Solar farm planned for former Calverton golf course site
The former Calverton Links golf course will not be used as a golf course anymore and could turn into a solar energy farm, according to Charles Cuddy, the attorney for the property owner.
The 126 acres owned by Calverton Links was sold to a group called Bashi Calverton Links LLC, headed by developer Parviz Farahzad, in May 2014. But the rest of the golf course — about 40 acres, or three holes — was on land that Calverton Links leased, according to Mr. Cuddy.
He said the owners of that property, the Posillico family, had previously agreed to place covenants on the property that required it to be used only for golf.
But since Calverton Links went out of business and the new owner has no intention of using the land for golf anymore, Mr. Cuddy asked the Riverhead Town Planing Board Thursday if the board could extinguish the covenants on the Posillico property.
“This is just trying to terminate a covenant that no longer has any meaning,” Mr. Cuddy said.
The Posillicos are concerned that the covenants could interfere with future efforts to develop the property, Mr. Cuddy said.
Both the Posillicos and Mr. Farahzad have applied to the Long Island Power Authority for approvals to put solar panels on their properties, said Mr. Cuddy, who represents both.
In December, the LIPA Board of Trustees announced a number of locations it had selected for potential solar panel farms on Long Island. One of them was listed as being a deal with San Francisco-based sPower Solar to put a solar farm “between 100 and 200 Edwards Avenue, on the west side, and between 400 and 500 Edwards Avenue, on the east side of Edwards Avenue.”
Neither LIPA nor sPower would be more specific at the time, although the address of Calverton Links is 149 Edwards Avenue. sPower is already constructing a 30,000-panel solar farm on 45 acres across the street from Calverton Links and the LIPA announcement would indicate that more solar panels are proposed north of that on Edwards Avenue.
The Planning Board on Thursday informally agreed to extinguish the golf-only covenant.
“It doesn’t have a golf course anymore, it would probably be better to extinguish the covenants at this point,” said Planning Board attorney Bill Duffy.
There is a chance the two property owners won’t get approval for the solar panels, Mr. Cuddy cautioned, since they must still negotiate an agreement with LIPA and then get town site plan approval. He said if they don’t get approval for the solar panels, the land will probably be sold.
