Next stop Kansas City? The Long Island Press’ Mike Martino reports Islanders owner Charles Wang (above, right) will formally announce he’s giving up on The Lighthouse Project, throwning the team’s future on the Island into further doubt.
One source says it would not be surprising, given Wang™s self-imposed deadline of Oct. 3 to have an approval from Hempstead Town Supervisor Kate Murray and the Town Board before he would put an end to the project. The Islanders opened up their season the day the deadline came and went.
The lack of financing for a project of this scale in this economic climate”the largest development since the birth of Levittown in the 1940s and ™50s”may be reason enough for Wang to pull the plug, says the source. Using the deadline may have been a tactic to enable him to gracefully bow out of the controversial project.
Wang bought the Islanders in 2000. Since first being proposed in 2003, the Lighthouse has undergone intense scrutiny from environmentalists and politicians, reaching a fever pitch in recent months with allegations that Nassau County Executive Tom Suozzi, Murray and former U.S. Sen. Alfonse D™Amato have all played key roles in stalling progress.
good bye take all you prison buddies with you. project had no hope from the begining, and now with the economy in the tamk the towns do not want to give away the tax breaks needed. Project woudld have been years behind schedule and billions over budget with no real economic benefit to the local area so take you mis managed hockey team, corroupt software company and move elsewhere, do you need help packing? e Think of th