Nathaniel H. Miller, an East Hampton Town Trustee accused of choking another man at a Maidstone Park beach barbecue last month, was cleared of the charge Thursday in East Hampton Town Justice Court.

"At the end of the day," said Daniel G. Rodgers, Mr. Miller's attorney, "baymen's justice was served."

Mr. Miller had been arrested by East Hampton Town police on July 12 after he placed a chokehold on Clint Bennett, a town highway department employee, who was also at the barbecue. Witnesses at the time reported that the two men had been arguing when Mr. Bennett challenged Mr. Miller by saying, "Do something about it," leading to fight.

Mr. Rodgers said the dispute was rooted in an incident dating back to 2011, when Mr. Bennett was charged, and later convicted, of arson for setting fire to a dory belonging to a fellow bayman, Paul Lester.

Mr. Bennett was convicted of the crime, and was sentenced on May 4, 2011, to 20 days in jail, as well as being required to pay $8,161 in restitution to Mr. Lester. Mr. Rodgers said Mr. Bennett failed to make that payment in full, leading to the dispute with other baymen. At least 25 people — friends, family members, and fellow town trustees — showed up in the courtroom Thursday in support of Mr. Miller.

"Our office has investigated the incident, and we do not feel we could meet the evedential threshold to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt," Sean McDonnell, the attorney prosecuting the case, told East Hampton Town Justice Lisa R. Rana, who then dismissed the case.

Outside the courthouse, Mr. Miller thanked his supporters for coming. "I am very sorry this all happened," he said.

A hastily scheduled East Hampton Town Board meeting will be held next week to address the concerns of many East End residents about noise from aircraft that use East Hampton Airport.

Following meetings last week in Bridgehampton and Peconic and on Shelter Island, town officials anticipated that a large number of people would come to speak out about airport noise at the town board's regularly scheduled meeting Thursday evening, but, with 13 public hearings on unrelated issues already on the agenda, East Hampton Town Supervisor Larry Cantwell said Monday morning that he was concerned that an overflow crowd would have nowhere to sit and many would not be able to fit into the modest Town Hall meeting room.

"In order to adequately host that many people who want to address the airport noise issue, we're scheduling this special meeting so people can attend," Mr. Cantwell said on Monday.

The airport noise meeting is slated for Aug. 27 at 6:30 p.m. It will be held at LTV Studios at 75 Industrial Road in Wainscott, which has more space than the Town Hall meeting room.

Kathleen Cunningham, the chairwoman of the Quiet Skies Coalition, commended Mr. Cantwell for creating a special meeting just to address airport noise.

"All over the East End, our neighbors and colleagues are being tortured, particularly by helicopter noise," Ms. Cunningham said in a press release.

The meeting comes just as recent numbers show flights in and out of the airport have grown. Between Jan. 1 and Aug. 4, helicopter traffic jumped by nearly 44 percent over 2013.

Though Hillary Clinton was not expected at BookHampton until 5 p.m. on Saturday, the line to see her began to form that morning. Edna Lanieri-Dewitt, who was first in line, arrived at 10 a.m.

"I'm excited about just meeting her," Ms. Lanieri-Dewitt said. "It's a once in a lifetime opportunity, and I'm thrilled that she's in this world."

By 5 p.m., the line stretched all the way from BookHampton to the west end of the business district by Intermix, and wrapped around to John Papa's Café on Park Place. The book signing was sold out, with all 1,000 tickets purchased in advance.

Aubrey Peterson, who is 11, said that he was willing to wait all day to see Mrs. Clinton. "Meeting Hillary Clinton in like meeting the Queen of England," he said.

Mrs. Clinton began signing books a little after 5. Though she reportedly signs 400 books per hour, she still took the time to greet each person, even pausing to have conversations with some. She spoke to one woman about her injured leg saying, "I broke my elbow a few years back and did physical therapy for it. Have you started physical therapy yet? I hope it goes well for you." She also shared a moment with a friend, Patti Kenner, and the two posed for a photo.

Ruth Vered, the owner of the Vered Gallery, who prefers to go by Vered, was not pleased with Mrs. Clinton's presence. Dressed in all black, she stood in front of Starbucks during the event, holding a hand made sign that read "The Worst Sec of State."

"Every move she made was bad. . . . She is not someone I would want as a role model for my daughters," Vered said.

