Suffolk County Treasurer Angie Carpenter, a Republican, formally entered the race for county executive March 30, styling herself a more “inclusive” and “less combative” alternative to the retiring incumbent, Steve Levy, also of the G.O.P. She said the economy would be her top priority should she be elected.

    “My vision is to have government be there to help people and not get in people’s way,” she said when interviewed by telephone April 4. “Too often we come up with overburdensome regulations and initiatives that make it difficult for residents and for business owners. Given the tough financial times we face, I think it’s absolutely imperative that we try to do all we can to keep our businesses here, thriving in Suffolk County.”

    Ms. Carpenter expressed concern about the tendency for youth to graduate from high school and college and leave the area. “We have to do all we can to keep our residents here. We’ve invested hundreds of millions of dollars in educating our young people, only for them to pick up and go to other parts of the country where it’s cheaper to live.”

    Ms. Carpenter, 67, of West Islip, was a county legislator from 1993 to 2005 and has been treasurer since 2006. She announced her candidacy to about 100 supporters in her hometown on March 30.

    She said fostering a congenial, effective working relationship with the Legislature and towns across the county was important. “We have coequal branches of government, and the Legislature is the policy branch of government. It’s got to be a partnership, it’s got to be working together. You can’t be butting heads all the time. Behind the scenes, quietly working together, not only working with the Legislature but also with the towns, making sure we have a cohesive message to foster and promote economic development.”

    “I’ve worked with her,” said Jay Schneiderman, county legislator for the East End district that includes the towns of East Hampton and Southampton, on Friday. “She’s done an excellent job as treasurer, has earned everybody’s respect. I think she’s qualified.”

    Mr. Schneiderman said he would almost certainly make an endorsement in the race for county executive, and that two issues would inform that decision: revenue sharing (or preventing county sales tax revenue from going exclusively to western Suffolk Police Departments and not those on the East End) and the presence in his district of so-called “sex offender trailers” (which house homeless people convicted of sex crimes).

    As far as the path to the G.O.P. nomination was concerned, Ms. Carpenter said, “I don’t foresee a primary. I’m very hopeful that everyone will coalesce around me. I’ve got all of what it takes to get the job done. I’m ready to hit the ground running with no on-the-job training.”

    Mr. Schneiderman foresaw a more contentious election season. “She’s won a countywide race and is a good candidate. She has fund-raising ability, but I think you will see other Republicans get in.” He mentioned Suffolk Comptroller Joe Sawicki as another Republican leader with “countywide name recognition” who is “very respected” — and who also happens to be from the East End.

    Babylon Supervisor Steve Bellone, the presumptive Democratic nominee, has not yet officially entered the fray, although an announcement is expected sometime this month.

    Addressing Mr. Schneiderman’s two priorities for the East End, Ms. Carpenter called the sex offender trailers “a travesty.” She added, “I don’t think it should be in anybody’s district. I believe the Legislature is addressing that. No one area should shoulder that kind of burden.”

    The candidate said she voted in the Legislature for and continues to support revenue sharing of sales tax money for public safety. Indeed, she voted in 2005 to override Mr. Levy’s veto of a bill that would have codified more equitable revenue sharing between eastern and western Suffolk towns.

    A report on housing in East Hampton, prepared by a group of volunteers, outlines the challenges faced here, where the rise in housing costs has far outstripped increases in income and the population of schoolchildren has resulted in a heavy tax burden in certain districts.

    The group was asked to come up with some baseline data for the town board to use as basis for discussions on how to provide more affordable housing here.

    At a meeting on Tuesday, the town board heard from members of the group, which was formed after a proposal by Town Councilwoman Theresa Quigley last year, which would have legalized illegal accessory apartments, drew criticism and ignited an impassioned discussion of housing abuses and needs.

    “The community reaction caused us to take a step back,” Town Supervisor Bill Wilkinson said. Called the “housing needs discussion group,” its members include residents as well as town employees and officials.

    The information in their report was compiled using United States Census data and information provided by school districts as well as a thorough a review of 31 town planning documents and studies, said Eric Schantz, a town planner who was part of the committee, at Tuesday’s meeting.

