NEW DORP BEACH — The rebuilding of a senior center that's been shuttered since it was damaged in Hurricane Sandy has hit a setback, the city said.
Construction at the New Dorp Beach Friendship Club, at 128 Cedar Grove Ave., was expected to start this summer.
But that contract was canceled in June because of issues with the wage agreement, according to the Parks Department which owns the land.
The project now has to go back out for developers to bid on.
"This saga has been yet another frustrating component of the utterly disheartening recovery process after Sandy," Borough President James Oddo, who posted about the delays last week on Facebook, said in a statement.
"The unfortunate fact is this will probably lead to a delay of up to a year. Another day, another delayed city capital project."
Many of the nearly 100 seniors that visited the center daily have been forced to travel to Great Kills Friendship Club instead since its closure. About 40 of them have been unable to get there, said Marie Didato, the state coordinator for the club.
"They've lost 20 pounds because we gave them breakfast and lunch. Some of them got really frail," she said. "Prior to that they were active.
"It's their second family," Didato said. "You don't see your family every day but you see the people at the center every day. This socialization, they miss all that."
Sandy sent nearly 15 feet of water into the center, located under the Our Lady of Lourdes church, nearly four years ago. It destroyed the furniture and collapsed the walls. The only thing to survive was the floors, Didato said.
"It looked like somebody took a bomb and blew it up in the middle of the thing," she said.
After the storm, seniors joined elected officials to call on the Parks Department to rebuild the center and eventually, in 2014, the city gave $1.5 million.
Oddo and Councilman Steven Matteo allocated another $300,000 to the project.
"The fact is, at first the city didn’t want to rebuild it, but thanks to our efforts and the efforts of the seniors who use it, the city relented," Oddo said in a statement.
"Now we are facing yet another setback."
The Parks Department put the reconstruction out to bid this year and got the first rounds of proposals in March, the agency said. However, because of issues over the hourly wages set in the contract, the bid was rejected in June.
The new bid for the project should start this year, according to the Parks Department.
"We understand the significance of the New Dorp Beach Friendship Club and what it means to residents of this neighborhood," said Lynda Ricciardone, Staten Island parks commissioner, in a statement.
Parks hopes construction will start in spring 2017 and the center reopened in the fall of 2018.
