Kiamisha Lake, NY – Thompson Supervisor Tony Cellini was trying to solve the mystery of who has been hawking homes on the Internet in Yiddish for a massive development in Rock Hill.

The group claimed to have approval for 1,000 homes on 500 plus acres.

There were two contact numbers on the Web site and an address on 36th Street in Brooklyn.

Cellini didn’t know what project they were talking about. He did have suspicions. Sitting in his office, he dialed the first number.

“This is Tony Cellini, supervisor of the Town of Thompson,” he said. “I am very curious to know who you are.”

Cellini didn’t get a call until after Monday’s Yom Kippur holiday.

The man on the other end wouldn’t give him his name or say who he was working for. The man’s cell phone number registered “private.”

But the two men had a lengthy conversation about developer Robert Berman’s Rock Hill Town Center project.

“I asked if he was talking to Berman,” Cellini said. “He said he has been negotiating, but hasn’t signed any deal. He is testing the market first.”

Berman’s project does not have final approval, but has been a source of controversy in the hamlet of Rock Hill.

The town Planning Board accepted the final environmental impact statement, with conditions, for 1,613 homes and about 60,000 square feet of retail space at Exit 109 off Route 17.

Berman envisions first building the retail section, which might include a supermarket, and about 491 units just north of Rock Hill. The next phases will follow over 20 years. Berman and partners own about 527 acres.

Residents are worried about the size and density of the project.

But Berman representative Steve Proyect said he knew nothing about negotiations to sell the development, or market the homes.

Proyect said Berman was still actively seeking his final approvals.

“Berman has the right to do with it what he wants, but it was understood that he wouldn’t flip it,” Cellini said.

Cellini said the mystery man told him that the downturn has made it difficult to sell homes anywhere.

“He told me there’s about 300 unsold homes in Monroe and several hundred in the Monsey area,” Cellini said. “I don’t think his response has been that good.”

(Source: Times Herald Record)