The Peconic YMCA may have finally found a home.
After 16 years and more shopping around for a site than founder Joseph Van de Wetering would care to remember, the organization is ready to pull the trigger on an 8.8-acre site on the south side of Main Road in Aquebogue, across from Vineyard Caterers.
Van de Wetering said Wednesday as soon as a preliminary environmental study is completed — which he said he expected "momentarily" — the deal will move forward.
Van de Wetering said he hopes they can break ground this summer.
The wooded site is being purchased for $535,000, he said.
Peconic YMCA has raised $6.1 million and needs to raise another $2 million to construct the facility, Van de Wetering said. It will include a gymnasium, an indoor Olympic-sized pool and about three acres of outdoor recreational space for summer camps and sports activities, he said.
The Y will create about 200 jobs and offer a variety of programs, including pre-care for school children, pre-K and day care and fitness programs, Van de Wetering said. The facility will also house community meeting spaces.
Riverhead Town Supervisor Sean Walter said he thinks the location is good.
"It's a win-win for Riverhead," Walter said Wednesday. "It's about time we got a YMCA."
The supervisor said the use would require a Town Board special permit, according to a preliminary analysis done by the town attorney's office.
Since Main Road is a state highway, the New York State Department of Transportation would have to approve access to the site, and the DOT may require a traffic signal there, Walter said.
Councilman George Gabrielsen also said he thinks the site will work for the Y. "As far as I'm concerned, it's probably a good site," he said. "The only down side is it will come off the tax rolls. But of all the sites they were looking at, that one had the least impact on the town as far as tax dollars go," Gabrielsen said.
Van de Wetering has been relentless in his pursuit of the Peconic Y project, an idea he had shortly after moving to Riverhead in 1995.
"The News-Review had an article about how bad things were for the kids in town, how little they had to do, so they got themselves into mischief occasionally," Van de Wetering recalled. "I asked my brother [Jack Van de Wetering], what kind of a place did you send me to? And I said, we've got to fix this."
Since then, the now-retired Grumman executive assembled a board of community volunteers, established a formal affiliation with the YMCA of Long Island, and has spearheaded a successful fundraising project.
Peconic YMCA has pitched a number of locations in the past, many of them tied to the development of other projects on the same or adjacent sites.
But Van de Wetering feels confident that the Peconic YMCA has finally found its home.
Editor's note: This story was reported by Peter Blasl.