Peter Kirsch, an attorney serving as East Hampton Town’s consultant on airport matters, will speak to the town board at a 10 a.m. work session on Tuesday at Town Hall.

    Mr. Kirsch has been asked to discuss information provided by the Federal Aviation Administration in response to questions that Representative Tim Bishop submitted to the agency.

    In its memo, the F.A.A. for the first time directly addressed the agency’s stance and likely response should the town decide to reject further federal grants in order to obtain more local control over the airport, such as the ability to limit its use in order to reduce noise.

    At a board work session on Tuesday, Kathy Cunningham, who was chairwoman of the town’s airport noise abatement advisory committee before it was disbanded last year and is now the head of the Quiet Skies Coalition, asked the board to consider several things before committing to a course of action.

    Ms. Cunningham said that should the board accept federal airport grants but choose to pursue the F.A.A.’s permission to enact noise-related airport restrictions through a process laid out by the agency, several elements should be considered.

    The F.A.A. has granted a municipality the authority to enact its own restrictions at only one airport in the country, she said — in Naples, Fla., and only after being ordered to do so by the court.

    In order to make a case to the F.A.A. for localized restrictions, the town must first prove to the agency that there is a noise problem. But, Ms. Cunningham said, the F.A.A. uses a “flawed measuring tool” to determine whether there is enough noise to warrant restrictions. Instead of tallying individual events in which noise exceeds a particular standard, the F.A.A. averages noise events that occur day or night over a year. Only if they exceed an average of 65 decibels would the F.A.A. agree that there is a noise problem; however, that level is greater than the maximum noise level allowed in East Hampton Town Code, Ms. Cunningham pointed out.

    By that standard, and with seasonal differences in use of the airport, the only place the F.A.A. would acknowledge a noise problem “would be on the airport footprint,” she said.

    “This is one of the reasons that I would strongly recommend you not go in that direction,” she said of seeking F.A.A. approval for local airport use restrictions.

    Another, she said, is that the F.A.A.-required noise study and standards is not applicable to all the types of aircraft, such as seaplanes, that cause noise problems here.

    Bill Babinski, a farmer who owns 20 acres of land on Beach Lane in Wainscott, will be able to build the second barn he needs after the East Hampton Town Planning Board okayed his application at an April 4 meeting. The 1,380-square-foot barn, to be erected next to one already standing, is a little less than half its size.

    A neighboring couple, Tom and Shelly Gilbert, expressed strong opposition to the application at a hearing on March 7, saying that the new barn would obliterate their ocean view if it were sited as proposed.

    The development rights to Mr. Babinski’s land are jointly held by the Town of East Hampton and the Peconic Land Trust, meaning it will be a farm in perpetuity. The Gilberts had contributed to the fund that purchased the rights, and felt that as such, they should be given some voice in the placement of the barn.

    Ian Calder-Piedmonte, a board member who is himself a farmer, spoke first.      “There is no question that this would be obtrusive to their view,” he said, adding, however, that “a lot of this issue is, we’re late in the game. This should have been settled when the development rights were [acquired].”

    The Gilberts had proposed alternative locations for the new barn, but Mr. Calder-Piedmonte, drawing on his experience as a farmer, found them wanting. “I wish there was a solution that would please everybody,” he said. “I don’t think there is one here. We have to allow the structure to be placed where the applicant wants.”

    The board members J.P. Foster, Patrick Schutte, and Nancy Keeshan agreed, as did Diana Weir, the vice chairwoman. “We’re within our legal boundaries that we have to comply with,” she noted. “We can’t leave the town open to any kind of litigation if we violate the town code.”

    The board’s chairman, Reed Jones, speaking last, found himself alone in seeking a different solution.

    “It’s remarkable that a barn would create so much excitement,” he began, adding that a compromise between the neighbors should have been sought. “It shouldn’t be 100 percent one person and zero percent for someone else. I think there should be a tradeoff.”

    The board then voted to approve Mr. Babinski’s site plan, 5-1, with Mr. Jones the sole dissenter.

    Shelly Gilbert, sitting in the audience with her attorney, left the hall  dejected. “I don’t understand. Community should be about compromise,” she said, stepping out into the early spring night.

