Having served four four-year terms as an East Hampton Town assessor, Eugene DePasquale, the Democratic incumbent, is vying for re-election. His opponent is Tina Silverman of East Hampton, a newcomer to local politics. 

“I think we could be doing much better,” Ms. Silverman said of the assessors office’s use of technology. “It can be more efficient; we can improve systems and improve how the community is serviced.” 

The East Hampton Town Republican Committee, noting Ms. Silverman’s past professional life, suggested that she run for assessor. She had been on the White House staff during the Reagan administration, worked in the White House’s trade representative office, and also for the Defense Department before moving to East Hampton 10 years ago. 

“I did a lot of contracting oversight and use of best practices as a consultant to the Department of Defense, so I’m very familiar with systems and how to improve them,” Ms. Silverman said. “I think that the website could be more user-friendly and modernized; it’s not caught up with the technology that is available.” She also mentioned the possibility of implementing digital mapping, so that assessors would not have to visit each property before arriving at an assessment. 

Speaking of those members of the community she believes need attention, she said, “We have to be careful about how we treat our senior citizens and longtime residents of East Hampton. We need to make sure there is fairness for all, that things are not done so they have a negative impact on senior citizens and longtime residents.”

However, Ms. Silverman made it clear that her interest in the position is short term. “I just think we can do better for the community, and I don’t intend to make this a career position. I have had my career; I just want to serve a term and help make things work better. At this point, I’m looking to serve enough time to improve the system and add some fresh thinking and innovation to the process.”

Mr. DePasquale, a 30-year Montauk resident, is running on his 16 years of experience as an assessor and his ancillary training.

“I really like my job, it’s intellectual, I like dealing with people, and every once in a while I get to go outside and look at properties, which is really wonderful,” Mr. DePasquale said by telephone last week. “It’s important to have continuity in my office because we do very complicated things, and to have people with institutional knowledge is a good thing.”

In addition to studying at Columbia University and later New York University, where he attained degrees in real estate finance and analysis and construction management, Mr. DePasquale is a licensed real estate broker, but does not work in the field. After taking office in 2002, he gained certification as an advanced assessor and a residential appraiser, both of which are licensed by the state.

“I bring a lot of experience, knowledge, training, and education to my job, and that kind of training and expertise brings continuity because I, and the other two assessors, know how to work with each other,” Mr. DePasquale said. “A brand-new assessor will require a lot of training to bring them up to speed, and I wholeheartedly believe you need continuity.” 

In addition to Mr. Pasquale, the town has two other assessors, Jeanne Nielsen, who is chairwoman of the board of assessors, and Jill Massa. Their terms will be up in two years. Ms. Nielsen’s salary was $84,102 in 2016; Mr. Pasquale and Ms. Massa earned $75,942.

Thanks to a new state law, East Hampton taxpayers will have the right to force a vote on whether the town should accept money for East Hampton Airport from the Federal Aviation Administration, which imposes rules on how airports function as a condition of providing funding.

Questions regarding whether to take F.A.A. grants have long been central to community discussion. The current policy is to decline further F.A.A. money as the restrictions related to prior grants expire. The policy is intended to allow more local control over the airport and reduce aircraft noise. 

The new law would allow a town board to hold a referendum before deciding whether to accept F.A.A. grants as well as allow voters to force a permissive referendum should a board vote to do so. Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo signed the legislation, sponsored by Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr. and Senator Kenneth P. LaValle, this week. 

The new law will give “the community a voice” in these town decisions, according to a press release from the legislators. With a two-decade life span, the aviation grants can have “a long-term impact on the community when they are accepted,” the press release says.

“I am pleased the governor signed this measure which puts the decision-making power regarding F.A.A. funds back into the hands of the community,” Assemblyman Thiele said in the release. “Town board members have terms that last only four years. Therefore, it’s important that voters also have a say on these agreements that will impact them for years to come.”

In the release, Senator LaValle said, “I fully support East Hampton’s efforts to make decisions concerning their own airport.” 

Regardless of whether the town accepts federal airport money, however, the F.A.A. holds sway over aspects of the airport’s operation. Through an application called a Part 161, the town is seeking F.A.A. permission to enact flight restrictions designed to limit the noise impact of helicopters and other craft.

