Community Watchdog

Babylon Town Assessor Michael J. Bernard holds an information booklet from the state's Office of Real Property Services designed to help homeowners with assessment challenges.
Newsday photo by Gwen Young

Suffolk residents who feel their property taxes are too high because their homes have been assessed at a higher value than what they're actually worth, especially in this soft housing market, have until May 20 to challenge their assessments.

In Nassau, homeowners had until March to grieve their assessments with the county's Board of Assessment Review. In Suffolk, each of the 10 towns has its own Board of Assessment Review that approves or denies the applications. The applications are the same for everyone statewide.

There's nothing to lose by filing an application, said Michael J. Bernard, Babylon Town Assessor and president of the Suffolk County Assessors Association. "Either the assessment stays the way it is or it gets lowered," he said. "It can't be raised as a result" of the homeowner's request. [Bernard explains the application in the video.]

Success is most often determined by whether homeowners can show the board that their assessment is wrong and that their house isn't worth what the assessor says it's worth. "The law requires the property owner to prove that the market value of their home is less than what the market value is as determined by the assessor," Bernard said.

Proving that entails finding comparable homes in your area through town assessor record or real estate records. Those homes can be either ones that have been sold around July 1, 2007 (the date the boards will be using to compare market values) or comparable homes in your area that have lower assessments. Comparable means they're about the same size, are on the same size lot, have the same number of bathrooms and bedrooms, and so forth. Most town assessors have employees who will try to help homeowners find the records they need, but be sure to do your homework and supply the exact addresses of the homes you're comparing.

There are various reasons assessments are lowered. For instance, if the assessor's "inventory" of rooms and taxable amenities of your home are incorrect, that can help your case. If town records show you have two bathrooms but you have only one or a deck and there is none that could mean a lower assessment.

But Bernard warns that property owners should be prepared for a town inspection to confirm their claims. "If they don't want us in their house, they shouldn't file a grievance," he said. And if your home is assessed for $500,000, but you recently purchased it for $400,000, Bernard calls that a "no brainer" in your favor.

In describing your home (page one, question 5) be sure to include any negatives about the property - excessive traffic, abuts industrial property - anything that might take away from the value of your home.

Bernard expects about 5,000 of the town's 60,000 homeowners to file assessment challenges this year. In Suffolk's largest town, Brookhaven Town Assessor Jim Ryan is expecting 25,000 to 27,000 requests for assessment changes, up from an average of 20,000 challenges a year because of the housing market.

The town has about 110,000 residential properties on the tax roll. "I anticipate that many more people than in the past will file, and there's no downside to it, so why not?" Ryan said.

Homeowners don't need an attorney or professional company to represent them and if they're not satisfied with the decision on their case, they can take it to the small claims assessment review where a judicial hearing officer makes the ultimate decision, Ryan said.

Probably the most important question is No. 7 on page one of the four-page application, he said. The question reads: "Property owner's estimate of current full market value of property." Even though the form says "current market value," both Ryan and Bernard said the review boards will be looking for the market value of the home as of July 1, 2007.

That means, whether you're comparing your homes to others that have sold in the area or homes that are comparable but are assessed for less, that date has to be the basis of your comparison. For instance, you wouldn't use a house sold in January as evidence in your application.

Ryan's office will have extended hours Friday, May 9 from 9 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. and Saturday May 17, from 7-11 a.m. to help Brookhaven town residents with information. Call your town assessor's office for hours of operation. If you plan to challenge your assessment in person instead of by mail, call to find out the hours the Board of Assessment Review will meet on May 20.

Applications must be postmarked by May 20. Click the links on the left for information about your town assessor.

Thomas Joseph Jr. and other residents of East Farmingdale say their one community park has been in need of renovations for years.
Newsday photo by Gwen Young

Sometimes blog comments can be annoying because people vent about things that have nothing to do with the issue that’s discussed.

That’s not the case with opinions voiced about the item posted here Thursday and published in yesterday’s Newsday concerning Michel (pronounced Michael) Park in East Farmingdale. (See comments below on the item with Thomas Joseph Jr., president of the local civic association.)

