Hoisting picket signs bearing such slogans as "No Mall Here", "No Town Land" and "Getting Mauled by Malls", several hundred local residents convened along Robbins Lane in Syosset on Saturday morning, Nov. 20 to protest the Michigan-based Taubman Co.'s proposal to build a one million-square-foot upscale mall on the former Cerro Wire industrial site.

The rally, organized by the Birchwood Civic Association of Jericho, was held on the eastern side of Robbins Lane, exactly adjacent to the empty, rundown lot where the Cerro Wire copper tubing factory once operated. The dreary Cerro Wire water tower, symbolic of the property's decay, set the backdrop of the protest, looming over the 39-acre parcel that is owned by newspaper publisher Tribune Co.

"I can't believe how many people are here today! It just shows how interested you are in your neighborhood, how you want your neighborhood to remain the best," cheered David Passigli, president of the BCA. "The quality of life will be forever changed...if this mall is built."

Passigli and former BCA president Todd Fabricant, the current chairman of the civic group's anti-mall campaign, addressed the spirited crowd, citing concerns that the proposed Mall at Oyster Bay, a complex that would include 100 stores, three anchor tenants and a three-tiered parking garage, would diminish the quality of life in Jericho and Syosset.

The most menacing threat, said Passigli, is the potential for dangerously high traffic and congestion levels, with car volume exceeding the capacity of local roads. Passigli cited a Taubman-funded environmental study which predicted a minimum of 3,000 cars per hour along Robbins Lane during peak shopping hours.

"Can we afford that type of congestion on this street?" asked Passigli to his fellow neighbors, who responded with a boisterous "No!" Passigli cautioned that many shoppers may try to avoid traffic back-ups by taking shortcuts through the nearby neighborhoods.

Taubman's reaction to the rally was one of skepticism and suspicion regarding the protest's actual motives. Company spokesperson Gary Lewi suggested that residents are being fed misleading and inflammatory propaganda from a rival developer - the Simon Property Group, which owns the Roosevelt Field Mall.

Herb Balin, one of the BCA's attorneys, and Ryan & Ryan Public Relations, which represents the BCA, both have the Simon Property Group as clients. Lewi said that Simon Property is interfering with the communication between Taubman representatives and the local residents, and that it had a hand in organizing the rally.

"This is no longer a discussion over legitimate issues; this is now a fight over market share," said Lewi, a Syosset resident himself.

Lewi said that dialogue bewteen Taubman and the community has been taking place for three years and will continue. Despite overwhelming sentiments at the rally that would suggest the contrary, Lewi characterized the public as open-minded about Taubman's mall plans.

"By and large, the people I have been dealing with who are my neighbors are responsible and articulate, and have valuable opinions...[But] this discussion winds up being held hostage by people who have an economic agenda."

Kevin Ryan, president of Ryan & Ryan, was adamant that his work for the BCA and the Roosevelt Field Mall in no way overlap. He also noted that the BCA independently approached his company, and not the other way around. "They solicited me to represent them. If Gary wants to get into conflict of interest, I could bring up clients that would represent a conflict of interest with him," Ryan said.

"That's his line of attack," concluded Balin. "He has nothing to say to defend his position, so he just throws darts and hopes that one of them hits the corner of the bullseye."

Fabricant resisted Lewi's idea that Taubman and local residents have been engaged in an open dialogue. Rather, he characterized the Taubman Co. as an unrelenting, uncompromising organization that refuses to listen to the community's concerns. "They have no intention of sitting down," said Fabricant at the rally. "We're not NIMBYS. We want development. This is an eyesore. This is disgusting. We're happy to have corporate offices...hotels...housing. Taubman's not interested."

However, it would not be in Taubman's interest to build anything other than a mall on the property because it only exclusively builds malls. The BCA must appeal to the Tribune Co. to consider other options, but the Tribune Co. has remained silent.

Fabricant also told residents that they must begin sending a strong message to the Town of Oyster Bay. He warned residents that the economic temptation of a mall may be too much for the town board to resist. "The town might be listening. The town has a little bit of a deficit problem. Selling some land might be a way to alleviate that," explained Fabricant.

He said that Oyster Bay must not grant Taubman the permission to use town land for the construction of additional roadways that would provide ample parking lot ingress and egress opportunities for shoppers. The BCA believes that if the town refuses to grant such permission, the mall proposal will likely be infeasible.

Traffic is not the only issue surrounding the mall. Fabricant also stressed concerns at the rally that many local businesses will lose customers to the shopping complex.

"We've already got Broadway [Mall], which will be a ghost town if this thing happens here," said Fabricant. He also questioned whether the tenants in the new mall would actually meet the upscale standards that Taubman is promising. Neiman-Marcus, one of the long-promised anchors for the mall, would certainly be one store meeting that standard; however, Fabricant said that to this day there is no proof that a lease agreement exists between Neiman-Marcus and Taubman.

Amidst all of the cheering and sign-waving, there was at least one dissenter in the crowd. Syosset resident Robert McCullough, a former library trustee, said that he has visited several Taubman malls nationwide and is impressed. "Ninety-nine percent of the people here have never visited a Taubman-built mall as I have," said McCullough. "It appears to me that you've got NIMBYism going on down here and that these people are unwilling to sit down and have a reasonable discussion with the Taubman people."

That opinion, however, was strongly outnumbered. "We want to stop [Taubman's] corporate imperialism," said George Flowers, president of the North Syosset Civic Association. Flowers said he was encouraged to see representatives of many local civics at the BCA event. "That's the way to go. We are, basically, one community."

Town Councilwoman-elect Bonnie Eisler, who as a Woodbury civic leader opposed the mall proposal, maintained impartiality at the rally. Eisler said that the residents showed great solidarity and that if they want to continue to make an impression on the town, they must "capitalize on their momentum."

Nassau County Legislator Judy Jacobs, who is openly against the mall, also attended the rally. "I think it's making a tremendous statement that this community is not against progress, but that it is against progress which destroys other businesses and the economy in its wake," said Jacobs.