Lawmakers and environmentalists are questioning a proposal by the federal government to sell Plum Island in Long Island Sound.
The island off the eastern tip of Long Island is home to the country’s only laboratory that studies infectious animal diseases. The Department of Homeland Security is opening a $1.14 billion laboratory in Kansas to replace it.
“It makes no sense,” Connecticut state Sen. Andrea Stillman said of the sale at a public hearing on Wednesday in Old Saybrook to review a draft environmental impact statement examining possible uses for the island.
“The common sense solution to this is to leave it alone,” she said. “What we have on that island now is an extraordinary research facility and an extraordinary wildlife habitat that live together.”
U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal said at a news conference that the sale “is not a done deal by any stretch of the imagination.” Federal law governing the sale requires it to be “subject to terms and conditions” that protect government interests, he said.
The federal General Services Administration, which is selling the property with the Department of Homeland Security, may not be able to reconcile two federal laws, he said. Congress required the sale in 2009 if the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s research facility closes and it enacted a bill in 2006 that established Plum Island as one of 33 “stewardship sites” in Long Island Sound that should be preserved.
Another public hearing is planned for Thursday evening in Greeenport.
Several environmentalists say they’re concerned that selling the island would jeopardize endangered terns, seals and other wildlife. Others say they worry about a potential loss of jobs if the lab is closed.
Moshe Gai, a physics professor at the University of Connecticut’s Avery Point campus in Groton, said it would be foolish to sell Plum Island for private development. It should instead be combined into a national park with other islands in eastern Long Island Sound.
“What are you going to do? Sell America?” he asked. “This is ours. We own it.”
Copyright 2012 The Associated Press.