    Mr. Schantz highlighted some of the details in sections of the report on land use, townwide and by school district, demographics, housing affordability, and the student population.

    There is a “disproportionate” distribution of year-round housing throughout the town’s five school districts, Mr. Schantz said, with the Springs district having the highest percentage. Springs also has the highest mean family size, at 3.6 people, compared to 2.4 in Amagansett, and has four times more students per square mile, on average, than the rest of the town.

    “The cost of houses has outpaced the increase in income on the entire East End, but this is striking in East Hampton,” Mr. Schantz said. While median income has increased by 64 percent since 2000, the median home price here has gone up by 310 percent, to $823,000.

    According to federal guidelines, housing is considered affordable if it costs no more than 30 percent of income. With the median family income in East Hampton in 2010 at $94,352, Mr. Schantz said, that calculation means that housing costs should be no more than $2,026 per month.

     Sixty percent of tenants, and half of all homeowners, are paying more than that for housing here.

    “I’m stunned in part by some of this data, and the amount of work that needs to be done on affordable housing,” said Councilman Dominick Stanzione after Mr. Schantz’s presentation. “And to see such a huge percentage of our population living in, strictly defined, unaffordable housing.”

    The town has consistently defined two goals since the adoption of its initial comprehensive plan in 1966, Town Supervisor Bill Wilkinson said at Tuesday’s meeting: to retain rural character and natural resources, and to provide adequate affordable housing for the year-round population.

    “East Hampton Town succeeded in fulfilling its first goal,” Mr. Wilkinson said. “East Hampton Town failed in fulfilling its second goal.”

    Since, 1960, he said, the year-round population has increased by almost 250 percent, from 8,827 to 21,103, but housing units for year-round residents grew by only 175 percent, from 4,750 in 1960 to approximately 8,500 today. Meanwhile the total number of housing units has reached 21,457.

    In 1960, 90 percent of the houses in East Hampton were owned by year-round residents, Mr. Wilkinson said, while today, that number is only 40 percent.

    “The combined impact of the increased number of second-home owners building expensive homes and the dedication of close to 50 percent of the available land to open space has led to a serious shortage of affordable housing for local people. We have learned that there is a current need of approximately 2,200 affordable housing units in East Hampton Town. We have just 330 affordable units today,” he said, reading from prepared remarks.

    “After reviewing, studying, and analyzing all of the information collected, the next question we must ask ourselves is: Where are we going? Will we determine the needs of our town and act upon them? Or will we just keep going along with blinders on? The future of our town is at stake and to resolve the issues facing us today, we must come together as one community and act in the best interest of us all. Reacting as individual hamlets will not solve our problems,” Mr. Wilkinson read.

    “It’s important for us to agree on, that these are the numbers, and how we see our town,” he commented. “The real important stuff starts from here. We’ll continue to have some passionate, healthy, vibrant discussions,” he said.

    The 2011-12 budget adopted by the Sagaponack Village Board of Trustees on Monday calls for both a total spending increase, from $556,858 to $563,180, and a tax-rate decrease, from 8.17 cents per $1,000 of assessed income to 6.7 cents.

    The trustees were all in agreement on the less-than-controversial budget resolution; it also brought no public comment. But Mayor Donald Louchheim, in a statement released with the budget, highlighted the logic behind the village’s incorporation in 2005 while bemoaning Southampton Town’s reassessment of its properties.

    Southampton Town Supervisor Anna Throne-Holst has in the past conceded that reassessments are conducted too frequently.

    “I am pleased to report that in its first five years of operations, Sagaponack Village has been able to maintain a low, stable tax rate and provide homeowners with a more responsive and forward-looking administration than existed prior to its establishment,” Mayor Louchheim wrote. “In each of those years, the total municipal tax bill to residents has been less than if Sagaponack had not been incorporated, and I am confident that we can continue this record.”

    The mayor described the cut in the tax rate as an effort to “cushion the impact of Southampton Town’s recent reassessment of village properties, which raised total assessed values in Sagaponack by 20 percent since last year.”