Obviously, East Farmingdale residents feel this park has been long-neglected and are frustrated because it’s taken years for the one park in their community to be refurbished.

In the hundreds of e-mails, calls and snail-mail we’ve gotten about problems, the question that comes up most often is “Why is the neighboring community taken care of, while ours is neglected?” It’s the same question, whether readers are writing about sidewalk, road and curb repairs, litter cleanup, lighting problems and other quality of life issues. Most people seem to think the disparities in services have to do with who you know. If there’s a town official living in the community, that’s the place that will receive attention.

I’d like to think that’s not true, but I have no explanation to explain the differences

For people in East Farmingdale, who obviously care about their hometown and it’s little park, I hope the Town of Babylon will move quickly to give residents what they’ve been promised.

We’ll post pictures here when the renovations are finished.

The area behind Ron Sme was cleared of trees and other vegetation to prevent train wheels from skidding, but Sme said the LIRR's "trimming" was excessive.
Newsday photo by Alan Raia

On Sunrise Highway in Lynbrook, the LIRR removed every bit of vegetation near tracks in late 2007, including the 30- to 50-year-old trees. It looks like a scene from the 1930s Dust Bowl. The LIRR said there would be some trimming, but it does not seem proper to butcher the landscape.
--Ron Sme, Lynbrook

We made a bunch of calls to the LIRR over a month-long period before we got answers. Spokesman Sam Zambuto said the railroad is now hammering out a beautification plan with local officials and residents.

The tree-cutting was part of a vegetation management program to address “slip-slide” concerns, a condition where train wheels skid on acceleration and braking due to an oily residue from crushed leaves, Zambuto said.

The Lynbrook area between Denton and Ocean avenues was one trouble spot on the Long Island Railroad’s Babylon branch.

Workers cut tree limbs that were entangled in overhead signal lines and others that were hanging over the tracks. Zambuto didn’t know the number of trees removed, but Sme estimated 20 were cut.

The phone number for LIRR’s vegetation management program and replaning efforts is 718-558-8228

--MICHAEL R. EBERT

Civic association president Thomas Joseph Jr. says East Farmingdale residents are frustrated about how long it's taken to get their community park completed.
Newsday photo by Gwen Young

We have just one small park in East Farmingdale, Michel Park. We have been promised upgrades for the park in writing by many Town of Babylon officials but they have not been done. We were promised a new walkway would be finished by the end of last year. The old one was ripped up in November and nothing has been done since. The playing field filled with rocks because lawn plugs the town planted never took hold and children have gotten hurt falling on the rock-filled grounds. No Little League will play there because of the conditions. A town official says there is a plan for the park, but apparently it’s a secret. We thought having a small park, we would see better results, but alas it is forgotten.
--Thomas H. Joseph Jr., president, Residents of East Farmingdale Civic Association

Based on Thomas Joseph’s exhaustive study comparing amenities at all of the town’s parks including pictures to illustrate the differences, we understand why residents are unhappy with the work-in-progress look at Michel Park.

To be fair, some of delays were caused by vandalism and the town’s efforts to repair the damages. And there have been improvements to the park, including a newly-paved parking lot, new playground equipment with safety flooring to avoid injuries and a new irrigation system.

By the end of the summer, there should be more improvements including the long-awaited stamped-asphalt walkway that will ring the perimeter of the park, town spokeswoman Vanessa Baird-Streeter said.

Park officials believe that vandals running vehicles on the field right caused the uneven grass plug problem. That prompted the installation of guardrails to keep them out. Once the walking trail is completed, the grass plantings will be addressed, she said. The bathrooms should be working by the time the park opens within a month.

Anyone who sees vandals in the park should call 911. If police can’t respond quickly, Baird-Streeter said, the town’s public safety officers should be called at 631 422-7600.

Marianne Haughey-Barrios needs a building permit for an add-on to her New Hyde Park home.

