The Town of North Hempstead broke ground on their portion of the flood mitigation project for the areas around Bruce Terrace on the old Motor Parkway property in Mineola on Thursday morning.
At a meeting of the Mineola Village Board on January 2 at the village hall, superintendent of public works Tom Rini said that the village is ready to accept the dirt excavated from the project, noting that he held a meeting with town representatives and the village’s engineers on Christmas Eve to review the process.
“We’re ready board, and they’ve already started moving some of the topsoil,” he said to the trustees.
The award letter for the village’s portion of the project was sent out on January 3 with the village’s contractor starting immediately “because there is coordination between the two contractors so we’ll get them right in there,” Rini said.
The project is a collaborative effort between the village, the Town of North Hempstead and Nassau County. New York State Sen. Jack Martins was able to obtain state funds for the project, leading to the three-way agreement. Land use agreements were signed between the town and village allowing excavated material to be brought across Westbury Avenue onto village property on the south to help build the bifurcation wall and build up the basin for the drainage pipes, Rini said.
“That coordination meeting has already happened and like I said, they have just started moving soil and that’s what they’ll do.”
After removing the topsoil it will be brought across the roadway. Workers will then conduct water mane work in the Carle Place Water District where a dead end water mane between Dow Avenue and Fairfield Avenue that the village granted an easement upon has to be adjusted.
“There’s some preliminary work before they really get into digging the basin,” Rini said. “It is getting started.”
Martins joined Mineola Mayor Scott Strauss, Town of North Hempstead Supervisor Jon Kaiman, Nassau Legis. Richard Nicolello and Town of North Hempstead Councilwoman Viviana Russell at the groundbreaking ceremony.
