I'm so stressed I'm eating ice cream out of the carton

Hi all,

I'm looking for a little help. My husband and I bought a house in S. Bellmore in 2011. Shortly after we flooded 2x in a year. Now, we've been here for 5 years and we have 2 kids. We need to move. I swear we have PTSD from all that we went through here. So, we started looking in Bethpage, Wantagh, Massapequa and Seaford. Now, the problem is that someone told me about the Bethpage Toxic Plume, which is apparently traveling, from Bethpage, southeast affecting all of the areas that we were looking in.

I DO NOT want to move from one nightmare to another. There are tons of articles about the toxins affecting the water in those areas and the elevated cancer rates.

What would you do? Scratch you original idea of moving to one of those 4 towns? If so - where would you look? I work in Baldwin and my husband works in Hauppauge. So we want a town somewhat between the two jobs. We can spend a max of $535,000 and we are looking for a nice community feeling, a walkable town with a good-great school district. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

I'm so stressed I'm eating ice cream out of the carton

I'm close with someone who is an expert in this area. You need to stay away from Bethpage and parts of Seaford due to the toxic plume. You can contact the USGS for specifics.

Have you looked at East Meadow? No real walkable town, but good schools. DH grew up there, his parents still live there.

Re: I'm so stressed I'm eating ice cream out of the carton

Ahhh!! Thank you! My husband thinks I'm crazy and this all of the talk about the toxins are blown out of proportion! (He really loves Bethpage and lived there for a few years before we got married).

What is USGS? I will contact anyone, anywhere to get more specifics about this.

And I will look into East Meadow. Thanks again!

I'm so stressed I'm eating ice cream out of the carton

USGS is the US Geological Survey https://www.usgs.gov/
I'd stick with Bellmore or Merrick. North of Sunrise

Re: I'm so stressed I'm eating ice cream out of the carton

Re: I'm so stressed I'm eating ice cream out of the carton

OP: your situation is exactly what we just went through. We recently moved from Baldwin Harbor to North Bellmore. I work in Melville and DH in Port Washington. We got flooded after Irene and Sandy. When DH bought the house, it was not in a flood zone, but after Irene, FEMA changed the maps and our house went from Zone X to zone AE.

Our house was 500 feet from one of the canals in BH and DH spent months rebuilding our basement after Sandy, and as soon as the market picked up- we listed it for sale in mid 2014 and managed to find a qualified buyer in Oct 2015. Closed 2/2016 and when looking for new homes, we ruled out every home south of Merrick Rd (I know some homes in S Bellmore/Merrick might not be in a flood zone but we didnt want to take the chance of being remapped again in the future).

We ruled out parts of Wantagh, Seaford and Farmingdale/Massapequa due to the Bethpage plume. I believe it is real, and I already underwent 2 surgeries due to pre-cancer and I cant afford to live in an area where the water might still carry trace chemicals in the wells. My house has a whole water filtration system and I never drink from tap. Our water is serviced by East Meadows water district.

We couldnt be any more happier with our house, our area, etc. we had similar budget as you and found many 3-4 bedrooms/2 bath homes that were in our range. Inventory is low but when you see something you like, you better jump on it quickly.

Message edited 8/1/2016 1:15:35 AM.

Re: I'm so stressed I'm eating ice cream out of the carton

Thank you so much for your post. DH and I thought that when we bought this home, we would raise our children here, so it's a bitter-sweet decision we've made to move. So, just out of curiousity ( because it seems we have similar criteria) you ended up buying in East Meadow/East Meadow schools? I really appreciate your post and I'm glad that your health is better after your scares with pre-cancer.

Re: I'm so stressed I'm eating ice cream out of the carton

Message edited 8/1/2016 8:26:06 AM.

Re: I'm so stressed I'm eating ice cream out of the carton

We are Massapequa Park but east of the park outside of the plume. When I did research I believe the plume is not predicted to spread as far as us. We use S. Farmingdale water.

When we started looking originally we looked at homes in Bethpage but crossed it off our list because of the plume.

I love my area. We are Farmingdale schools which I know some people poo poo but so far we have 0 complaints. Our neighbors who have been here a lot longer than us love the schools and from what I see there are lots of great programs and great people.

Re: I'm so stressed I'm eating ice cream out of the carton

I second looking at North Bellmore -- convenient location, nice area, have many friends who are happy there. We also have 2 young kids and bought in S Bellmore in 2012 but were lucky to avoid damage from any of the storms. I realize though that we easily could have been less lucky.

I'm so stressed I'm eating ice cream out of the carton

We just moved to Merrick North of Sunrise and South of Southern state. We love it here! can walk to town, close to highways, great schools and community.

Re: I'm so stressed I'm eating ice cream out of the carton

I'd try north bellmore/Merrick.. Also I just moved from
Wantagh and from what j recall when we looked at the map, we (in north wantagh) were not close to the plume. We just moved from there to the north shore.