“F.A.A. grants severely limit, irrevocably for a period of 20 years, the ability of the Town of East Hampton as owner of its airport to control its own property,” the Quiet Skies Coalition, a group focused on airport noise, said in a press release. “The legislation is therefore a step forward in achieving and maintaining local, democratic control over this significant town asset for the benefit of all members of the community.” The group has taken out full-page advertisements in local newspapers expressing its views.

Should a future town board accept state or federal airport grants, the matter could be put to a vote by the electorate if enough signatures are gathered, within 30 days, under the permissive referendum law. At least 5 percent of those who voted in the last gubernatorial election would be required.

The East Hampton Town Trustees’ harbor management committee, which has served as an unofficial liaison between residents and Deepwater Wind, the Rhode Island company that plans to build an offshore wind farm some 36 miles from Montauk, will hold its next meeting on Wednesday at 6 p.m. 

Rick Drew, a trustee and co-chairman of the committee, said at the trustees’ meeting on Monday that one topic will be the proposed South Fork Wind Farm’s cost to the community, including the cost to customers of PSEG Long Island, which has signed a contract to purchase electricity from Deepwater Wind. 

In addition, “we will be covering resiliency, specifically resiliency of our energy grid,” Mr. Drew told his colleagues. He hoped for the attendance of a guest speaker, who he said “was just in the Caribbean in an official capacity” to survey the recent hurricanes’ impact on electrical grids, “and what may happen, via simulation, if a serious hurricane were to hit East Hampton, and how we may want to plan accordingly.” 

As of yesterday, the meeting’s location had not been determined. It may be held at the Donald Lamb Building on Bluff Road in Amagansett, which houses the trustees’ headquarters, but a larger venue may be chosen to accommodate the anticipated turnout. The Oct. 4 meeting of the committee, which also focused on the South Fork Wind Farm, was held at Scoville Hall, also in Amagansett. 

At the committee’s December meeting, Mr. Drew said that he expects Deepwater Wind officials to present findings from post-construction surveys around the Block Island Wind Farm, a five-turbine installation built by Deepwater Wind. That installation, the nation’s first offshore wind farm, began operation last December.  

The trustees, who have jurisdiction over many of the town’s beaches, waterways, and bottomlands on behalf of the public, have committed to announcing their position on the proposed South Fork Wind Farm by the end of this year. Opinion is divided in the town, with fervent support from environmentalists and opposition from commercial fishermen, in particular. Candidates for the trustee board, who will be selected in the Nov. 7 election, are similarly split. 

“We want to have this project work where it’s going to be safe and not harm anybody,” Brian Byrnes, a trustee, said on Monday, adding that the body is performing due diligence and acting as “messenger for the community.” 

“We get an answer to a question” about the project, said Diane McNally, “and it leads to more questions. Unless and until all those questions are answered, the way it has been presented does not have my support.” 

The terms of all eight sitting trustees expire at the end of 2017, and six of the current trustees are running for re-election. One seat on the board was left vacant after the resignation of Pat Mansir in April.

The Suffolk Legislature is expected to soon decide on the county’s 2018 vector control protocol, directly affecting the methods used by the Department of Public Works in an attempt to reduce the number of mosquitoes in Accabonac Harbor and elsewhere.

Last year, the department agreed to try an experiment aimed at reducing the aerial application of methoprene, a mosquito larvicide, in the harbor, rather than institute a ban. It called for the identification of “hotspots” that could be precisely targeted for spraying.

At the urging of the East Hampton Town Trustees and Legislator Bridget Fleming last summer, Stony Brook University interns collected water samples from the harbor, which were analyzed for mosquito larvae, and spraying occurred based on the results.

At their meeting on Monday, Kevin McAllister, the founder of the environmental advocacy group Defend H2O, urged the trustees to reiterate their opposition to the use of methoprene. The county used methoprene and Bti, a biological agent that is believed to be harmless to nontarget species, over approximately 18,000 acres in Suffolk last year, Mr. McAllister said. The 2018 vector control plan, which includes the use of methoprene, will make its way through the Legislature’s Council on Environmental Quality next month, he said. He predicted that the council would approve the plan, after which it will move to a public works committee and, in December, the full Legislature for a vote.

 “I will continue to register opposition to this pesticide again deployed directly in the marshes,” he told the trustees. 