Vered was the only protester that day. Many people in line were wearing "Ready for Hillary" stickers, in reference to her presumed 2016 presidential campaign. Howard Dean, a 2004 candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination and a former chairman of the Democratic National Committee, was spotted at the event, too. (His mother has a house in East Hampton, and he's a frequent visitor.)

"I'll wait forever for her to be president," said Linda Fuller, a former English teacher at the East Hampton Middle School. "We need American women in power."

Jerry Seinfeld was spotted at Babette's restaurant in East Hampton Village on Monday taping an episode of a new television show called "Car Matchmaker."

Mr. Seinfeld, who has a house overlooking the ocean in East Hampton, sat down with Spike Feresten, a comedian and former "Seinfeld" writer who hosts " Car Matchmaker," at a corner table with two camera operators and several other crew members hovering nearby. Despite the taping, Babette's was open and busy as usual.

Mr. Feresten, who has also worked on "Saturday Night Live" and "Late Show with David Letterman," received three Emmy nominations during his time as a writer for "Seinfeld." In fact, he was behind the famous "Soup Nazi" episode. He went onto to co-write the animated film, "Bee Movie" with Mr. Seinfeld.

"Car Matchmaker" will debut on Esquire Network in the fall, and he Tweeted a photograph with Mr. Seinfeld in front of a Porsche, thanking him for "an incredible RSR infused morning in East Hampton," referring to the Porsche 911 GT3 RSR.

The Porsche was parked outside Babette's. Mr. Seinfeld has a big collection of classic cars.

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This article has been updated from an earlier version of that said that Mr. Seinfeld was taping an episode of his own online show, "Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee."

Woodlands in the Town of East Hampton have been "decimated" by foraging deer, according to a representative of the U.S. Forest Service who will present his findings at a forum hosted by the Village Preservation Society of East Hampton on Thursday at 5:30 p.m. The group will meet at the Emergency Services Building at 1 Cedar Street in East Hampton. The meeting will be open to the public.

Kathleen Cunningham, the executive director of the society, quoted Thomas Rawinski when she told the East Hampton Village Board last Thursday that the Forest Service official had surveyed woodlands in the town for a report he presented to them in June. Ms. Cunningham told the board that the deer population in East Hampton, according to Mr. Rawinski, "is having a profound impact on our old-growth trees, oak saplings, and a variety of other flora and fauna that depend on that ecosystem to survive. . . . His term was our forests are 'decimated.' "

Mr. Rawinski "opened my eyes to the impact deer are having on old-growth trees," Ms. Cunningham said last week. "Down the road, we're going be in some big trouble in these forest areas, we're going to have to restore them. . . . Forests are important in supporting a variety of other flora and fauna, a whole host of things that are going to be seriously negatively impacted."

In June, the Village Preservation Society launched its Spay-a-Doe fund-raising program, aimed at broadening the scope of the village's deer-management plans. The village allocated $30,000 to deer management for the fiscal year that started on Friday, a figure preservation society officials have called "woefully insufficient." The group has stated that the cost of sterilizing a doe is approximately $1,000, and it plans to raise $100,000 for a sterilization program it hopes will be enacted, in conjunction with a cull, in the fall.

"We haven't met our goal yet but are doing really well," Ms. Cunningham said.

Anthony DeNicola, founder and president of White Buffalo, a nonprofit organization that works to preserve native species and ecosystems, will also attend the meeting. White Buffalo, Ms. Cunningham said, would be hired to conduct the spaying program.

Police are looking for a man they said broke into a Bridgehampton house, armed with a handgun, robbing a victim and pistol whipping him on Tuesday.

Southampton Town police said they were called to a house on the Bridgehampton-Sag Harbor Turnpike, near Huntington Crossway, at 11:31 a.m., and found a 26-year-old with injuries.

A man with a handgun forced his way into a house by "violently shoving a 51-year-old female who had answered the door," Detective James Mazzio said in a press release issued on Wednesday night. The man then went upstairs and demanded that the victim give him money, then struck him "repeatedly" with the gun. The robber then stole multiple electronic devices from the house before leaving on foot, according to police.

Police said they believe this was no random act, and "that the perpetrator targeted the residence." No description of the robber was provided.