Newsday photo by Bill Davis

I live in New Hyde Park and have been waiting for a building permit since last July. Although I’ve seen stories about the indictments in the Town of North Hempstead’s Building Department, I haven’t heard much about how absurd the wait has become for permits. Can you update the town’s permit backlog and common problems?
--Marianne Haughey-Barrios, New Hyde Park

While the town still hasn’t caught up with the backlog created by the 2006 building department scandal involving the illegal issuance of permits and certificates of occupancy, the wait has been “significantly reduced,” officials said.

An 18-month probe of the building department led to the arrest of three town employees, including former commissioner David Wasserman, and prompted officials to temporarily stop issuing permits, causing a delay of nine to 12 months.

Now, it’ll take about three months to get a building permit. The backlog should eliminated by July, town spokesman Justin Meyers said. “The industry standard is 6-8 weeks...We’re almost back to that point.”

In November, the town assembled two teams of four employees to trim the backlog. The teams are stationed away from the building department offices to minimize distractions, Meyers said, and are using a new tamper-proof computer database that replaced an outdated paper file system.

Some common problems such as deviating from the approved plans halfway through the process can cause bottlenecks in the permit process or submitting plans that aren’t fully to code, he said. “The backlog should be totally killed by July,” town spokesman Justin Meyers said. “The industry standard is 6-8 weeks.... We’re almost back to that point.”

In Haughey-Barrios’ case, Meyers said the surveyor who stamped her documents wasn’t licensed in New York and that caused a delay. He expects her to receive her permit for a second bedroom shortly.

--MICHAEL R. EBERT

Nassau County Exec Tom Suozzi and landscape architect Richard C. Arnedos put the finishing Earth Day touches on one of six trees planted on Stewart Avenue in Bethpage...

...but Suozzi was quick to give his Department of Public Works employees credit for doing the actual planting.
Newsday photos by Gwen Young

Newsday’s Community Watchdog readers may recognize the location of this tree planting by Nassau County Executive Thomas Suozzi.

It’s Stewart Avenue in Bethpage, by the B-7 commuter parking lot where the county and Town of Oyster Bay collaborated to get the dangerous sidewalks replaced.

County public works workers planted six Japanese tree lilacs, part of the 2008 planned plantings for this year that Suozzi said will cost nearly $1 million to spruce up roadways and county parks.

The trees are environmentally friendly and Suozzi said the county would get a $50 rebate per tree from the Long Island Power Authority because they’re “wire friendly” and grow only to about 25 feet. He mentioned that trees are one of the things that increase in value once it's planted.

Suozzi scooped some dirt onto one of the trees with a gold-painted shovel for the cameras, but rightfully gave credit for the work to his public works crew.

I'll have an item in the Community Watchdog column soon about the deadline in Suffolk County for filing a tax assessment grievance. You can file a grievance from May 1 until the May 20 deadline. No filings are accepted after that date.

Michael J. Bernard, the Town of Babylon Assessor and President of the Suffolk County Assessors Association, will do a video walk-through of the four-page form that's used statewide (except for NYC, Nassau County and an upstate county), which will be posted on this blog in the future.

You can save yourself the trouble of filling out the forms by taking documentation showing your home is over-assessed to your Town Assessor before the May 1 tax rolls are set. After they're set, the assessor can't change anything - changes have to be approved by the Assessment Review Boards in each of the 10 Suffolk towns.

Check out this Web site if you think your assessment is too high.

Guenter Bier says his European friends laughed at the broken utility pole, but he saw it as a serious problem.
Newsday photo by Gwen Young

For several years now, there is a broken pole on the western side of corner Woodbury and Bethpage Roads in Hicksville. The lower part is gone and it just hangs on a piece of rope tied to another pole! Our visitors from Europe took photos to show how much our infrastructure is run down here. Every time we talk, this subject comes up and causes big laughter, but it is a serious matter. Perhaps your help will do something about it because I do not know the owner of the pole.
--Guenter Bier, Hicksville

A few days after we called the Long Island Power Authority, workers removed the broken pole.