As he has stated previously, Connecticut banned methoprene’s use in coastal areas in 2013, New York City restricted its use near Jamaica Bay in 2001, and Rhode Island has restricted it adjacent to Narragansett Bay and Long Island Sound. These jurisdictions all rely on Bti, Mr. McAllister said. “When you consider the stresses on our water bodies . . . this is an insult that really needs to end.” 

Rick Drew, the trustees’ deputy clerk, spoke of “some modest success” with the method implemented last summer and suggested continuing it as an incremental approach to ending aerial spraying of methoprene, should the county vote to approve its continued use next year. Tyler Armstrong, a trustee, agreed. Larval sampling to identify hotspots should allow precise targeting with Bti instead of spraying a wide swath of marshland with methoprene, he said. 

“I have an interest in revisiting what went on this past season,” Mr. Drew said, “and looking at how that might be able to be leveraged.” Through that effort, an area that is hand-treated with Bti rather than sprayed with methoprene via helicopter could be expanded, he said. 

Diane McNally, a trustee, suggested that Mr. Armstrong draft a statement on the trustees’ opposition to methoprene that would be forwarded to the Legislature.

A Sag Harbor man was charged with multiple counts of drug possession, two of which were felonies, on Saturday night after an encounter with East Hampton Town police.

According to Detective Sgt. Daniel Toia, an officer approached a parked 2002 Saturn at the end of Breeze Hill Road in Springs. According to Detective Toia, the officer reported that a strong smell of marijuana was coming from the car.

Richard Anthony Grigonis, 24, was in the driver’s seat, with another man, whom police did not identify, in the passenger’s seat. The officer later reported that as he talked with Mr. Grigonis, he noticed a plastic bag at the driver’s feet. “The stuff in that bag is mine,” Mr. Grigonis told the officer, according to the court file.

Assessing the bag as containing marijuana, the officer searched the car, allegedly finding a second bag behind the driver’s seat. The combined weight of the substance in the bags was more than two ounces, police said, and Mr. Grigonis was charged with misdemeanor possession. Mr. Grigonis was arrested; his passenger was not.

As police continued to check the vehicle, however, they allegedly found 21 small tubes containing a highly concentrated form of marijuana, weighing more than a quarter ounce, which triggered a felony charge.

Other drugs appeared during the defendant’s processing at police headquarters, police said. “There is coke in my wallet,” Mr. Grigonis said, according to court papers. The amount of cocaine brought on a second misdemeanor charge. “That’s LSD in my wallet,” he also was quoted as telling police. Possession of one milligram or more of the hallucinogen LSD, which allegedly was found, is a felony.

Represented by Trevor Darrell, Mr. Grigonis was arraigned in East Hampton Town Justice Court Sunday morning by Justice Lisa R. Rana. Several family members were in the court and posted $10,000 bail, which was set by Justice Rana. She had noted that the Suffolk district attorney’s office had requested bail of $30,000.

Justice Rana said she expected the defendant to immediately check into a drug rehabilitation program, and she agreed with Mr. Darrell to waive Mr. Grigonis’s appearance at his next date on the court calendar, Nov. 16, provided he did so.

East Hampton Village Mayor Paul F. Rickenbach Jr., who has spoken forcefully about the nation’s gun policies in the aftermath of mass shootings, has conveyed his strong support for legislation co-sponsored by Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr. that would make so-called “bump stocks” illegal in New York State. 

The gunman who killed 58 people and wounded almost 500 at an outdoor music festival in Las Vegas on Oct. 1 is believed to have modified his weapons with devices that enable them to fire in rapid succession. 

Mr. Thiele announced on Oct. 10 that he would co-sponsor the proposed legislation, introduced by Assemblywoman Patricia Fahy, that would outlaw a trigger crank, a bump-fire device, or any part, combination of parts, component, device, attachment, or accessory that is designed or functions to accelerate the rate of fire of a semiautomatic rifle to approximate the operation of a machine gun. 

“As our nation is unfortunately aware, these devices are becoming more readily available to members of the general public for no good reason,” Mayor Rickenbach, a former police officer, wrote to Mr. Thiele last Thursday. “The continued assault on our fellow Americans is tragic and incredibly unsettling. With the help of legislation such as yours, maybe we can work toward a less volatile and dangerous world than we live in.”

The letter followed remarks the mayor delivered at the village board’s Oct. 5 work session. After calling for a moment of silence in honor of the victims, he was somber. “I just don’t know what it’s going to take” for meaningful legislation on firearms, he said. “We’re all citizens of this wonderful country, but as the future is unfolding it seems there is just more and more loss of life with respect to attacks with semiautomatic assault weapons, and also automatic weapons.” 

