By RICH CALDER
June 9, 2008
A member of the city's Coney Island Development Corp. has been quietly living in a beachfront building rent-free on the taxpayer's dime, thanks to a $3.6 million sweetheart deal he cut last year with the Bloomberg administration, the Post has learned.
And now, board member Dick Zigun is showing his ingratitude by planning to resign from the agency overseeing Coney Island development to protest the administration's revamped vision for the fabled amusement district.
Zigun confessed Friday that he's lived for the past decade on the second floor of the majestic Surf Avenue building that also houses a nonprofit organization he founded in 1980.
Zigun's Coney Island USA - which runs a world-famous circus sideshow and museum and organizes the annual Mermaid Parade - had been paying $100,000-a-year rent on the site until 2007, when the city handed it $3.6 million in taxpayer-funded grant money to buy the building from its previous owner as part of an expansion plan.
But Zigun's secondary use of 1208 Surf Ave. as his home appears to be a blatant violation of the funding agreement with the city.
The agreement stipulates that the site must be used "for the benefit of the people of the city," such as for a museum or cultural arts center dedicated to preserving Coney Island's history. It doesn't include provisions allowing the building - which is zoned for amusements and entertainment - to be used for residential use.
Lynn Kelly, president of the Coney Island Development Corp., expressed both shock and skepticism over the newspaper's findings.
"The city has no indication of anyone living there," she said.
"It sounds like one of those great Coney Island rumors that may or may not be true. If it's true, there will likely be a city investigation."
But Zigun, 55, admitted to The Post that he lives in the building after being told his driver's license, voter-registration records and court documents list "1208 Surf Ave." as his home address as far back as 1996.
Known as the "Mayor of Coney Island," Zigun even took a reporter on a tour of his modest living accommodations, which include two small rooms and a bathroom on the second floor.
The space, which Zigun said he also uses as an office, includes a brown leather couch near his work area that folds out into a small bed.