    Indeed, the board has styled itself as protecting its population from a less-sensitive town government. In this case, the mayor wrote, it was attempting to help “offset the new reassessment burden imposed on us.”

    The budget does not provide for any big new projects or construction, though $30,000 for additional parking and $5,000 to digitize Planning and Building Department records are noteworthy items.

    Supervisor Throne-Holst has stated her intention of revisiting the town’s assessment practices, perhaps by implementing reassessment every few years rather than annually. However, she has yet to submit a specific proposal to voters or to the Southampton Town board.

    The first quarterly report issued by the East Hampton Town Ordinance Enforcement Department shows that housing violations make up a majority of cases the department has been dealing with since the start of the year. Of the 265 code-enforcement cases dealt with or under review as of April 1, 75 involved overcrowding or other violations of housing code.

    Furthermore, 51 of the documented housing violations were found in Springs; the remaining 24 were dispersed through­out East Hampton Town.

    Springs also leads the pack in environmental violations, with 31 of 73 reported cases involving litter, protected land, and illegal signs. Other zoning violations, including non-compliance with planning board or zoning board determinations, are also significant in Springs, which had 27 of the 46 reported cases; Amagansett and East Hampton, had seven zoning violations each, the second highest rate.

    Many of the cases that landed in the hands of the Ordinance Enforcement Department this quarter originated from a complaint lodged by a member of the general public, according to the report. It lists 52 of the 75 housing cases as having started with a resident’s complaint.

    Sixteen cases stemmed from ordinance enforcement officer patrol.

    The Springs Citizens Advisory Committee and residents met several times over the past few months at Ashawagh Hall, on Springs-Fireplace Road, to discuss what many have perceived as a housing crisis in Springs.

    Town Councilwoman Theresa Quig­ley’s proposed overhaul of the housing code touched off a firestorm in the hamlet this winter when she said she was considering a change in rules that would allow bedrooms in basements and in accessory structures, including garages, for the first time.

    At one of the Springs Citizens Advisory Committee meetings, at the end of February, Patrick J. Gunn, the town’s assistant attorney and administrator of public safety, said that a crackdown on illegal housing and overcrowding was his top priority.

    At that time Mr. Gunn said he was expecting a number of property owners to choose voluntary compliance with the town code rather than face sentencing in East Hampton Town Justice Court. However, the quarterly report indicates that in Springs, only 14 property owners chose to comply. Forty-six cases are currently in the Justice Court system, with five more about to enter. Twenty-two are still under investigation.

    Of a total 136 complaints in Springs (including those in categories other than housing), the Ordinance Enforcement Department determined 35 were unfounded.

    Across the town, safety matters, such as house numbering and pool fencing, which used to make up the bulk of cases, now only account for about 10 percent of the total. Officers, who can usually spot such violations from the street, brought a majority of these cases to the attention of the department.

     The records show that of the town-wide total of 265 cases, the 116 resulted from public complaint and 122 resulted from patrols. (The remaining 27 were termed “referrals from other agencies,” such as law enforcement.)

    Mr. Gunn did not return a call requesting comment on the report. But Councilwoman Julia Prince, the town board’s liaison to the Ordinance Enforcement Department, said yesterday that she is very pleased. “They’re doing a great job,” she said.

    The East Hampton Town Planning Board has recommended that the town board deny applications to rezone residential properties in Wainscott and Amagansett.

    Thomas Burke, who owns the Jeremiah Baker House on Main Street in Amagansett, asked to have the property restored to its limited business overlay designation, which was removed following the adoption of the town’s comprehensive plan in 2005.

    The house, which is on the National Register of Historic Places, was once owned by Jeremiah Baker, an innkeeper and mail deliverer in the 19th century. The former limited business zoning would have allowed for a small business to operate on the property. Mr. Burke said he wanted to open a sculpture and furniture repair business there.

    “It would be spot zoning,” Elaine Jones, an Amagansett resident and business owner, said at the April 6 meeting. Spot zoning, or changing the zoning of one piece of property when it does not fall within a town-mandated zone change, is illegal.

