Vacant in Garden City: Another Bank Coming to Village

Another bank may soon call Garden City home -- that makes 22-plus banks currently doing business in the village.

According to building superintendent Mike Filippon, a Bank of America could be a tenant amongst the street-level retailers of the mixed-use building at the corner of Franklin Avenue and Seventh Street.

"I know everyone's anxious to hear about any developments at the new building at Seventh and Franklin," he said. "The developer just filed an application for a variance to allow a bank to occupy approxmately one-third of that space on the ground floor."

Banks are currently not permitted in that district.

"Historically, the change that was made to that district in 1984 - so we're going on 28 years now - was directed at two specific uses - one was restaurants and the other was banks - because the board of trustees at the time felt those two uses were displacing a lot of the retail and personal service shops that traditionally had been used in that downtown district."

TRustee Brian Daughney questioned how many banks and restaurants currently exist. "I think we probaby have eight or nine banks and eight or nine restaurants in that zone right now," he said.

Commissioner Ernest Cipullo, in surveying all the village's banks in light of the recent Nassau County bank robberies, said the village has an excess of 20 banks in total. "I think it's 22," he said.

Does Garden City have too many banks? Let us know in the comments.