    At the same meeting, the board held two public hearings on site plan applications. The first was from East Hampton Indoor Tennis, which wants to replace its inflatable bubble with a metal one and add two adjacent small utility buildings. The second was from Riverhead Building Supply for its outlet on Industrial Road in Montauk, to install a 4-by-8-foot propane tank. Neither application met with opposition.

    The board will hold a public hearing on Wednesday to consider a proposal from Verizon Wireless to upgrade its facility in Montauk, near the town recycling center. Verizon wants to remove the three antennas currently on the tower and replace them with nine, in order to improve service in the area.

    The planning board’s March 21 meeting ended in a closed executive session with a town attorney, Kathryn Santiago, to discuss two lawsuits brought against the board earlier that week by David Eagan, attorney for the Concerned Citizens of Wainscott. One of the suits involves a property at 411 Montauk Highway in Wainscott, at the corner of Montauk Highway and Sayre’s Path. Concerned Citizens is challenging the board’s action of Jan. 25 granting approval for the construction of housing there.

    The second lawsuit involves a site permit granted to the owner of 55 Wainscott Hollow, Jeffrey Colle. This suit contests a point seemingly settled in State Supreme Court, in which the court ordered the board to reverse an earlier finding against Mr. Colle.

    The East Hampton Town Board split along party lines last Thursday in a vote on reorganizing the Human Resources Department. As reported last week, the measure, approved by the Republican majority, 3 to 2, abolishes the position of Pat Breen, the town personnel officer, who served as the department head. The board also moved two other staffers to different departments, one to the town clerk’s office and the other to the tax receiver’s office, leaving just one in human resources.

    The change assigns the former personnel assistant in the department to a payroll unit under Len Bernard, the town budget officer. Any other functions formerly performed by the Human Resources Department will now be handled by the budget office or supervisor’s office.

    The resolution offered by Mr. Wilkinson notes that the town’s full-time work force has decreased from more than 400 positions in the 2008 budget to 311 as of the beginning of last month. Savings from the reorganization of the Human Resources function, it says, are projected to be approximately $170,000 a year.

    The measure was also described as “an effort to create operating and financial efficiencies.” Mr. Wilkinson noted that the town’s financial operations are being monitored by the state comptroller “because of past administration misdeeds.” He was referring to the prior, Democratic administration. Under the terms of a state law allowing East Hampton to issue bonds to cover an accumulated budget deficit, the comptroller is to review all budgets during the life of the bonds. “We lost a lot of our ability to have the looseness you’re requesting,” he told Democratic Councilwoman Sylvia Overby, who voted against the changes.

    In explaining her no vote, Ms. Overby noted that the budget officer is appointed by and serves at the pleasure of the supervisor. “There are just no checks,” she said. “From purchasing to auditing to [information technology] and grants — [all] are reporting directly to the budget officer, who is reporting directly to you,” she told Mr. Wilkinson. Town  Councilman Peter Van Scoyoc, the other Democrat on the board, also voted no.    

    “Employees need to have a place where they feel safe,” Ms. Overby said. Under the reorganization, they would have to bring their issues or complaints to Mr. Bernard, she said. “They deserve to have someone in their court, that watches their back.”

    The reorganization also creates a new audit and accounting unit, to be headed by Charlene Kagel, the chief auditor, and assigns a grants analyst under her supervision.

    “This was just woods,” Maureen Murphy, the executive director of the East Hampton Housing Authority, said. She was referring to the Accabonac Apartments, a 50-unit project that opened in 1999, a year after Ms. Murphy joined the agency. Now, Ms. Murphy is retiring from the post. “It’s enough,” she said. “It’s time.”

    When Ms. Murphy left her teaching position at Brooklyn College’s School of Education and headed east to Montauk, she was appointed to the authority. “There was just Avallone then,” she said, of the Avallone Apartments in Montauk, a 17-unit complex that was opened by the town in 1993.

    Ms. Murphy served as the chairwoman of the housing board from 1998 to 2000, and then became the executive director. In that time, available subsidized housing has grown from the original 17 units to include the 50 units at Accabonac and an additional 24 at the most recently opened Springs Fireplace Apartments. For the most part, the apartments are intended for older citizens and some families in the middle income range.

    The East Hampton Housing Authority works with East Hampton Town, but is a separate entity. The group receives federal subsidies, but Ms. Murphy said, “It’s very difficult to buy land. We don’t have that much money.”

