Seaford Avenue School Property Survey Underway

A poll on what should be done with the former Seaford Avenue Elementary School property is now underway. The community input survey is available on the Seaford School District's website, and fliers and newsletters will also be sent to homes asking residents to participate.

The Seaford Avenue Elementary School was closed in 1981 and served as the home of Five Towns College for the next 12 years before it was relocated to its current home in Dix Hills. The Nassau County Board of Cooperative Education Services had been running programs in the former elementary school in recent years, but earlier this year decided it no longer needed use of the 1939-built building, which is located at 2165 Seaford Ave.

Seaford district officials are hoping the survey will give the board of education the pulse of what residents would support for the property. Any proposal would need to be approved in a referendum vote.

"[The survey] will give the board some strong direction about the direction we should move related to that building and property," said Seaford Superintendent Brian Conboy during his administrative report at the Nov. 4 board meeting. "We're trying to get a very strong sample."

Some of the many options the district has for the property that are included in the survey are renovating the building to attract a new tenant that would lease the facility, selling the property to a developer, or razing the structure to create expanded athletics fields the district and community can utilize. Some options for developing the land if the property is sold could include creating condominiums or 55 and older housing units while also maintaining the current athletic fields on the site, according to district officials.

The district is now losing out on $445,000 of revenue it had previously received each year for leasing out the facility. The cost of maintaining the vacant building is roughly $100,000 a year, according to district officials.