“I would hope that our colleagues in Washington on both sides of the political aisle heed the message with respect to the stock barrel applications that can be made to a semiautomatic rifle to make it fully automatic,” he said. “It defies description.” 

To lawmakers who say the aftermath of a mass shooting is not the time to discuss the issue, he asked, “When is the right time?” 

These weapons, he said, are only appropriate for law enforcement or the military. “Aside from that, there’s absolutely no application.”

“We’ve got to get our act together,” he said, echoing remarks he has delivered several times in the recent past.

For the first time in a long time, voters will elect someone to be the Suffolk County district attorney who is not named Thomas Spota. Mr. Spota, who is 76, decided not to run this year, after winning four consecutive elections, beginning in 2001. Timothy Sini is on the Democratic, Conservative, Working Families, and Independence lines; Ray Perini is the Republican and Reform Party candidate. 

Mr. Spota’s office has come under fire in the last few years, particularly after the conviction last year of James Burke, the Suffolk police chief, on multiple charges stemming from the beating of a suspect due to a personal vendetta. Mr. Spota had mentored the police chief for many years.

Mr. Sini, 37, graduated from Brooklyn Law School in 2005. He was a law clerk for federal judges in the Southern District of New York and in the Second Circuit. He served in the United States attorney’s office for the Southern District from 2010 to 2014, where he prosecuted gang members and drug dealers. He joined the administration of Suffolk Executive Steven Bellone as an assistant deputy before becoming commissioner of the Suffolk Police Department in late 2015. He is married with three children and lives in Babylon Village. 

Mr. Perini, 70, graduated from Brooklyn Law School in 1973, becoming an assistant district attorney in Kings County. In 1976, he moved to the Suffolk district attorney’s office, where he set up its Narcotics Bureau and founded the East End Drug Task Force. He remained the county’s chief narcotics prosecutor until establishing the law firm Perini & Hoerger in 1989. He is married, with two children and three grandchildren, and lives in Huntington.

In interviews this week both candidates spoke about what their focus would be if elected. Mr. Sini sees the battle against drunken driving, as well the fight against drug dealers and gang violence, as multi-pronged. For example, the current Stop-D.W.I. program is funded, in part, through fines levied in courts upon conviction. 

Mr. Sini believes the district attorney’s office should funnel part of its share of forfeiture money, that is, cash and assets seized from criminals like drug dealers, into enforcement, treatment, and education. He also believes the office should “forcefully argue for stronger sentences” in D.W.I. cases and called for a program to show young people “the impact of just a couple of drinks.”

“D.W.I. enforcement is all important,” Mr. Perini said Monday. Like Mr. Sini, Mr. Perini wants to enhance programs like Stop-D.W.I., which pools various police jurisdictions in an effort to arrest drunken drivers. He believes state legislators could aid that effort by raising the stakes for those involved in fatal accidents while drunk. Instead of trying such a case as vehicular homicide, a B felony, he would like to prosecute such cases at the higher A felony level, as homicide.

Both men were critical of the current practice in Mr. Spota’s office of using forfeiture funds for assistant district attorneys’ bonuses.

In the war against drugs, Mr. Perini pointed to having founded the Narcotics Bureau in the 1970s and his numerous prosecutions of drug dealers. He believes he has the experience to bring down those he calls “kingpin” drug dealers, who earn $75,000 or more over a six-month period. Proving kingpins’ level of income could be accomplished through court-ordered wiretaps and surveillance videos, he said. Upon conviction, the kingpins should face 25 years to life in prison, he said. 

  At the same time, “treatment is important for the users,” he said. With the age of some drug users dropping, education and outreach to youngsters, down to the fifth and sixth grades, is important as well, Mr. Perini said. He said there were 400 deaths in the county from drug overdoses in 2016 and that he expects that number to hit 500 this year. 

Mr. Sini believes that dealers of heroin and fentanyl, in cases where overdose deaths can be traced back to them, should be prosecuted for manslaughter. At the same time,  he said it was important that addicts “not be afraid to go to treatment or to drug court. We have a great drug court.”

 Drug Treatment Court is an alternative to incarceration, with eligibility decided in the district attorney’s office based on the criminal history of the defendant and the nature of the charges, according to the state’s judicial website.