    Ms. Murphy expressed her gratitude to others on the housing board, mentioning Helen Fitzgerald, who died last month. “I’ll miss Helen,” she said. She also reminisced about some tenants “who have been with us from the beginning,” recalling one woman — who recently left the complex to live with her daughter — “driving around here and looking when this was nothing but dirt.”

    “We work hard,” she said with a bit of pride in her voice. “This could easily turn into a slum, but we do whatever it takes to keep the property looking clean and landscaped.”

    When asked about her retirement, Ms. Murphy smiled. “I’m of a certain age,” she said. If she could wave a magic wand, Ms. Murphy would love to see some land donated to the authority so it could increase available housing.

    “There are still people here who need housing,” she said. “It would be so nice if someone donated a sizable piece of property that we could develop.”

    Denise Schoen of Tarbet, Lester, and Schoen, the attorney for Michael Davis, who owns the Wainscott Wombles property at 411 Montauk Highway in Wainscott, received a two-week extension of time on Tuesday to respond to the Concerned Citizens of Wainscott, as represented by David Eagan, who is challenging a ruling by the town building inspector that a residence on the lot, which has a commercial use, would be legal.

Alex Walter, the Z.B.A. chairman, reported that the two sides were in negotiation toward a possible settlement, and the extension was approved unanimously.

“We’re trying to settle the matter between my client and Mr. Eagan’s multiple clients. I’m hopeful that we’ll be able to reach an amicable settlement,” Ms. Schoen said yesterday.

“We stand by our legal analysis as correct,” Mr. Eagan said at the meeting. “We have been approached by counsel of Wainscott Wombles if they could come up with a different plan. Our goal all along is for that property to be redeveloped in accordance with law,” Mr. Eagan said

    The East Hampton Town Zoning Board of Appeals held a busy but brisk session on Tuesday evening at Town Hall with four applications for variances on the agenda, in addition to a discussion about the Wainscott Wombles project on Montauk Highway in Wainscott (covered separately). Only one of the four applications drew opposition at the meeting.

    The application that drew an objection came from the owners of 2034 and 2036 Montauk Highway on Napeague, Mindy Nam and Mark Dhenert, who plan to merge two lots into one large, 31/3-acre parcel on property that runs from the highway all the way to the beach. The only thing they want from the Z.B.A. is a natural resources permit.

    Merging the lots would allow the applicants to cover a much larger area, with a 6,050-square-foot tennis court, a 640-square-foot pavilion, 831 square feet of decking with parking, and a 100-square-foot shed.

    The objection was to their proposed installation of a 2,300-square-foot lawn.

    Alex Walter, the Z.B.A. chairman, asked Billy Hajek of Land Marks, a planning firm representing the owners, why they wanted a lawn as opposed to natural vegetation. “Is it because the patio is away from the dwelling, and you want to walk across the lawn to get to the patio? Did they just want a lawn? Give me the rationale for the lawn,” Mr. Walter said. “They wanted something light on the feet,” Mr. Hajek responded.

    Mr. Hajek then referenced an application from the past in which the board granted an applicant something that would not ordinarily be permitted in exchange for a reduction in density. Making two lots one would meet that criterion.

    George Stankevich, however, the neighbor to the immediate west, argued that a reduction in density by folding together the two lots might not protect the property if it were sold. He urged the board to consider restrictions on future use. “You have the opportunity to lay down conditions,” he told the board.

    “This is an area of extraordinary beauty and fragility. We are concerned about anything that may imperil these qualities in the future,” he said.

    Tyler Borsack, who reviewed the application for the Town Planning Department, agreed with Mr. Stankevich about the quality of the property, saying the department was concerned by the impact of a lawn on the fragile dune eco-system, which, he said, was one of the rarest in New York State.

    Although Mr. Hajek said the owners would be willing to accept a restriction on the type of fertilizer that could be used on the lawn, Mr. Borsack had previously cautioned that such covenants were difficult to enforce.

    Dismissing these concerns, Don Cirillo, a member of the Z.B.A., said, “You’re only asking for a natural resources permit, so I think you should be allowed to do what you have to do.”