“We took care of it,” LIPA spokeswoman Elizabeth Flagler said simply.

We’ve heard from many readers who complain about old utility poles that need to be removed. Like Eugene Murtha of Babylon, who says there are so many old poles that haven’t been removed after new ones have been installed in his community, that they’re an eyesore. But he doesn’t know which utility to call.

And many of our readers say they get the runaround, with LIPA and Verizon pointing at each other.

Actually, there’s a pole etiquette between the two utilities.

“There is an agreement between the two utilities,” Flagler wrote in an email. “The utility that removes their equipment [wires] last is responsible for removing the pole,” she wrote. “To determine responsibility for poles requires a tracking of the work performed on the pole. The best way for homeowners to get poles removed is to call one of the utilities and have them make that determination.”

The LIPA hotline for pole removal is 800 490 0075. The Verizon number is 800 483-7988.

Duane Koncelik and his neighbors have been trying to get the state DEC to force the removal of tons of dirt and debris dumped illegally near their East Patchogue homes.
Newsday photo by Gwen Young

A tenant of the industrial property bordering our homes in East Patchogue brought in hundreds of loads of dirt and construction debris from Queens in tractor trailers, creating mounds of dirt, rocks and cement over three stories high. Now, every time it rains, this mountain is eroding onto Strong Lane and Strong Road and seeping into the bordering wetlands. We have been reporting this to the Town of Brookhaven, police and state Department of Environmental Conservation for over a year. The mud and potholes are taking a toll on our cars and homes. It is truly a nightmare and extremely sad that the DEC and town are ignoring the problem, especially the environmental destruction.

--Duane Koncelik, East Patchogue

What a mess. But DEC officials say the problems involving the commercial property on Orchard Road will be gone before the summer is over.

As Koncelik said, his neighborhood has been plagued for a while. The DEC documented illegal dumping of construction and demolition debris, known to waste management types as C&D, at this site in Sept. 2006.

Two months later, the DEC noted that soil erosion from the illegal dumping had entered the freshwater wetlands on Strong Road.

DEC spokesman Bill Fonda said that during 2007, the agency spent time trying to determine which tenant on the property was doing the dumping.

Nothing happened until March 27, this year, when a DEC consent order was signed, triggering the formal start of the cleanup process that will take a few months to complete, Fonda said.

In the consent order, the DEC ordered the property owner to stop the illegal dumping and assessed a penalty of $10,500. The owners were also ordered to bring the land back to acceptable environmental conditions.

That won’t happen overnight.

Time-consuming steps that need to be completed include soil sampling by a certified lab and the DEC analysis of the results. Then the owner has to present a plan for DEC approval to grade the area so the dirt doesn’t continue to wash onto the residential streets and wetlands.

And more DEC approvals are needed for the owner’s planting plan to restore native species to the wetlands. Then the owner has to prepare a cleanup plan that also needs a green light from the DEC to bring the property back to its pre-dumping condition.

In addition, the owner must show the DEC tracking records of where the C&D was sent and also remove any unauthorized wastes that were washed into the wetlands.

Fonda said that based on the required timeline for submissions and approvals, cleanup of the property should begin towards the end of July, or sooner if things move smoothly. The owners have already started using bales of hay and fencing to prevent the dirt from washing onto the roadway, he said.

Anyone who wants to report a violation to the DEC can call the toll-free hotline at 800 847-7332. It’s a statewide number, so be sure to specify the location of the violation. All calls are confidential, Fonda said.

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A Watchdog reader, Ann, wants to know about those little signs. I haven't had a chance to call some towns (Huntington and Babylon will be the first ones I get to because I see them in those areas the most) to find out if those grounders are legal or not.

If they're not, I guess that means - like other litter - anyone can pick them up and dispose of them properly.

Ann, I'll make those calls as soon as I can. Thanks for your continued interest.

I can't be the only person who gets frustrated when looking for house numbers on Long Island. Is it that people don't like to put numbers on their homes or buildings? The problem is just as bad in business areas as it is in residential neighborhoods.