The victim, whose name was not released, was taken to Southampton Hospital, where he was treated for non-life threatening injuries.

A search of the area ensued. Southampton Town police received assistance from Sag Harbor Village police and the Suffolk County Sheriff's K-9 unit, but the suspect was not located.

On Tuesday evening, police from several jurisdictions, including  Southampton Town, East Hampton Village, East Hampton Town, and Sag Harbor Village, were staking out the area on the foot, reportedly searching the woods. Huntington Crossway was blocked off at both ends, while a county police helicopter conducted a search. Many of the officers on the street were seen carrying rifles on their shoulders.

Detectives said they are conducting "a full, vigorous investigation into the incident," but would not comment further.

Cyril’s Fish House has lost its license to sell alcohol, according to Joseph Prokop, the attorney handling East Hampton Town’s ongoing legal confrontation with the popular Napeague roadside bar and restaurant.

The New York State Liquor Authority prosecuted Cyril’s on 83 charges and found it guilty on Tuesday of 73 of them, Mr. Prokop said. Yesterday, its members voted 2-1 to cancel the license.

Clan-Fitz, the ownership entity of the business, will not find comfort in that one dissenting vote, which reportedly was to revoke the license permanently.

The S.L.A. was to have served the cancellation notice yesterday. East Hampton Town Police Chief Michael Sarlo said Tuesday that the department had been unofficially notified of the suspension, but had not yet received official word from the authority.

William Crowley, a spokesman for the S.L.A., said yesterday that the owners could reapply for a license from the board but that the establishment’s record would be taken into account.

As part of the lawsuit against the restaurant and Clan-Fitz, East Hampton Town is seeking an injunction that would force its closing. The request will likely be decided upon by the end of this month.

Out in Montauk, another establishment is facing a confrontation with the town. On Tuesday, the East Hampton Town Board voted 5-0 to seek a temporary restraining order from State Supreme Court against the owners of the Memory Motel.

“They have no site plan approval for the outdoor bar, or for the fencing, or the tables,” said Michael Sendlenski, a prosecuting attorney for the town. The bar has also decreased its on-site parking, another code violation, he said, adding that Memory principals were “confrontational with our code enforcement officers” during a recent visit.

Mr. Sendlenski said the town would be in State Supreme Court in Riverhead today seeking the injunction.

Two Montauk homeowners have been charged with violations of the East Hampton Town code related to tenant turnover in the houses they rent.

Louis Scagnelli, the owner of 20 Foxboro Road, is accused of “renting out his house to a rotating cast of tenants over successive weekends,” according to a press release from the town’s Code Enforcement Department. Complaints from nearby residents cited new tenants and excessive vehicles and noise on weekends, the release said. Mr. Scagnelli was charged with six counts of excessive turnover, and more charges are likely as the investigation is continuing, according to David Betts, the town’s director of public safety.

One neighbor, who spoke to the press about the problem in June, said that week to week, “You never know what to expect.” Some weeks of the summer, she said, the temporary renters were relatively calm, whereas, in others, “all hell breaks loose.” She had called the town several times to complain, but felt she was getting the runaround. The neighbor, who asked not to be identified, said the house was being advertised online as a party house.

When a reporter visited the house one Sunday and identified himself as such, a renter told him that he and 12 others in their early 20s had rented it out for the weekend. The double garage door was open that day, revealing a cavernous space that could easily hold six cars. The renters that weekend had all taken the train to Montauk.

John Templeman, a Manhattan attorney and owner of 5 South Federal Street, was charged initially with one count of excessive turnover and one count of electronic medium advertising daily and weekly rentals. He had advertised his house on several Internet sites, including Airbnb, for fees that ranged from $900 per night to $1,600, with an additional $50 for each guest over 10. The activities at Mr. Templeman’s house, which were previously reported in The Star, prompted a longtime resident of the hamlet to create a Facebook page, Montauk Rental Madness.

Three more charges against Mr. Templeton were added on Tuesday: illegally converting a residence into a two-unit house and lacking a certificate of occupancy for the newly created spaces. According to Mr. Betts, Mr. Templeton faces possible fines of $500 to $1,000 per charge, as well as up to six months in jail. The charges are misdemeanors.

Mr. Templeman was also charged with pumping pool water into the street.