Mr. Sini also believes the Suffolk Legislature needs to revisit the laws regarding the weight of narcotics. Possession of eight ounces or more triggers an A1 felony charge. In his opinion that should be reset at a lower weight, particularly given the increased potency of the heroin being used.

He touted his record in prosecuting dealers of emerging “designer” drugs, such as bath salts, which is not spelled out in current law. He was the first, he said, to demonstrate that their molecular structure was analogous to drugs that are covered when he was a U.S. prosecutor, he said.

Battling gangs like MS-13, which have a foothold in pockets of the county, is a major focus for both men. Mr. Sini would create an East End Gang Task Force. As with the East End Drug Task Force, it would provide for combined resources and take advantage of the knowledge of local officers. 

Both men support term limits for the district attorney and pledged to limit themselves if elected, Mr. Perini to two four-year terms, Mr. Sini to three, regardless of whether limits are created under law.

Each sees the other as the wrong man for the job. Mr. Perini questions Mr. Sini’s  experience, while Mr. Sini believes his opponent is too entrenched in the system to bring about the change he believes is needed.

Mr. Sini pointed to his record as Suffolk County Police commissioner. The department was immersed in scandal after Mr. Burke’s legal troubles came to light. “The district attorney’s office is in a similar situation,” he said. What is needed is “bold, fresh leadership.” 

“If you don’t care who gets the headlines, and you work together to get the bad guys, we can be effective,” Mr. Perini said.

“I’m very passionate about what I do, and whatever I do, I put my all into it. If you want things to happen, you’ve got to make them happen,” Manny Vilar, the Republican candidate for East Hampton Town supervisor, said last week while standing in front of the East Hampton I.G.A., passing out campaign materials and waving or calling out greetings as passers-by honked and said hi. 

“My mom and dad,” he said after one honk, watching their car head north toward Springs, where they live down the street from him on the road where Mr. Vilar grew up. 

He and Jerry Larsen, who is running for a seat on the town board, had just come from taping their show on the public-access channel LTV, “Hear It From Your Neighbor,” and had a few minutes together to greet shoppers coming and going from the I.G.A. before Mr. Larsen was off to another obligation.

“The campaign trail is exceptionally busier for us, not being the incumbents,” Mr. Vilar said. His opponent, Peter Van Scoyoc, has been a town councilman since 2012, and Councilwoman Kathee Burke-Gonzalez, also on the Democratic ticket, is seeking a second four-year term. (The third Democrat, Jeffrey Bragman, a lawyer, is running for the first time.) “We have full-time jobs. I’m taking vacation time, then going on duty and working until 2 in the morning.” 

Mr. Vilar is a first sergeant with the New York State Parks police and president of Police Benevolent Association of New York State. Mr. Larsen, who retired last winter as East Hampton Village police chief, runs a private security company.

While they are both first-time candidates, they believe that their combined experience, coupled with that of their running mate, Paul Giardina, who retired last year from the federal Environmental Protection Agency, makes them uniquely qualified to take over the reins of town government. “Everybody who’s running, we’re all good people. Everybody means well,” Mr. Larsen said, “but we feel that Manny and myself and Paul have more experience.”

Mr. Vilar pointed to his own three decades in law enforcement, his emergency management know-how, and his boots-on-the ground environmental protection efforts as a member of the parks police. “Everybody can talk a good game about environmental protection and sleep soundly at night,” he said. “Myself and the people I represent, we’re the ones out there in the middle of the night in inclement weather making sure it actually happens.” With the P.B.A. — the fifth largest police union in the state outside of New York City — he has experience in labor relations and contract negotiations and has worked closely with the New York State Legislature “on any legislation that either directly or indirectly impacts our members.” 

Campaigning has been an eye-opener on several fronts for Mr. Vilar and Mr. Larsen, who have, until now, interacted with the community on very different fronts — as coaches, in law enforcement, as parents, but never as the faces of one political party or another. Mr. Vilar has six children; his eldest are grown and out of the house and his youngest is in eighth grade at the Springs School. 

“Some people are willing to engage you in conversation, and some won’t even acknowledge you,” said Mr. Larsen, who is registered with the Independence Party but was unsuccessful in his efforts to force a primary on that line. People ask them whether they are with the Democrats or Republicans, and some, after hearing they are on the Republican ticket, simply hand their literature back to them without another word. Mr. Larsen lamented that fact that even on the local level it seems that people frustrated by President Trump will not give a Republican candidate the time of day. “It’s sad that people are that narrow-minded that they hold people to a national standard,” he said.