Maybe some people aren't bothered by the lack of numbers because they rely on a GPS system. But even a GPS can be wrong - they say my house is on the wrong side of the street!

What about emergency vehicles? Heaven forbid there's an emergency like a fire - and there's no house number. Should fire fighters just look for the smoke if the house isn't engulfed? Some blocks on Long Island have numbers that aren't in sequence. Those are the worst.

Every building should have a number to make it easier to find. I can't be the only one who thinks so.

I was cheering while driving on Route 110 in Farmingdale recently. On the side of the road was a crew of two men picking up litter along SUNY Farmingdale's section of 110. Don't know if they were school employees or state workers, but it was a GO TEAM moment for me. Wish I had my camera with me to post their picture here.

Maybe with the milder weather, towns around Long Island will be sending out crews to do the same thing. That would be a good thing. Hope they can take those little signs with them.

Leonard Shifrin and his neighbors say the curbs on their street were ruined by a Town of Hempstead snowplow and want them replaced.
Newsday photo by Gwen Young

About six years ago we had a bad snow storm and the plow driver hit the curbs a number of times. Over time, the curbs crumbled on Aron Drive North, Revere Lane and Abbey Lane. I’ve contacted the Town of Hempstead Highway Department three times and the town denies responsibility. I’ve written to elected officials and got nowhere. It’s a shame to pay such high taxes and have an unsightly appearance in our neighborhood. I bet if this occurred in front of a politician’s home the problem would be remedied in no time.
-- Leonard Shifrin, Seaford

Susan O'Rourke of Seaford (with friend Attila) wants broken curbs on her street repaired by the town.
Newsday photo by Gwen Young

I am hoping you can help shed light on a problem we are having with the Town of Hempstead. Our curbs have all but disintegrated and it’s dangerous for kids and the elderly. There is crumbling concrete everyone trips over. I have twisted my ankle more than once getting out of the car. We have notified the town, sent letters to Supervisor Kate Murray, Rep. Peter King, etc. No one is willing to take responsibility.
--Susan O’Rourke, Seaford

Bad news. Unless the damage was caused by the Town of Hempstead or there is a major road project in the area where everything is being redone, homeowners are responsible for replacing curbs and sidewalks at their own expense, spokesman Michael Deery said. That includes cattywampus sidewalk panels uprooted by trees planted by the town.

Because the curbs in their area look beaten or eaten up, Shifrin and O'Rourke believe the damages were caused by town snowplows or road salt. What other explanation could there be, they ask, when the deterioration is so random within the same neighborhood? Some curbs look fine, others are a mess (see video).

Deery says town inspectors have declared the curbs are in “a natural state of deterioration,” disavowing any town responsibility.

Town policies vary. For instance, curbs in the Town of Oyster Bay are replaced by the town, and individual homeowners aren't billed, spokeswoman Marta Kane said. “We take care of the road up to the sidewalk, that would include driveway aprons and curbs,” she said. However, sidewalk repair is left to homeowners, she said.

Town of Hempstead homeowners have two options to replace curbs and sidewalks: Hire someone or contract with the town to do the job. If you choose to have the town do the work, it’s billed through property taxes over a five-year period, with 6 percent interest, Deery said. More than likely, the town’s price will be less expensive because of the volume of work the town contracts out to various companies, he said.

In Seaford, "Previous inspections by the town indicate the curb deterioration is from normal wear and tear," Deery said, "but to leave no doubt, inspectors from the town's engineering department will conduct another inspection of the areas in question."

In a related matter, another Seaford reader asked why a neighboring area in Wantagh was outfitted with fancy Belgium or Belgian-block curbs when her requests for curbs in her curbless neighborhood have been ignored.

Deery said in that Wantagh area, the followed it’s policy of replacing original materials with a like product.

Homeowners who want to contract with the town to have their sidewalks or curbs replaced can call the highway department at 516 812 3184.