    The first hearing of the evening was for a proposed teardown and a new house at 95 Northwest Landing Road. An existing 986-square-foot, one-story house would be replaced with a two-story, 1,470-square-foot house with an additional 300 feet of deck on each floor. The application was for variances to allow wetland setbacks of 81.6, 64, and 31.3 feet when normally 100 feet is required. The 81.6-foot variance would put the new structure less than 20 feet from the wetlands. Additionally, a new septic system would be put in 22 feet from the wetlands when 150 feet is required.

    Joel Halsey of the Planning Department pointed out that while the numbers sound extreme, the existing house was built before the town zoning code was written and is two feet closer to the wetlands than the proposed new house would be. No one spoke in opposition.

    Another application involved tearing down an existing house. Vincent and Christine Sama want to put up a new 1,169-square-foot structure at 116 Runnymeade Drive on Gardiner’s Bay in Springs. Mr. Borsack, noted that the new building, even with the addition of a swimming pool, would be seven feet farther inland and would have minimal environmental impact. He expressed concern, however, that the applicants had refused to revegetate the property with indigenous plants.

     The fourth application was from Amedeo and Antonella Gabrielli, as represented by Richard Hammer, to build a 280-square-foot swimming pool at a new house at 589 Montauk Highway in Montauk. The Gabriellis need a five-foot variance for the pool.

    The board has up to 62 days to make a determination on all four applications.

East Hampton Town

Accabonac Excavation

    The East Hampton Town Trustees will hold a special meeting today starting at 10 a.m. in their Bluff Road, Amagansett, office. The subject will be the excavation of the entrance to Accabonac Harbor.

Draft New Lighting Law

    Councilwoman Theresa Quigley and members of a lighting code committee presented a new draft of outdoor lighting legislation on Tuesday. The draft will be reviewed by town board members and discussed at a future meeting.

    Key elements reviewed by Ms. Quigley include a provision that light sources not be visible beyond property lines and that light falling onto a neighboring property may not be in excess of a proscribed amount, “unless required for safety and security,” according to the draft. The proposal also calls for all exterior light sources to be energy efficient and to be positioned at an angle of 90 degrees or below, with several exceptions, including uplighting of trees and of historic buildings and museums that are not in a residential zone.

    The proposed law would allow any legally pre-existing outdoor lighting not meeting the new requirement to remain. Those building something new, or renovating more than 50 percent of a property, would be required to comply with the new rules. Others doing work that requires a building permit would be required to comply with the new law only on that portion of the premises that is being improved.

    In order to have time to discuss it and then have a hearing on the new law before adopting it, or a revised version, the majority of the town board agreed Tuesday to extend by 60 days a suspension of enforcement of the current lighting law for commercial properties. It was due to expire at the end of this month. Ms. Quigley and Supervisor Bill Wilkinson voted against the extension.   

    A push this week by Town Councilwoman Sylvia Overby to suspend or rescind a resolution to sell a piece of public land in Montauk and first obtain an appraisal on it was rejected and prompted angry outbursts by Supervisor Bill Wilkinson and Councilwoman Theresa Quigley.

    Ms. Overby and Councilman Peter Van Scoyoc had voted against the sale of a 3,700-square-foot piece of a town alleyway, which bisects the Ronjo motel, for $35,000 to the motel’s new owners, Chris Jones and Lawrence Siedlick, in the absence of an appraisal and an assessment of the purpose and need for the alleyway system.

    Supervisor Wilkinson defended the sale price, which, he said, he had pulled “out of the air.”

    Mr. Jones and Mr. Siedlick, who were at the meeting on Tuesday, had offered to pay for the appraisal, Ms. Overby said. Mr. Wilkinson at first agreed with the idea.

    But, he asked, “What does having an appraisal have anything to do with the board’s action [in approving the sale]?”

    “I’m saying they’re two independent actions,” he said. “If you wish to do an appraisal, we don’t have to suspend the original resolution.”

    New York State Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr. said in a telephone interview this week that, though there is no express provision in state law requiring an appraisal before selling town land, according to the New York State Constitution, “you cannot make a gift of public property.”

    He said that “you need an appraisal to be able to document” that officials, in approving a sale, have properly maintained their fiduciary duty to taxpayers and their property, and to defend the sale in case of questions by the state comptroller or a lawsuit by taxpayers.

    Ms. Quigley said Tuesday that she didn’t support getting an appraisal because she believed appraisers would set the price for the alley piece at $5,000. “I think the rest of the money is a gift to the town,” she said of the difference in the sum offered.