    Jon Tarbet, an attorney representing Paul Masi, who lives behind the Baker House, said that Mr. Burke’s plan does not take into consideration the goals of the comprehensive plan, which he said removed the limited business overlay so that nonresidential uses would not stretch farther down the south side of the highway in the hamlet.

    Saying Mr. Burke’s proposal would be a detriment to surrounding residential neighbors, Mr. Tarbet said the town code requires all zoning to be in compliance with the comprehensive plan.

    “How can the town board ignore the comprehensive plan?” he asked.

    Kathryn Santiago, the planning board’s attorney, said that following some research, she determined that the town is charged with “considering the town as a whole” and may not be required to follow recommendations of the 2005 document.

    “It’s scary that we would even consider changing it at this point,” said Peter Van Scoyoc, a board member, noting that the plan, which he said took many years and much community input to create, has only been in effect for six years.

    “It could inspire a domino effect,” said Robert Schaeffer, “it’s smacking of spot zoning.” The remaining three board members, Reed Jones, the chairman, Nancy Keeshan, and Patrick Schutte, agreed, and promised they would send their recommendation to town board.

    Likewise, the board found little favor for a plan to change the zoning of the Wainscott Post Office, which is also zoned for residential use. The owner of the property, a company called Wainscott Pooh, has asked that the lot be rezoned to central business.

    Stuyvesant Wainwright, an attorney representing the property owner, said that the comprehensive plan recommended that the post office be moved to the north side of the road from where it sits on the south side on Montauk Highway in the hamlet.

    Although the federal government has eight years remaining on its lease with Wainscott Pooh, Mr. Wainwright said there was no guarantee that the Wainscott Post Office would continue to operate there when the lease expires. It has been reported that home delivery is planned for the hamlet in the next two years.

    “Wainscott is in desperate need of some attention,” said Laurie Wiltshire, a land planner working for the property owner. She said the land is not suited for residential use, and called the intersection of Montauk Highway and Wainscott Stone Road the noisiest intersection in town.

    “Every single ambulance that leaves town goes past this intersection,” she said.

    Many from the Wainscott community came out in opposition to the plan, saying that any business that could cause more traffic on Montauk Highway would not work.

    “We don’t need more traffic there,” said Ms. Keeshan. Mr. Van Scoyoc agreed, calling the intersection a bottleneck into East Hampton.

    “I want to maintain Wainscott as it is,” said Jose Arandia, who lives on Sandown Court. Jordy Mark, another hamlet resident, echoed Mr. Arandia. “We kind of like the grittiness of Wainscott,” she said. Although Ms. Mark waxed poetic about the hub that is the Wainscott Post Office, Mr. Wainwright said that wherever the office ends up is “up to the U.S. government.”

    Again, all five board members at the meeting voted to recommend denial of the application. The town board will make a final determination at a later date.

    Candidates for school boards made their intentions official this week. There will be contested races in Amagansett, Springs, East Hampton, and Sag Harbor, but with the departure of the incumbents on the East Hampton and Springs School Boards, those races are wide open.

    In East Hampton, John Ryan Sr., a board member since 1993, and James Amaden, the school board president and a board member since 2005, are stepping down. Looking to take their seats are Patricia Hope, Jacqueline Lowey, Marie Klarman, Paul Fiondella, Liz Pucci, and Bill Rosenthal. Regardless of the election results, come July all but two of the board members — Laura Anker Grossman and Stephen Talmage — will be in their first terms.

    Asked about his decision to leave the school board, Mr. Ryan said, “I did the dispensability test. You stick your hand in a bucket; if the hole stays in when you pull it out, you’re indispensable.”

    “I’ve enjoyed it, but 50 years is enough,” he said, referring to his time on the board and his 28 years as a math and computer teacher in the district. His 9 children attended East Hampton schools and 18 of his 22 grandchildren will, too. “I’m proud of our school system. We have great staff, great administrators, great parents.”