On the local level, Mr. Vilar said, “we shouldn’t have Republican and Democratic Parties; we should have This Party and That Party.” Concerns in East Hampton cut across party lines, he said: “leaf pickup, whether the street light works or doesn’t work . . . from simple things like that to the difficult things like protecting our water quality.”

“Government has one function first and foremost: public safety,” Mr. Vilar said. In his mind, everything else, including environmental protections and zoning regulations, flows from that main responsibility. 

Standing on the corner last week, both Mr. Vilar and Mr. Larsen faulted the current town board and the ones that came before it for what they see as a lack of action on a number of issues, among them transportation and water quality. At the same time, they believe the current town board has been too quick to support Deepwater Wind’s plan for 15 offshore turbines about 30 miles from Montauk. “The town board, I believe, did the community a disservice because it jumped in with both feet without having . . . all the facts,” Mr. Vilar said. “Renewable energy is where we need to go, but you have to have all the facts. . . . We don’t have all the facts to know that you’re not going to create a greater environmental impact to our underwater ecosystem and not going to economically impede your ability to seek other alternative energies.” 

“I’m a big fan of solar and micro-generation,” he said. “There are other sources of renewable energy that still need to be vetted out and that project, itself, still needs to be vetted out.” At the same time, he said, he would “absolutely oppose” offshore drilling in the Atlantic. 

On the campaign trail, town residents tell him they are frustrated with the lack of public transportation, both in the town and regionally. “The East End should take over the assets of the M.T.A. and create a regional transportation authority,” he said. People also talk to him about the need for affordable workspaces. More of those could cut down on the number of vehicles commuting to and from points west each day, he said. 

A lot of problems that the town board tries to fix through new legislation could be fixed through better enforcement, Mr. Vilar said. He pointed for example to the summer party scene in Montauk, which he said is far less hectic than the scene that state parks police deal with on any given summer weekend at Jones Beach. “We have terrific town employees and we need to let them do their jobs.” 

He said people talk to him a lot about “the constant fluctuation in how policy is determined and implemented” and that they feel “a lot of it is left to subjective criteria.” Among his proposals is one that would stipulate that all appointed boards be made up of two members named by the majority party, two by the minority party, and a chairman agreed to be both parties, so that bodies like the planning board or zoning board of appeals are “no longer subject to political whims.” 

He also proposes internal committees that would review resolutions before they are submitted to the town board for approval “to vet out the unintended consequences.”

He described himself as a pragmatic thinker who can make split-second decisions but always looks at the big picture before “drill[ing] down the facts.” He loves to work, he said. “I’m in a great position. I love what I do. . . . I don’t need a job; I’m doing this because I love my community.”

Many great stories are told over great meals, so if Conca D’Oro’s walls could talk they would likely have a lot to share after 42 years on Sag Harbor’s Main Street. 

With less than a week left before the old-fashioned pizzeria and Italian restaurant is taken over by Michael Cinque and Laurent Tourondel, who bought Conca D’Oro over the summer and also own LT Burger on Main Street, the Venesina family shared a few stories of their own. 

Shortly before the lunchtime rush, after Frank Venesina, who owns Conca D’Oro with his parents, Lina and Tony Venesina, made sure all the dough, cheese, sauce, and other Italian fare was prepared for the day, he and his mom sat at a corner red-and-white-checkered table and began. 

On Dec. 13, 1975, having lived in America for only a few years, Lina and Tony Venesina opened Conca D’Oro, following in the footsteps of Mrs. Venesina’s brothers, John and the late Peter Gambino, who left their native Sicily and successfully opened Baby Moon in Westhampton in 1972, and the late Celestino Gambino, who opened La Parmigiana in Southampton shortly thereafter. 

“I always liked to cook, to be in the kitchen, to see people,” Mrs. Venesina said in soft, broken English — a language that Frank Venesina said his mother barely knew when his parents first moved. “Cooking was something we liked to do, and that’s why everything is fresh, cooked day by day, from the very beginning to today.” 

It was not long before most of Mrs. Venesina’s side of the family had also left Sicily and opened various other Italian restaurants including Luigi’s Italian Specialties in East Hampton and Primavera Italian Specialties in Montauk. 

