Senate Bill S2724

                                BILL NUMBER:S2724

TITLE OF BILL:

An act to amend the public health law, in relation to authorizing the
state to acquire from the federal government the Franklin Delano
Roosevelt campus of the department of veterans affairs Hudson Valley
health care system at Montrose

PURPOSE:

Authorizes the state to acquire from the federal government the
Montrose VA

SUMMARY OF SPECIFIC PROVISIONS:

Section one of the bill grants the commissioner, with approval of the
director of the budget and the director of the division of veterans
affairs, authority to acquire portions of the Franklin Delano
Roosevelt campus of the department of veterans affairs Hudson Valley
health care system at Montrose if at any time they are no longer used
for veteran's services, in order that they may be used for veteran's
purposes.

Section two of this bill provides for an immediate effective date.

              

JUSTIFICATION:

The Franklin Delano Roosevelt Campus of the Department of Veteran's
Affairs in Montrose, New York, is sacred ground. Many Veterans have
resided at this facility and have known it as their only home for many
years.

Originally known as Crugers Point Park, the land was optioned to the
Veterans' Administration by Westchester County Executive Herbert
Gerlach on February 13, 1945 for the construction of the first
Veterans' facility in the nation. This land was deeded for Veteran's
services, and today is also home to the twenty-five acre New York
State Veteran's Home at Montrose.

One of seventy-two lands acquired by the Veterans' Administration for
the purpose of constructing a V.A. Hospitals, the Franklin Delano
Roosevelt campus was unique to the Veterans' Administration
construction program as the only departure from a main building
design, and the campus was dedicated to memorialize President Franklin
Delano Roosevelt upon its opening in 1949. Additionally, the campus
occupies the original site of the Boscobel House, already placed on
the National Register of Historic Places.

In recent years, many of the critical services offered at this
facility, which sits across the Hudson River from the United States
Military Academy West Point and caters to one of the State's largest
Veterans populations, have been moved to other facilities and portions
of the campus have fallen into disrepair.

Sitting on what is perhaps the last prime, undeveloped riverfront
property along the Hudson River within thirty miles of New York City,


in recent times, Montrose has attracted the gaze of developers who
seek to make use of the Enhanced Use Lease provision of the United
States Code. One proposal left only 12 acres out of the 184 total
acres for veteran's services.

We cannot ask those who have given so much for us all, and their
families, to travel long distances for these services elsewhere in
order to construct luxury condominiums. This land should remain sacred
ground, forever used for Veteran's services, as was originally
intended. Any development to the ground should be earmarked solely for
veterans. This legislation would authorize the Commissioner of Health
to acquire those portions of the site no longer used for veteran's
services to ensure the majority of the land will be kept, and
increased for veteran's medical and other services, job training,
education, new skills development and more services for women
Veterans.

PRIOR LEGISLATIVE HISTORY:

2012 - S.1476 - referred to Health

FISCAL IMPLICATIONS:

Varies. The costs of the acquisition could range from fair market
value when acquisition is authorized and made by purchase, to nothing,
if the land were to be acquired by grant or condemnation.

EFFECTIVE DATE:

This act shall take effect immediately.