    She railed against Ms. Overby and Mr. Van Scoyoc, accusing them of following a policy of “delay, delay, delay, and stall, stall, stall.”

    “I don’t believe in your way of doing government,” she said. “I believe that government should be made by us. That’s what we’re here for.”

    Ms. Overby noted that the land is not owned by the board, but by the taxpayers. “We need to make sure we are doing our fiduciary responsibility — getting an appraisal,” she said. “It is not trying to stop government. It is trying to act responsibly.”

    “You’re going to have a permissive referendum on this property,” Ms. Overby warned. Taxpayers can challenge the sale through the permissive referendum process provided they collect a certain number of signatures on a petition within a limited time.

    “Go ahead, let’s have it,” Mr. Wilkinson said.

    Councilman Dominick Stanzione provided the third vote against Ms. Overby’s request. However, later in the meeting, Ms. Quigley announced that she had received a text — from whom she would not say — saying that an appraisal on the land had already been ordered. She questioned Ms. Overby about why an appraisal had been commissioned without board authorization.

    Ms. Overby said yesterday that it had not been requested by anyone representing the town.

    The East Hampton Town Zoning Board of Appeals ruled on Tuesday in favor of two applicants who needed variances to install septic systems. In a unanimous decision, the board found that a variance for a third floor was appropriate because it provided a way to put in a multi-ringed septic system that would conform to the county health code and help protect Lake Montauk.

    At the same meeting, the board granted a 60-foot variance from the required setback from the oceanfront dune crest in Amagansett so that a septic system could meet county regulations.

    Seven condominium units in two buildings are planned for the Lake Montauk property, a 3.4-acre parcel at 374 West Lake Drive, which has resort zoning. Because the land contains wetlands and is very close to the water table, there appeared to be no site for a septic system. The applicants’ solution is to fill the area between the new buildings and West Lake Drive, and to place the septic system in the fill.

     Each unit would have two floors, totaling 500 square feet. The property around the building would be graded up to the seven to eight-foot level of the first floor. The third floor would, in effect, be the basement, hidden beneath the livable areas and used only for storage.

    The only problem with the plan, and the reason why the town planning board, which had the application before it for site plan review, sent it to the zoning board, is that the zoning code prohibits three stories.

      Brian Gosman, a board member from Montauk, began the deliberations Tuesday. “Most of the complaints that came from the March 6 hearing were the actual height and the looming effect it would have,” he said. “Even if they were to build a two-story structure they could still build a taller building than they are proposing,” he said. He added that the buildings could have been three feet higher than now proposed.

    “I feel like this area of Montauk could use some improvements, some new infrastructure. I feel that a condo use as opposed to a hotel use will be better suited for this property and have less environmental impact,” he said.

     Sharon McCobb, another member of the board, told the board that the third story made the proposal “environmentally more stable.” Lee White, a board member, was in support of the variance, as were Don Cirillo, the vice chairman of the panel, and Alex Walter, the chairman.

    The only problem board members saw was that a mound of fill had already been placed on the property.

    “We do need to talk about the fill, though. It’s a concern,” Mr. Walter said. He asked the board to require that the fill be tested and that, if it were found to be unacceptable, make sure it would be taken out.

    The matter of where the fill had come from seemed to be answered during the March 6 hearing. Steve Kalimnios, whose family’s corporation North Harbor Realty owns the property, also owns the Lake Club and Marina on the eastern side of Lake Montauk. Permission to dredge there recently received a time extension. It seemed that the fill had come from that project, but Mr. Walter said after the meeting that the origins were still uncertain.

    In the second decision Tuesday involving a septic system, the board ruled in favor of unnamed applicants who own Pandion L.L.C., and plan to build on the last undeveloped oceanfront lot on Marine Boulevard in Amagansett. Pandion won the right to place a one-story house with a deck only 40 feet from the dune crest where the zoning code requires 100 feet.

    A heated exchange had occurred between Mr. Cirillo, acting as chairman at the public hearing on the application on Feb. 28, and Brian Frank, the East Hampton Town Planning Department’s chief environmental analyst, when Mr. Frank, who strongly opposed the requested variances, asked for a two-week extension of time to allow the Planning Department to study the septic system. He argued, in part, that the variances would create a dangerous precedent.

