(The following story by William Murphy and Steve Ritea appeared on the Newsday website on February 15.)
NEW YORK — State and local officials criticized the Long Island Rail Road yesterday for refusing to reveal a planning document about a proposed third track that would show the community impact in western Nassau – such as which properties would be seized through eminent domain.
“It’s time we draw back the steel curtain of secrecy at the LIRR,” Mineola Mayor Jack Martins said at a news conference in Mineola Village Hall with members of the State Assembly.
The LIRR submitted a copy of the document recently to the Federal Transit Administration. This week that agency denied a Freedom of Information Act request by Newsday, saying the document “could contain inadvertent errors that our staff would catch and work … to correct for the final version.”
The LIRR has yet to refuse a similar request by Newsday formally, but spokesman Joe Calderone said it “is not releasable until signed off on,” by the federal agency.
Martins, a Republican, and the other officials said the LIRR should make it public. “It is a draft document, but it is a public document,” Martins said.
Joining Martins at the news conference were GOP Assembs. Thomas Alfano of North Valley Stream, Tom KcKevitt of East Meadow and Rob Walker of Hicksville.
Alfano said the MTA, the parent agency of the LIRR, “is trying to hide from our villages.”
“Let the people know. Let the people who own the homes, pay their taxes and who have invested their lives in the community know what’s going on,” Alfano said.
The lawmakers said they planned to hold public hearings under the auspices of the State Assembly advisory committee on the MTA, which is not a standing committee of the Democratic-led Assembly. Gov. Eliot Spitzer, a Democrat, supports the third-track project.
Record ridership and the LIRR’s plan to connect with Grand Central Terminal in 2014 prove the need for a third track, Calderone said. The LIRR began holding community meetings on the project in 2005 and has worked to reduce the impact to property owners ever since, he said. More meetings will be held this year, allowing for additional public input, he added.