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Padavan asks city to oust Totten cops

By John Tozzi

Padavan identified a 9.6-acre area encompassing 17 buildings, a pier and a playing fields along the fort's western shoreline that has been used by the NYPD since the 1980s. In a Dec. 28 letter to Mayor Michael Bloomberg, he asked that the police operation be moved to a different area of the fort so the waterfront could be integrated into the new Fort Totten Park to create a continuous esplanade along the shore.”When I go past there, all I see is lines of parked cars,” Padavan said in a phone interview. “Whatever they do over there they can do somewhere else.”Gina Masullo, a spokeswoman for the Parks Department, said Parks officials are discussing the property with the police.”We have been working with the NYPD to facilitate the move,” she said. The Police Department did not respond to requests for comment about what operations they conduct at the base.Padavan said he envisions the area “along the lines of developing something similar to Mystic Seaport.”He said the Police Department should move its operation to the other side of Fort Totten, where the Fire Department has a training facility and where the police canine unit already operates.In addition to developing the shorefront into a tourist attraction, Padavan suggested that pier could be used for small boats.”The need for a ramp for people to get boats in the water-kayaks, small crafts-has been talked about for years,” he said.U.S. Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-Bayside), who helped broker the original deal in 2000 that moved the U.S. Coast Guard to the Merchant Marine Academy in Kings Point, said he supports using the space for parkland.”Certainly the beautiful waterfront was always a critical part of the overall use of the park for the greatest number of people, and hopefully it will be available soon,” Ackerman said in a statement. “We will work to find a very suitable home for the NYPD allowing them to remain on the fort.”The Civil War-era Fort Totten officially opened as a public park in June, and the first phase of renovations, to improve the historic battery, was completed in the fall. Padavan has been instrumental in securing grants to develop the park as have other officials including Ackerman, Borough President Helen Marshall and Councilman Tony Avella (D-Bayside).Padavan said that if the NYPD does not vacate the property, the Parks Department should be granted access to Willets Street and the Endicott path, which run through the former Coast Guard property. Furthermore, he wrote, the police use of two buildings in the area would violate the terms under which the property is set to be transferred from the federal government to the city.The senator, who was stationed at Fort Totten when he served in the Army Corps of Engineers, said there is no reason why the police could not move their facilities and open that portion of the waterfront to the public.”This is Fort Totten Park,” he said. “It's not Fort Totten police station or Fort Totten fire station. This is a park.”Reach reporter John Tozzi by e-mail at news@timesledger.com or by phone at 718-229-0300 Ext. 188.