    There are some things he would do differently, he said, indicating his frustration over the district’s ongoing lawsuit with Victor Canseco and Sandpebble Builders. He wanted to remain on the school board through the building project, which is now nearly complete. “I think it’s been satisfactorily done. There are good people on the board and good people running.”

    Ms. Lowey, who has a son in first grade and a daughter in fourth grade at the John M. Marshall Elementary School, is a former deputy director of the National Parks Service and a former deputy chief of staff for the U.S. Department of Transportation. She now works as a consultant to nonprofits and corporations. She served on the board of the Children’s Museum of the East End for years and was instrumental in raising the money to build it. At school, she said, she was a four-time class mother and is a frequent volunteer. This is her first run.

    Ms. Hope was a biology teacher at East Hampton High School for 33 years and head of the science department for 8. When she retired from teaching, she said, she knew that she wanted to run for school board eventually and has been attending board meetings regularly for the past year in preparation. “I want to be measured and civil, and I think there’s room for that,” she said Tuesday. “I think money should be spent wisely and in the interest of the students’ education,” she said. “Any money not spent wisely in the interest of the students needs to be questioned.”

    Ms. Pucci, a past president and vice president of the John Marshall PTA, serves on the East Hampton Middle School’s site-based committee and occasionally on the district’s committee for special education. The mother of four boys, two of whom are still in the school system, she works part time for the district as a lunch monitor at John Marshall. She has been involved in school affairs for 16 years. “It’s such a critical time. I’m really nervous about our school,” she said Tuesday.

    Paul Fiondella, long a board watchdog, had not returned calls by press time, and Ms. Klarman and Mr. Rosenthal also could not be reached.

    The nonpartisan East Hampton Group for Good Government will hold a candidates’ forum on April 30 at 1 p.m. in the high school auditorium.

Springs

    In Springs, Liz Mendelman, Tim Frazier, Phyllis Mallah, and Arthur Goldman are vying for the spots that will be vacated by Christopher Kelley, the board’s president and a board member for 12 years, and Thomas Talmage, elected in 2005.

    Ms. Mendelman, who has a professional background in medical technology and human resources, is president of the school’s PTA, an assistant Junior Girl Scout troop leader, and a member of the Springs Citizens Advisory Committee. She has two daughters at the school and is running for school board for the first time.

    Mr. Frazier, the principal of the Southampton Intermediate School, has worked in the education field since 1976, as a teacher first and as an administrator starting in the mid-1980s. His wife, Tracey Frazier, is a teacher at the Springs School.

    Ms. Mallah, who ran for school board last year, was a teacher and assistant principal in the Yonkers public school system before retiring to Springs. “Though I have many interests, I still consider myself a consummate educator,” she wrote in a brief biography provided to the district along with her petition to run.

    Mr. Goldman, a frequent board watcher who is running for the first time, is a social studies teacher and coordinator at East Hampton High School, where he has taught for 14 years. Both of his daughters graduated from the Springs School, and his wife, Eileen Goldman, is a teacher’s assistant there.

Amagansett

    In Amagansett, the three candidates for two spots include Vincent Vigorita and Patrick R. Bistrian, board members since 2005, and Phelan Wolf, a parent and attorney looking to win a spot on the board for the first time.

    Among other things, Dr. Vigorita is the medical director at Biomet Tissue Banks, a professor of pathology and orthopedic surgery at the State University of New York Health Science Center at Brooklyn, and director of research at Kingsbrook Jewish Medical Center and St. Vincent’s Medical Center’s department of orthopedics.

    Mr. Wolf and Mr. Bistrian could not be reached by press time.

Sag Harbor

    Four candidates are competing for three positions on the Sag Harbor School Board. The incumbents, Sandi Kruel and Theresa Samot, who have served two terms, and Mary Anne Miller, who has served one, are running to keep their seats, and Annette Bierfriend is making her first run.

    Ms. Bierfriend is a co-president of the Sag Harbor PTA and serves on the district’s long-range planning, professional development, and prekindergarten committees. She worked as a senior mortgage underwriter before becoming a stay-at-home mom eight years ago.