    There is seemingly only one obstacle remaining between Michael Davis and his Wainscott Wombles development on the corner of Montauk Highway and Sayre’s Path, but that last obstacle may be impassable, at least according to David Eagan, an attorney for the Concerned Citizens of Wainscott and a neighbor, who is challenging the right of Mr. Davis to proceed with his plans to tear down the building there and construct a similarly-sized one with a garage, small house, and parking spaces behind it.

    Concerned Citizens of Wainscott are appealing a June 2, 2011, determination by the town’s senior building inspector, Tom Preiato, that allows Mr. Davis to build a 600-square-foot house and garage on a commercially used parcel. The East Hampton Town Zoning Board of Appeals will hold a hearing on the matter on Tuesday at 7:30 p.m.

    Mr. Davis named it Wombles after a fictional character from his childhood.

    “Wombles were created by author Elisabeth Beresford, originally appearing in a series of children’s novels,” he said in an e-mail. The alliterative sound of Wainscott Wombles along with the image of these little gnome-like characters cleaning up Wainscott appealed to him, hence the name.

    The approximately 13,000-square-foot property is on the south side of Montauk Highway in Wainscott and is zoned for residential use, but because it had been used commercially before current zoning went into effect, it is exempt from some residential restrictions. It was on this basis that Mr. Davis applied for and was granted a “dual use” certificate of occupancy by Mr. Preiato.

    The 1,300-square-foot building on the property now was originally constructed in the 1960s as a diner. It sits toward the rear of the property with a white gravel parking area taking up much of the front of the parcel.

    The house Mr. Davis plans to build necessitates the dual use certificate, according to the presentation made by Mr. Davis’s attorney, Denise Schoen, of Tarbet, Lester and Jones, during a hearing for site plan approval in front of the East Hampton Town Planning Board on Dec. 7. Mrs. Schoen told the board, which later approved the site plan, that there were at least 17 other examples of dual usage certificates of occupancy in the Town of East Hampton. The Planning Department countered that these examples were not apropos.

    Mr. Eagan said this week that Mr. Davis’s arguments in favor of the dual use certificate are just so much fictional fluff.

    In 1975, he said, the then-owners of the property applied to the East Hampton Town Zoning Board of Appeals for a use variance to change the building from a diner to an antiques store and a real estate office and to expand the building by about 20 linear feet. The zoning board granted the request.

    “The legal effect of the use variance in 1975 was to terminate the pre-existing, nonconforming diner use,” Mr. Eagan said on Monday.

    “Under New York State law,” he said, “a use variance is not considered to be pre-existing or nonconforming. It is considered a permitted use.” Meaning, Mr. Eagan said, that a house can be built on the property using current zoning, or a business can be built applying the variance, but not both.

    Mr. Eagan explained that the zoning board, which has to be modeled on New York State law, can hear two types of appeals. One is the traditional request for variances from property line setbacks.

    “The second,” Mr. Eagan said, “is a use variance.” Such a use variance is extremely rare, Mr. Eagan said, requiring proof that without the variance the property is not economically viable. “This may be the only use variance that exists in East Hampton,” he claimed.

    If you depart from the strict rules of the variance, Mr. Eagan said, you have to revert to the current zoning code for the property.

    Ms. Schoen does not agree with Mr. Eagan’s interpretation. “Here’s the missing link,” she said about his argument, “there is no New York State case law that says that says once you get a use variance you’re stuck with it.”

    The hearing on Tuesday in front of the zoning board is to determine the merits of Mr. Eagan’s appeal and not the merits of the project itself.

    “We are not making any type of decision on the merits of the project, only on the determination of the building inspector,” Alex Walter, the board’s chairman, said.

    Whichever way the board rules, Mr. Eagan believes the matter will end up in court. For his part, Mr. Eagan said, referring to the certificate of occupancy issued by Mr. Preiato, “This is never going to survive judicial scrutiny.” Mr. Eagan then allowed that if he were Mr. Davis, he would probably take the matter to court if the board ruled against him.

    “There’s two sides to every argument. I genuinely believe this is the correct interpretation. In my mind the code interpretation is not a stretch at all,” Ms. Schoen said, adding that Mr. Eagan was arguing for a broad interpretation. “Ours is code-based.”

    Ms. Schoen’s partner, Jonathan Tarbet added, “If he wants that changed he should talk to the town board or run for office.”