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Freeport's Gary Guilliam wants to know if gas stations in Nassau County can charge for air to fill tires. (Newsday photo by Robert Mecea)

I thought Nassau County had a law that stated gas stations could not charge for air. Is this law still on the books? And, if so, who does one contact?

--Gary Quilliam, Freeport

According to the Nassau County Office of Consumer Affairs, we learned that the “fee or free” decision for air compressors at Nassau gas stations is established by individual townships.

In the Towns of Hempstead and Oyster Bay, air compressors should be available "on-the-house." In North Hempstead, however, gas stations can charge a small fee for their use.

“The law hasn’t changed,” said Richard Russ, assistant director of the Nassau County Office of Consumer Affair’s Division of Weights and Measures. “It’s been up to the towns for as long as I can remember.”

Under state law, Russ said gas stations with four or more dispensing nozzles are required to provide compressed air to inflate tires. The law, however, does not require the air be free.

“Compressors may be coin operated and the price is up to the station,” said Jessica Chittenden, communication director for the Department of Agriculture & Markets.

Most government and environmental agencies encourage drivers to keep tires inflated, because it can significantly increase gas mileage, Russ said.

Low tire pressure, for example, reduces mileage up to 4% per five pounds of pressure and can waste more than two million gallons of gas daily in the U.S., according to the nonprofit Environmental Defense.

Nassau County residents with concerns about a gas station are asked to contact the Nassau County Office of Consumer Affairs at 516-571-2600. Residents can also submit a complaint form.

--MICHAEL R. EBERT

Related sites to this topic:

Many of you email or write to us about the kind of problems we’ve addressed in our Community Watchdog column published in Sunday's Newsday.

We try to give a phone number or email address where you can write or call if you have a similar problem (sometimes it's town-specific).

For instance, whenever we feature a problem regarding a telephone pole, we get people who write in about a problem they’re having with a pole.

If your problem involves a Verizon pole, the number is 800 483 7988. Call and get a work order number from them and then follow up a couple of weeks later if the work hasn’t been done.

It pays to make sure it’s a Verizon problem. If it’s really a LIPA problem, there’s a good chance Verizon workers won’t tell you unless you ask them when they’re there.

We try to have a variety of different issues in the column, so it's unlikely we'll do a pole complaint every week.

Where are all those little signs on the roads coming from? Driving around Long Island, they seem to be popping up everywhere. Signs the size of a sheet of paper with advertising for everything from weight-loss programs to new roof construction. They’re stuck into the grass medians with wires that are attached. Not pretty.

Are these signs legal? Do you need a permit to place them there? Would people who don't like them get into trouble if they removed them?

They’re not the size of billboards, but does anyone find it annoying to see them helter-skelter along the roadways?

Diane Wittman of Oceanside wants this Oceanside creek and its shoreline to be kept free of objects such as the shopping cart behind her and litter along the shoreline.

Every morning, I walk along Bayside Avenue, between Yost Boulevard and Messick Avenue in Oceanside. It’s a disaster. What could be a lovely nature preserve with ducks and swans has become a garbage-strewn dump. Shopping carts are in the creek. Plastic bottles, hub caps and bags of garbage litter the shore. Shouldn’t this be the responsibility of the Town of Hempstead? The only response to my calls and letters has been when code enforcement picked up some sofas that had been dumped there. Can you help?

Town of Hempstead conservation and waterways workers moved quickly to pull the carts from the creek after our call, town spokesman Michael Deery said.

The litter blanketing the area may take a bit longer to remove because the shoreline is private property.

The creek is the town’s responsibility, the shoreline isn’t. Last week, Deery said code enforcement officials would attempt to serve the property owners with a notice to clean up the place.

Based on town code, “You have to keep your property free of litter and debris,” Deery said. That applies to homes and business properties.

How long it’ll take to get the shore area cleaned depends on how cooperative the owners are, Deery said. If they don’t comply, the town will take them to court. If they hire lawyers to fight the summons, it could drag out the process. But, as Deery pointed out, hiring a crew to clean up the area would probably be more cost-effective than hiring attorneys to fight what needs to be done anyway.

