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Riverhead ZBA approves Brendan House request

PAUL SQUIRE PHOTO | New Beginnings Brendan House on Sound Avenue in Riverhead.
PAUL SQUIRE PHOTO | New Beginnings Brendan House on Sound Avenue in Riverhead.

Brendan House, the proposed community residence for people who have suffered traumatic brain injuries and need round-the-clock care, was granted town approval this week to house eight people, instead of the previously-approved four.

The New Beginnings Community Center in Medford, a nonprofit care group, is building the facility in an former farm house at 4079 Sound Avenue in Riverhead.

In April, the group received a favorable town Zoning Board of Appeals ruling that a “traumatic brain injury facility with a second residence for the ‘house parent'” is considered a permitted use in the Agricultural Protection Zone, in which the house is located.

The approval allowed the facility to house four residents.

But New Beginnings vice president Steve Scerri told the ZBA on Thursday that when the group went for the building permits for the project, employees from the building department and the county health department asked why the group was only using four bedrooms when there are other bedrooms in the house.

“They said that if we got approval from you guys, they would be fine with giving us approval for extra bedrooms,” Mr. Scerri told the ZBA on Thursday.

The aides that will work at the home will not stay overnight, he said.

The house mother will be in a separate house on the property.

With no one speaking in opposition, ZBA  members approved the request Thursday by a 4-0 vote, with one member absent.

Michael Hubbard, a Riverhead teenager who suffered severe brain damage in the aftermath of being badly burned by an exploding gel candle in his backyard in May, 2011, is expected to be one of the residents of Brendan House.

New Beginnings has been holding a number of fundraisers for the Brendan House and another one is scheduled for this Sunday, Sept. 29, at noon, at the site on Sound Avenue across from Reeve Farm.

The event is being billed as “country fair” and will feature things like pig races, duck races and food and games.

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