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

BILL NUMBER:S1476

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. Hospital-s, 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

2010 - A.10604 - Held for Consideration in Public 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.