Town resident with cleanup issues can call 516 489-6000.

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Black fence poles are in need of chain link fencing to surround the basketball court at Haypath Road Park in Old Bethpage, one of several problems there raised by Allan Rabinowitz.

I’ve been writing to the Town of Oyster Bay about problems at Haypath Road Park in Old Bethpage. The basketball court desperately needs resurfacing to close up large holes, it needs fencing installed where there are now fence poles that children can run into and get hurt, and the lights in the park are on day and night. There’s potential for playground injury and possible litigation and I do not want to see taxpayers’ money paying for park lights that stay on 24/7. I got a call from someone in the parks department saying they’re looking into repaving, but I’ve heard that for the last two years.

The wait for fixes to make this park all Rabinowitz wants it to be will be shorter than a basketball season.

Within three weeks, the court will be asphalted and properly paved to eliminate the holes under the basket on both ends. “Once that’s done, the fence will go up around the basketball court,” town spokeswoman Marta Kane said.

As for the lights, Kane said there’s been an “issue” with the contractor, but park officials have been told those problems will be addressed so the lights will only shine when they're supposed to shine.

Part of the problem with the basketball court repaving is its location. The park is hilly and the court is up a slight incline, making it difficult for asphalt trucks to dump in that area, so park officials were trying to determine whether it should be relocated to an area more easily accessible before renovations to the park were completed, Kane said. That uncertainty delayed the fence installation because the court couldn’t be paved with the fence in place. By the end of this month, things should be up to snuff.

Residents with questions about town parks can call 516 797-4128.

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Hank Mills of Bay Shore inspects lights around the Robert Moses Water Tower after they were repaired to shine only at night instead of 24-7. - Newsday photo by David L. Pokress

Every Sunday, I drive my car to Captree State Park in Babylon, weather permitting, and I’ve noticed that the ground lights shining up to illuminate the Robert Moses Water Tower are on 24 hours a day. Not only are these bulbs burning, but so are our taxpayer dollars. How do we turn them off?

--Hank Mills, Bay Shore

You won't see the lights on during the day anymore, Mr. Mills.

A German-made light sensor for the 12 high-pressure sodium bulbs that illuminate the tower failed earlier this year and had to be replaced, Captree officials said.

Until the lighting system was repaired, workers had to control the lights manually with equipment housed in the tower. But workers were forced to leave the lights on 24-7 after a hinge on the tower’s metal door broke, and they were instructed to stay away to prevent injury.

The replacement part was installed the same week we called. “The lights are only supposed to be on at night and we have resumed that schedule,” said Dan Keefe, spokesman for the state Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation.

According to Keefe, Captree’s bulbs are photocell controlled, which means they have sensors that automatically turn on the lights when the sun goes down. In winter months, the lights will typically illuminate around 4 p.m. and stay lit until 7 a.m. the next morning.

Anyone with questions or concerns about a state park can call the Long Island office of the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation at 631-669-1000 or submit an email form.

-- MICHAEL R. EBERT

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Fire broke out in the kitchen of a home on Francine Avenue, between Route 110 and County Line Road in North Amityville, early Tuesday afternoon. No one was injured.

On my way back to Newsday's headquarters in Melville, I turned down Francine Avenue, between County Line Road and Route 110 in North Amityville.

There was so much smoke, I couldn't see the end of the street, and then I heard sirens.

A house was on fire. Apparently three young guys were cooking in the kitchen and ran out of the house when the fire started.

Eddie Lopez, who lives next door, jumped into his wheelchair to make sure he wouldn't be trapped. (He lost his right leg years ago while in serving in the U.S. Navy.) He wheeled himself down the ramp in front of his house and took some pictures of the fire. Lopez said he was glad no one was hurt because a house is replaceable, lives aren't.

Firefighters from North Amityville, Copiague and Lindenhurst responded and seemed to have everything under control within an hour. Looked like the back of the house got most of the damage. Like Eddie Lopez, I'm glad no one was hurt and we're all grateful to the volunteers who were at the scene to knock down the fire.