran is pushing for developers, now, to include more affordable housing options when building up downtown areas.
“I would argue having more affordable housing, more walkable downtowns will attract more business here because businesses want to come and locate where the cool kids are, where the talent is,” Curran said.
She notes that it’s been done in Farmingdale and it can be done in other places as well.
“We don't have a lot of land left, and we want to keep the green spaces and open spaces that we have, but I'm looking at a model like Farmingdale,” she told WCBS 880. “It’s a village that has built, over the past several years, apartments around the train station and since that happened the downtown has been completely rejuvenated. It used to be a bit of a ghost town, now it’s got restaurants and bars and shops and it's a vibrant place.”
The Nassau County executive adds that there are incentives for companies to build affordable units.
“I pushed our IDA – that's the Industrial Development Agency that gives tax incentives to developers and other businesses looking to do business in Nassau – I pushed them to adopt a new policy to incentivize additional affordable units,” she said.
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