Property off Sunrise in Massapequa may be sold by the Village of Massapequa Park under a proposal being considered by Village officials. Massapequa Park Village has posted the Kitcherer Yard for sale, a piece of property in East Massapequa on 50 E. Chestnut Street. Village officials are hoping to get between $1.2 and $1.5 million for the property, said Mayor Jim Altadonna.

The property – located in an industrial area is listed at $950,000 for the commercial portion of the site and $350,000 for an attached residential piece. The Kitcherer Yard is eclectic, containing a large garage, salt shed, a paved lot, field and a small section of woods. Listing it for the Village is realtor Mark Dimarsico of Greiner- Maltz Co., of Long Island.

Residents were first notified about the sale in May when the Village sent letters out about the way the board was working to counter the fiscal crisis. One option was to sell the land, which generates about $50,000 a year in revenue for the Village from a car dealership that leases a portion of the site. That goes to offset the $250,000 a year the Village pays in mortgage bond payments. But the decision to sell off the land is not without controversy.

“I do not agree that this property should be sold,” said John O’Brien, a former Village trustee, rumored to be running for mayor. “They do not make land anymore; the Village would never get a piece of property like this in the Massapequas again. And if we did, it would cost us much more money. This property has what we need; the property should not be sold. It’s a travesty.”

The Kitcherer Yard was purchased by Mayor Camillo Giannattasio in 1999 for $1.5 million. According to O’Brien, who served as a Village Trustee in the Giannattasio administration, Village officials at the time had a vision for the land. The Village board needed an area to store a salt shed. They also wanted a place to temporarily store downed trees after severe storms until the debris could be dragged off to the dumping grounds and needed a place to dump street sweepings, since they could no longer use Brady Park, considered a wet land area. Finally, administration wanted to fulfill a promise made to residents of Seventh Avenue where the department of public works is located to move the public works department, eliminating noise and traffic it generates near their homes and to address environmental concerns.

But Altadonna, who defeated Giannattasio for Mayor in 2001, said he has his own reasons for now selling the land, the first of which is to pay off a large debt on a piece of land that is underutilized. The Village payments run through 2014.

“We owe $1.425 million and we are continuing to pay debt service on land that we don’t have a use for,” said the Mayor. “Simply hoping that one day it will evolve into something more is not good government.”

Under Altadonna’s proposal, the Village will retain a piece of the property to temporarily store street sweepings and other debris until they are ready for disposal. The Village plans to sell the garage, which contains a Village bus, a generator, a light, benches, Christmas decorations and a wood chipper, among other things. Altadonna explained that the Village will keep some items on the paved lot, but the rest can be stored at Brady Park.

William Colfer, the former superintendent of public works for Massapequa Village Park, believes that keeping the site in public hands would be beneficial to taxpayers.

“When Hurricane Gloria hit in 1985, there was no place to put the debris that fell on the roads. It took a year to get rid of all the debris – hundreds of trees -- and we were putting them on every vacant lot we could find.”

Noting that the Town of Oyster Bay’s first allegiance is to town residents, not Village municipalities, Colfer wonders where the Village would put debris if a storm like that hit again.

“We just had a major storm, and we partnered with the Town of Oyster Bay to use their yards,” said Altadonna.

As the Village gets closer to selling the land, Altadonna plans to enter into an intermunicipal agreement with Supervisor John Ven- ditto “to assure we always have space.” Although independence is good, sometimes it’s much cheaper to work together with all levels of government. “Trying to remain independent can be negative when it comes at a huge cost to taxpayers,” he said.

“We had an intermunicipal agreement with the Town in years past and they locked us out numerous times,” countered O’Brien. “The problem with intermunicipal agreements is that you make them with the supervisor and supervisors change. In politics, things change.”

As for moving or expanding the public works department, Altadonna rejects the idea, saying it would cost the Village money and remove that department from the heart of the Village. “Public works has a home already, near Village Hall, the control center of the Village,” Altadonna said. “When you have multiple facilities, you are just going to increase the tax base, which I am not a fan of. We would have to raise money to expand and build the needed facilities, plus there would be logistic, security and management issues.”

Over the past year, Altadonna has referenced the Kitcherer Yard at numerous board meetings. When he proposed a Village Police Department, he suggested that the Yard could house the headquarters. When there was a controversial cell phone tower planned, he proposed the Kitcherer Yard as an alternate site.

Mayor Altadonna concedes that he has tried to find a use for the land, but “not one of the cell phone carriers deemed the property desirable.” And Altadonna no longer feels the police department belongs there because it is not located within the boundaries of Massapequa Village.

As of now, there have been a few offers on the property, but all lower than the asking price. Altadonna has said that he will not sell the property, if he can’t get at least $1.2 million for the piece.