The Floral Park Board of Trustees voted Tuesday to approve a special use permit for a below-grade parking facility tied to the proposed Stella-Cerrone apartment development, clearing one hurdle in what promises to be a long approval process for a project that has drawn loud opposition from Nassau County residents.
Mayor Kevin Fitzgerald was direct about what the vote actually means. “This decision does not approve the full building project,” he said. “It specifically grants approval for underground parking.” The project still needs review from the village board, the zoning board, and the architectural review board before anything gets built. Future rounds will decide the building’s height, occupancy, and design.
That’s a lot of runway left. And the neighbors know it.
The Stella-Cerrone development, as proposed, would put up two apartment buildings totaling more than 150 units, rising five stories at the tallest point. The board closed the public hearing on the special use permit back on February 3, after residents spent months raising objections about height, traffic, school enrollment strain, construction disruption, and pressure on emergency services. The developers pushed back with additional studies disputing those concerns, and village officials concluded the proposal won’t cause significant traffic or parking strain.
Whether Floral Park residents buy that finding is another matter. Opposition at public hearings was fierce, and the development will likely draw sustained scrutiny through every remaining approval stage.
The permit the board approved Tuesday does carry real constraints. Fitzgerald said the decision includes a host community benefit agreement, which guarantees the village receives full tax payments regardless of any payment-in-lieu-of-tax arrangements that Nassau County might negotiate separately. It also lays out construction timelines, limits roof use, addresses infrastructure requirements, requires first-responder collaboration, and imposes other conditions. Developers don’t get a blank check here.
Trustees also adopted a $37,971,880 budget for the 2026/2027 fiscal year. That’s $365,586 more than last year’s $37,606,294 budget. Village Treasurer Gerard Bambrick told the board that pension contribution changes and rising insurance premiums drove most of the increase. The tax levy goes up $1,026,000, or about 3.49%, according to the Long Island Press coverage of the meeting.
A 3.49% levy increase is not catastrophic. It’s also not painless, and it lands on top of Nassau County property taxes that already rank among the heaviest in the country. Floral Park homeowners are well past the point of shrugging at budget lines. Every tenth of a percent matters on a tax bill.
The meeting opened with a moment worth pausing on. Outgoing Fire Chief Gil Luger gave his final report to the board after 49 years of service to the village. Mayor Fitzgerald then swore in new and promoted chiefs Eric O’Connor, William Lauria, Frederick Sangen, and Kevin Fogarty. Forty-nine years. In an era when volunteer fire departments across Long Island struggle to recruit and retain members, that kind of tenure doesn’t happen by accident.
The board handled a full docket of routine business alongside the bigger votes. Trustees approved special-use permits for Tulip Bagels to expand with a juice bar and for a new martial arts studio at 4-10 Tulip Ave. Neither item will reshape Floral Park’s future, but they’re the kind of small-business decisions that keep a downtown street functional. The board also authorized three payments totaling about $13,500 to cover damages, a rental car, and an insurance claim stemming from an auto accident involving a public works vehicle.
The Stella-Cerrone project is the fight worth watching. Floral Park is a dense, transit-adjacent village in Nassau County with exactly the kind of commuter profile that Albany and county planners point to when they push for more housing near Long Island Rail Road stations. State housing mandates and local resistance have been colliding across Long Island for years, and Floral Park is now one more arena for that argument. A 150-plus-unit, five-story apartment complex in a village of small homes and tight streets is not a neutral proposal. It didn’t arrive neutral, and it won’t be reviewed that way.
Tuesday’s vote on underground parking is the first formal approval the project has received. It won’t be the last contested vote the board takes on it.