“Excessive turnover has been the focus of many of our online complaints and is being vigorously investigated to provide for the quality of life expected in our town,” Mr. Betts said. Mr. Betts said last Thursday that the activities at the two houses were among the most egregious violations of the provisions of the code covering rentals.

Regarding Mr. Scagnelli, he said, “I think that when somebody continues to violate the code five and six and seven and eight times — that might be one of the more significant ones.”

The town has adopted what is essentially a “three strikes and you’re out” policy. Mr. Betts said that the town will aggressively pursue owners with three or more incidents of violating town law regarding short-term rentals. He also said there are several more owners throughout the town who are at the two-incident level, so there are likely more cases yet to come.

Investigation into the activities at both houses began two months ago, after the town learned what was occurring through its online complaint form, a new tool launched in late May. The form has been effective in gathering the evidence needed to take code-breakers to court, Betsy Bambrick, the head of the Enforcement Department, told the town board just this week.

According to Mr. Betts, the public’s use of this “real time” tool is essential for enforcement. “We need people to call up, but also to use the online system.” It is a mistake for residents to wait until morning to make a complaint if there is an egregious violation.

By going to the online complaint page, code enforcement officers, who are in the field on weekends as late as 2:30 in the morning, can react right away, and catch violations that may be harder to find in the morning. “We need to have the public help us with enforcement,” Mr. Betts said.

When the Big Apple Circus presents a preview of its new show, “Metamorphosis,” at Guild Hall on Aug. 24, it will be the first time the artists in this year’s production will perform together. In fact, it was only on Monday that the aerialists, clowns, contortionists, illusionists, trapeze artists, and other talent that make up this year’s cast arrived in Walden, N.Y., to begin rehearsing together.

“Metamorphosis” previews in the ring in Virginia starting in September and opens at Lincoln Center on Oct. 17, then goes on to Bridgewater, N.J., and Boston, and closes its season in Queens.

The Guild Hall stage show is a joint fund-raiser for the cultural center and the not-for-profit circus, whose East Hampton supporters include Mary Jane Brock, vice chairwoman of the Big Apple board, and Barbara Slifka.

“There are so many worthy causes,” Ms. Brock said Tuesday at her house on Main Street, “but this one is pretty distinctive. Where else do you see an organization peddling joy? It’s multigenerational; it works for everybody. You do not have to be a child to enjoy the Big Apple Circus. It’s beautiful and sophisticated.”

The classical European-style one-ring circus was founded in 1977 by Paul Binder and Michael Christensen. “Part of our mission is to show people that circus is a noteworthy and worthy art form. That’s one of the reasons we appreciate being at Lincoln Center,” said Ms. Brock, who has served on the board since 1981, invited by Ms. Slifka’s late brother, Alan Slifka, Big Apple’s founding chairman.

Each year, there’s a new show with new performers and some who are back by popular demand, but there a few things audiences can be sure of, no matter the year: equestrian acts, clowns, jugglers, aerialists, “and we always have a dog act,” Ms. Brock said.

With young audiences “very often, the circus is the first live entertainment they’ve seen, and in today’s world with so many screens, to have a child experience live entertainment is so different,” Ms. Brock said. “There’s an exchange that takes place between the audience and the center ring. You’re no more than 50 feet from the artist, you see him sweating.”

On Aug. 24, people will have a chance to be even closer. Ms. Brock and her husband, Charles Brock, will host a reception at 3:30 p.m. with circus artists out and about among the guests in advance of the 5:30 p.m. show in Guild Hall’s John Drew Theater. Tickets to the reception and show cost $125, or $120 for members. Tickets for the show only start at $50.

As a not-for-profit, an important part of the circus’s mission is to “give back to the communities in which we perform,” Ms. Brock said. The “jewel in the crown” of those outreach efforts, by Ms. Brock’s estimation, is Big Apple’s Clown Care program, through which professional artists make “clown rounds” to pediatric hospitals and treatment centers all over the country, using “humor to help relieve stress and tension in a child’s room.”

She described a visit that served as the impetus for Clown Care. In 1986 Mr. Christensen was asked to perform at an annual Heart Day event for children who had undergone heart surgery at what is now New York Presbyterian-Columbia University Medical Center. He and his team parodied the doctors, made fun of the seven food groups, did a red-nose transplant on one of the doctors, and turned a big scary syringe into a flute that could be played. “Michael came away from that and said, ‘I want to create a program that lets me do this every day.’ ”

Big Apple also runs a Circus of the Senses for vision and hearing-impaired children and adults, a Vaudeville Caravan in Chicago in which performing duos visit with residents in nursing care facilities, two after-school programs, and offers free or discounted tickets to underserved children and senior citizens.

