Developer’s plans include room for Patchogue Chamber office

Could a relocation be in the future for the Greater Patchogue Chamber of Commerce?

The chamber is “very seriously” considering an offer by the developers of a 262-unit apartment development planned for West Main Street to move its offices there.

The developers of the Carriage House apartments want to relocate the trolley building from the old lace mill and incorporate it into one of the two apartment buildings they want to build.

The developers, Nord Development Group, a subsidiary of Farmingdale-based Ferrandino & Son Development Group, have offered to lease the trolley building to the chamber for 20 years at $1 a year, chamber executive director David Kennedy said.

The developers have met with Kennedy and chamber president Jo Bennett and with the chamber’s executive committee.

“It’s certainly a wonderful offer,” Kennedy said. “It’s being very seriously considered.”

“I would say it was very well received,” Kennedy said of the developers’ proposal.

The chamber has two years remaining on its current lease for its space on North Ocean Avenue, for which it pays about $20,000 a year, Kennedy said. The chamber has been located on North Ocean Avenue for about 50 years, he said.

Any move would require a vote by the chamber’s 30-person board of directors, Kennedy said.

Any move would also be several years away.

It would take two years once the project is approved and construction begins to complete the first of two buildings, which will include the trolley house, Eric Russo, an attorney for the developers, told the Village of Patchogue Planning Board at its meeting on Dec. 19.

Kennedy spoke at the Dec. 19 planning board meeting and said the chamber hasn’t taken a position on the project yet, but “we want to see the process play out.”

“We’re very intrigued with the project,” Kennedy told the board. “We’re grateful they’d spend $150 million in our community.”

The project is scheduled to be heard by the village board of trustees on Jan. 8.