While learning to run a restaurant, Mr. and Mrs. Venesina were also raising their two young sons, Frank and his older brother, John, who were 1 and 3 when the restaurant first opened. 

Although both Frank and John spent most of their youth in the restaurant, learning the ins and outs of the family business, John later went on to open his own restaurant, Edgewater in Hampton Bays. Frank, on the other hand, despite a brief leave for school, has been involved for as long as he can remember. 

“I was probably 4 years old running around this place,” he said. “I’ve worked here since I was 15. I’m 43 now.” 

Many of the restaurant’s staff has also worked at the mainstay for a long time. Seve Martinez, the friendly face behind the pizza counter, has been serving slices for nearly 15 years, and Franco Ligregni, the chef, has been in the Conca D’Oro kitchen for about 25. 

Throughout the many decades that Frank Venesina has been in the restaurant, he said one of his fondest memories was 15 years ago when the Sag Harbor Elementary School’s fourth graders surprised him by singing a song about him during the school’s morning program. 

Because Conca D’Oro is in the heart of Sag Harbor Village, it is little surprise that the pizzeria has been a Sag Harbor staple for all these years. 

Frank said that it is not unusual for kids’ backpacks to line the floors as students grab an after-school snack. Sometimes, he said, he even sees kids doing homework there. While Conca D’Oro has been the go-to for many to grab a bite or meet up with friends, some adolescents  found their first jobs there.

“So many kids have worked here over the years,” Frank said nostalgically. “I have seen a lot of kids grow up in this town.”

The change in routine is going to take some getting used to.

“It’s my life. Almost every day it’s the same routine and we will need to have a different routine now,” Frank said. “It will be a big change; this is all we know.” 

While Frank said he has no idea what to expect on Tuesday, Conca D’Oro’s last day, he is already beginning to prepare dough and ingredients for $1 cheese slices and $10 cheese pies that will be the special all day. 

“There are a lot of things I’m going to miss,” Frank said. “I’m going to miss all these connections and miss seeing the kids, but it’s just time for us.” 

Although there are mixed feelings in the community about the Venesinas selling, the new owners have said they plan to keep the place an affordable, family-friendly spot, and have offered Frank Venesina the option to stay on. And he likely will, he said.

Eighteen candidates will vie on Nov. 7 for the nine seats on the East Hampton Town Trustees.

The trustees, a governing body distinct from the East Hampton Town Board, were granted jurisdiction over the town's common lands, including many of its beaches, bottomlands, and waterways by the Dongan Patent of 1686.

The trustees have diverse functions, including issuing permits and collecting fees for docks and moorings, and activities on lands under their jurisdiction, such as bulkhead reconstruction, but the trustee board has increasingly focused its attention on addressing water-quality degradation and stopping attempts by private property owners to privatize beaches or beach access points. Trustees are elected for two-year terms every two years, with all nine terms expiring in the same year.

Even if all of the incumbents running are re-elected, there will be new members on the 2018-19 board. Two current trustees, Tim Bock and Tyler Armstrong, are not seeking re-election. A third, Pat Mansir, resigned earlier this year.

Nearly all of the candidates have multiple party backing. Many of the candidates took part in recent forums organized by the East Hampton Historical Society.

Click on the names below to read about their backgrounds and qualifications. The letters following each name represent their party endorsements: C for Conservative, D for Democratic, I for Independence, R for Republican, Rf for Reform, W.E. for Women's Equality, and W.F. for Working Families. A sample ballot for the Town of East Hampton can be downloaded as a PDF here and in Spanish here.

John Aldred, D, I, W.F.

Joseph Bloecker, R, C, I

Francis Bock, D, W.F.

Brian Byrnes, D, W.F.

Gary Cobb, R, C, I

Dell Cullum, D

Richard Drew, D, I, W.F.

Julie Evans, R, Rf, C, I

Jim Grimes, R, C

Michael Havens, R, C

Lyndsey Hayes, R, C, I

Susan McGraw Keber, D, W.F., W.E.

Rona Klopman, D, I

Diane McNally, R, C, I

Francesca Rheannon, D, W.F., W.E.

Bill Taylor, D, I, W.F.

Susan Vorpahl, R, C, I

Willy Wolter, R, C

The Star's 2017 East Hampton Town Trustee endorsements can be found here.