“My heart was hooked when I realized that instead of just writing a check, I could fill a tent with people who were my guests,” Ms. Brock said.

“Do you feel the pond is in danger of dying?”

That was the question posed by the author and futurist Faith Popcorn to Diane McNally, clerk of the East Hampton Town Trustees, at that body’s meeting on Tuesday. Ms. Popcorn, along with other Georgica Pond shoreline homeowners, attended the meeting to express their concerns about the pond, which the trustees closed to crabbing and fishing on July 24 because of the discovery of cyanobacteria, or blue-green algae.

On Tuesday, the trustees resolved to maintain the pond’s closure to the harvesting of fish and crabs through Aug. 26, the date of their next meeting. Ms. McNally described the closure as precautionary. While there is no data confirming that crabs would be affected by the algal bloom or that consuming them or fish would be unsafe, the trustees determined on July 24 that “it is in the best interest of the public” to close the pond.

The extension can be rescinded before Aug. 26, Ms. McNally said, should testing determine that the algal bloom has dissipated. The trustees perform regular water-quality monitoring in conjunction with Christopher Gobler of Stony Brook University.

Ms. McNally said that Dr. Gobler had reported the continued existence of “minute levels” of the algae in the pond, and recommended its continued closure, in a discussion shortly before the trustees’ meeting. Ms. McNally and Dr. Gobler are to discuss the matter today in a meeting with East Hampton Town Supervisor Larry Cantwell, Mayor Paul F. Rickenbach Jr. of East Hampton Village, and Kim Shaw, the town’s director of natural resources.

“I don’t think it is dying,” Ms. McNally told Ms. Popcorn. However, she said, “It’s a huge problem because it encompasses the whole watershed.” The closing of one waterway, a popular site for crabbing, harms more than recreational users, she added. “The commercial guys have been losing money. The retail businesses that stocked up on crab nets have been losing money. Restaurants. It has been felt townwide, what the loss of one waterway can do to an economy.”

A long discussion ensued, encompassing what Bill Taylor, a trustee and the town’s waterways management supervisor, called the “thousand insults” to the pond. “It’s a whole attitude. It’s a death-of-a-thousand-cuts sort of thing,” he said, involving aging residential septic systems and wastewater.

In June, the Nature Conservancy, an organization that works to protect ecologically important lands and waterways, issued a report asserting that large quantities of nitrogen are leaching from onsite disposal systems into waterways on the South Fork, an overabundance of which is blamed for oxygen-depleted water, algal blooms, fin and shellfish kills, and the loss of seagrass and marsh habitat.

Fertilizers containing phosphorus and nitrogen are contributing to conditions ripe for oxygen-depleting algal blooms, said Deborah Klughers, a trustee. Shesuggested a peer-pressure campaign to discourage the overuse of fertilizers. “Write a letter to all your neighbors,” she told the shoreline property owners in attendance. “Say, ‘Please, let’s save the ecology of the pond. Just do what’s right for the planet.’ ”

After the Nature Conservancy’s report was issued, Mr. Taylor had said that, “Even going back 20, 25 years, you’d ride around in a boat and could pick out the places that were overfertilizing, easily. If it’s making your lawn green, it’s probably making your water green, too.”

“Make people humiliated to have a green lawn,” Ms. Popcorn urged. “That should be like smoking, a bad thing. . . . I’m not in your place, but I think we’re being too gentle.”

Ms. Klughers also suggested pressuring the Suffolk County Department of Health Services to approve new and affordable septic systems for residential use. “The septic systems are not denitrifying,” she said. “I would love to retrofit my existing septic system.”

“We would definitely advocate for Suffolk County Health Department to approve new and improved septics, and tax incentives for homeowners to upgrade before they have to,” Ms. McNally said. She said that all government agencies must educate residents as to how their actions are impacting the environment.

Ms. Popcorn suggested that the trustees and the Georgica Pond Homeowners Association meet regularly to discuss common interests. The trustees endorsed the idea.