    Ms. Samot, the board’s vice president and a former president, has served on its audit, financial planning, budget, policy, and wellness committees and was chairwoman of the district’s Wall of Honor committee. She is also a director of the College of New Rochelle alumni board and a Girl Scout leader. Two of her daughters graduated from Pierson High School and a third is a student there now.

    Ms. Kruel and Ms. Miller could not be reached by press time.

Other Schools, Other Races

    At the Montauk School, Patti Leber, a past vice president of the board, is running unopposed to keep her seat.

    The Bridgehampton School District’s longtime clerk, Joyce Manigo, died on Saturday, and the district was unable to provide the names of candidates this week.

    The Wainscott School had not returned calls as of press time.

    Voters will go to the polls to cast ballots on candidates and school budgets on May 17.

With Reporting by Rocio Fidalgo

    Under state and federal mandate, East Hampton Town must design and implement a comprehensive program to deal with stormwater runoff, ensuring that it does not transport pollutants into water bodies such as Lake Montauk and Accabonac Harbor.

    Rain washing off roads and traveling directly into nearby waters, or through storm drains that empty into harbors or bays, can carry fertilizers, toxic chemicals, bacteria, or debris that affect the health of the waters, sometimes resulting in their closing to shellfishing, or to swimming. That in turn can have an economic impact.

    The program, known as MS4, for Municipal Separate Storm Sewer System, imposes detailed requirements for its various components, including public education, land use and building regulations that set standards for dealing with stormwater runoff, a proactive campaign to find and eliminate illicit discharges of stormwater into water bodies, and pollution prevention guidelines for town activities such as road maintenance, landscaping, and winter de-icing.

    “Stormwater is a serious issue on Long Island,” and a primary cause of problems in the Long Island Sound and south shore and Peconic estuary systems, Eileen Keenan, a project manager of New York Sea Grant, a nonprofit educational organization for municipal officials, told the East Hampton Town Board on Tuesday.

    Ms. Keenan has been working with a team of town employees, including those in the planning and natural resources departments, along with Councilman Dominick Stanzione, on East Hampton’s MS4 program.

    According to the State Department of Environmental Conservation, which oversees the municipal stormwater programs, several of East Hampton’s water bodies, including Northwest Creek, Accabonac Harbor, Lake Montauk, and Georgica Pond have exceeded the allowable maximum level of pathogens.

    One requirement of the MS4 program will be to “reduce bacterial impairment” of those sites, Ms. Keenan said.

    East End towns have banded together in order to more effectively address stormwater issues, Ms. Keenan said, through the Peconic Intermunicipal Stormwater Management Project.

    Coordinating efforts, she told the town board, will allow adjacent towns to work together on protection of shared drainage areas, avoid duplication of efforts, and allow the municipalities to leverage their financial and technical resources.

    It could also, she said, increase the chances of obtaining grants to pay for the installation of drainage structures or other work, as some funding is earmarked only for joint multitown projects.

    In addition, she said, East Hampton, which has just begun its MS4 project, could benefit from the experiences of other towns that were required to begin sooner.

    With funding from the Peconic Estuary Program, and working with consultants including representatives from the Cornell Cooperative Extension service, the collaborative project will identify towns’ priorities, develop an action plan and budget, and create the needed intermunicipal agreements.

    A single-car accident on the morning of April 13 took the life of a Bridgehampton woman who was eight months pregnant.    

    According to Southampton Town police, Michelle Forbes-Greaves, 31, was pronounced dead at the scene after her 2001 Saturn collided with a tree near the Bridgehampton Head Start on the Bridgehampton–Sag Harbor Turnpike.      Her unborn child did not survive the crash.   

    After an investigation, police said Ms. Forbes-Greaves had been driving southbound when her car swerved into the opposite lane, sideswiping one tree and then crashing headlong into another.

    There have been no determinations yet as to what may have caused the accident, but police impounded the car for safety checks. Police closed the road for three hours while the Bridgehampton Fire Department used heavy-rescue equipment to remove Ms. Forbes-Greaves from the vehicle. She was taken to the Suffolk County Medical Examiners Office in Hauppauge.

