The Riverhead Town Board unanimously voted Tuesday afternoon, Aug. 5 to designate J. Petrocelli Riverhead Town Square LLC qualified and eligible to construct the new Town Square on East Main Street and an adjacent five-story hotel with restaurants and shops on the ground floor.
The town board had picked J. Petrocelli Contracting as the master developer for the Town Square project in 2022, but did not hold a required public hearing on whether the company was ‘qualified and eligible’ to construct the project until July 22 of this year.
J. Petrocelli Contracting has done a great deal of work in downtown Riverhead, beginning with the construction of the aquarium there 25 years ago, and continuing with the adjacent Sea Star Ballroom and Hyatt Place hotel, as well as The Preston House hotel across Main Street from the Hyatt and the renovation of several town-owned buildings.
Two buildings across from The Suffolk Theater have already been torn down to make way for the Town Square, which is slated to include a playground and an amphitheater, designed with terraced tiers to move it out of the floodplain. Most of the buildings at the town-owned East End Arts campus to the east of the Town Square will also be raised out of the floodplain as part of the project.
The hotel, on property currently owned by the town that would be transferred to J. Petrocelli as part of the deal for $2.6 million, would have 76 rooms, 12 penthouse condos on the fifth floor, three retail shops and a restaurant facing onto the Town Square, and parking spaces for the condos under the building.
While many speakers at the July 22 hearing said they believe Joe Petrocelli, the principal of the company, is qualified and eligible to build the project, they questioned the town’s process — only one document, the proposed contract, was available for public review before the hearing, and financial information presented by Mr. Petrocelli’s attorney at the public hearing wasn’t made available to the public in written form until after the hearing.
Board members said at a July 31 work session that they had reviewed further financial documents that they were expecting would be made public the following day, and while Town Attorney Erik Howard said he prepared a memo containing that information on Aug. 1, members of the public at Tuesday’s meeting said they hadn’t seen that memo posted on the town’s website.
Several people spoke ahead of the vote, mainly in favor of the application, including Bob Castaldi, the owner of The Suffolk Theater; Dean Gantley of Suffolk County Legislator Catherine Stark’s office, speaking on behalf of Ms. Stark; and Georgica Green Ventures President David Gallo, whose company builds affordable housing throughout Long Island. Business owners including Joe Oliver of JJ’s Armory and Sandy Pond Links owner Earl Truland also spoke in favor.
“He has a proven track record, and he’s helped put Riverhead back on the map,” said Mr. Oliver. “Let’s stop imagining a better downtown — open up the doors and walk into it.”
“I was a contractor for a long time, and I know good work when I see it,” said Mr. Castaldi. “Joe Petrocelli does good work.”
But Kathy McGraw, a frequent critic of the Town Board’s methods, said that, while she believes J. Petrocelli is qualified and eligible to build the project, “the sham and mockery you’ve made of the legal process to reach that finding is deplorable.”
“The law says the public is entitled to the information the board is using to make the finding,” she said, adding that the information in Mr. Howard’s Aug. 1 memo “was never shared with the public.”
“You made a joke out of the public hearing process,” she said.
Adele Wallach asked why, in the contract, monies J. Petrocelli had pledged to the project earlier in the process were being deducted from the total price.
“If he was not deemed qualified and eligible, would he still be getting his guaranteed return?” she asked. “I’m not expecting an answer.”
John McAuliff asked the board to postpone voting on the qualified and eligible resolution until September due to the public’s lack of ability to review the financial documents. He added that, of 19 letters submitted through the public hearing process, 17 were opposed to the hotel portion of the project.
“This whole process has conflated two things — the Town Square, which everyone is in favor of, and the hotel, which many people are opposed to,” he said. “It would be better for the town if you paused a bit, and had a discussion in September when people have a chance to see all the financials.”
The Town Board responded by unanimously approving the resolution.
Councilman Ken Rothwell delivered what he called a “profound yes.”
Town Supervisor Tim Hubbard said before voting that people have been coming to him saying it’s difficult for them to understand “why there would be opposition to making your downtown a beautiful destination space where people can come.”
“For people to disingenuously come up to the microphone and say ‘can you put it off?’ Are you kidding me?” he said. “This is decades in the making. If you just got your head in the game in the last two weeks, that’s on you. We’ve had four years, multiple public hearings, and I can’t wait to get shovels in the ground on this project.”
He then asked the crowd to think about what political party the people who oppose the project belong to.
“They should be called the party of stagnation,” he said. “Every good thing that you want to do for the whole of Riverhead, somebody just has to come out and oppose it, sometimes for no other reason than I have an R after my name and they have a D.”
All five members of the current Town Board are Republicans.
“What’s best for the Town of Riverhead is the golden hand of Mr. Petrocelli,” the Supervisor added. “I’m very excited. I’m like a kid on Christmas morning.”
“Bravo, Mr. Supervisor,” said Councilwoman Joann Waski.
Claudette Bianco of Baiting Hollow was unimpressed.
She said she was not happy with “recent comments by several board members at the last board meeting and the last recent work session, disparaging taxpayers because they disagree with you.”
“Last time I looked, this was America and people are still allowed to disagree with you. Some of their disagreement is not with Mr. Petrocelli as a person or a developer, but with the process,” she added. “To make it a political issue, because they disagree with you? They’re not necessarily against the project. They just maybe didn’t like the process…. To disparage taxpayers? It’s rude and uncalled for, and I am offended.”
“If the shoe fits, wear it, and I call it as I see it and I will continue to do that my entire life,” said Mr. Hubbard.
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The deeper we get into the Petrocelli hotel problem, the more it feels like EPCAL and Sound Avenue resorts redux. Big development and profits are the primary goal. Council member Kern has said at two Board meetings that hotel rooms for tourists are more important than the desires of the people of Riverhead. Other Board members attack critics as ill-informed and late comers. The Supervisor characterized us as “the party of stagnation”, referred to “multiple, multiple public meetings” and “opposition to making your downtown a beautiful destination place”. In my comments, I suggested there was a “Party of Arrogance and Overdevelopment”, noted the absence of open public discussion about adding a hotel to the town square park, and that the disagreement was whether a five story hotel advanced or detracted from the public space. Here are two options for the Town Square park. Tell the Board which you prefer. https://saveepcal.blogspot.com/2025/08/two-options-for-town-square-park.html