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The Islip Town Board has unanimously approved plans for Long Island’s first LGBT-sponsored senior affordable housing complex in Bay Shore.
“I was happy to support this senior housing complex,” Islip Town Supervisor Angie Carpenter told GreaterBayShore after Thursday’s vote. “I am certain that this new project will be a wonderful addition to our Islip community.”
Smart growth group Vision Long Island also showed up at Town Hall to advocate for the proposal.
LGBT Network is teaming up with D & F Development Group to build a 75-unit apartment complex — along with a LGBT community center — on Park Avenue and Mechanicsville Road, just north of Main Street, where the group is currently located.
The project is designed to address a shortage of affordable senior housing options on the island, and it will be marketed to LGBT communities.
Because of nonconformity laws, the housing will be open to all 55 and older seniors who make between 60 to 80 percent of the area’s median income.
“Older LGBT residents still feel prejudice living on their own and some older LGBT adults feel the need to return to the closet in their golden years in order to ensure that they will receive quality care and can be their true selves,” the LGBT Network’s president and CEO, Dr. David Kilmnick, told GreaterBayShore earlier this month.
As of now, barring setbacks, the project is set for construction beginning in June 2018 with an anticipated completion around May of 2020, according to an LGBT spokesperson.
“It is a beautiful development downtown,” Islip Town Councilman Steve Flotteron said of the project. “Bay Shore has been coming back amazingly over the last 20 years.
“And now its marching more and more north.”