    Meanwhile, East Hampton Town police determined that a vehicle rollover in Montauk on Sunday afternoon may have been caused by someone driving over 50 miles per hour on Flamingo Road.   

    One of the men involved in the accident, Fabian Conce, 22, was said to have a head injury after he was ejected from the car. Fire department radio chatter that afternoon indicated that Mr. Conce, who was taken to Stony Brook University Medical Center by a Suffolk County helicopter, had become combative with emergency personnel, which led them to believe he had suffered a head injury.      

    The driver of the car, a sport utility vehicle, was Diego Barahona, 19. Witnesses at the scene said that he had been attempting to pass them on the left on Flamingo Road when he lost control of the S.U.V. and it overturned, landing on its roof.    

    The Montauk Fire Department responded to the scene and closed the road for more than an hour after the accident, which occurred at about 3 p.m. Mr. Conce was taken by Montauk Ambulance to the East Hampton Airport, where he was met by a county helicopter and transferred to Stony Brook Hospital. Mr. Barahona, who was transported some time after the first victim, was taken to Southampton Hospital.     

    Two other passengers, Carlos Guaz­hambo, 22, and Jofre Rodes, 19, refused to be treated at the scene.   

    A three-car accident at the intersection of Cedar Street and Stephen Hand’s Path in East Hampton on April 10 that left two injured was said to have been caused by a driver who did not stop at the intersection. According to reports, a witness to the accident, which occurred at around 6 p.m., said that Michael F. Mikelic of East Hampton did not stop at the stop sign on Stephen Hand’s Path, causing him to collide with a car heading east on Cedar Street.    

    Mr. Mikelic, 36, said he did stop, but had not seen the oncoming car, which was driven by Carmen Magdalena Carpio Mora, 28. The crash caused Ms. Mora’s car to run into another car, which was stopped on the south side of Stephen Hand’s Path.    

    Ms. Mora, of Maryland, and one of her passengers, 8-year-old Steph­anie Pallchisada, were transported to South­ampton Hospital after Ms. Mora complained of neck pain and the girl complained of pain in her pelvis. A 1-year-old passenger in Ms. Mora’s car, and Cladio Cajamarca, who was sitting in the front passenger seat, were uninjured. Mr. Mikelic’s passenger, Olga Mikelic, was also uninjured. The man in the stopped vehicle hit by Ms. Mora, Bolivar Vazquez, was also not hurt.    

    Police did not issue citations to anyone involved in the accident.   

    An East Hampton woman was taken to Southampton Hospital after two vehicles attempted to turn into the Brent’s General Store parking lot on Montauk Highway in Amagansett at 5 p.m. on April 13. Jacqueline Sedlar, 59, told police she was heading east on the highway and making a right turn into the Brent’s lot. At the same time, Jeffrey H. Smith of East Hampton, who was heading west, made a left turn into the lot, causing the cars to collide.    

    Mr. Smith told police another car attempting to turn left onto Abraham’s Path was blocking his line of sight, and that he did not see Ms. Sedlar as she maneuvered around the waiting car.

    Donald Cirillo, who was backing out of the lot during the collision, said his car was hit by Ms. Sedlar’s car.    

     Ms. Sedlar was taken to the hospital after complaining of neck pain.

    On Tuesday, the East Hampton School Board did what it had decided to do at the last three meetings — including a four-plus-hour marathon budget talk on Friday night — it got the overall tax-rate increase to below 6 percent, 5.89 percent to be exact.

    The proposed budget for 2011-12 is $64.4 million with a budget-to-budget decrease of .56 percent from this year. However the tax levy will increase by an estimated 3.64 percent, an addition of $2.56 per $100 of assessed value. This year’s budget is just under $64.8 million.

    “This is the estimate,” said Isabel Madison, the district’s business administrator. “We’re not sure yet.”

    The difference between the budget proposed several weeks ago and the one that was adopted on Tuesday is a decrease in spending of approximately $1.4 million, in cuts that the board said came by asking the heads of each department to go back to their desks and come up with their own suggested reductions.

    Most of the decreases come from paring down expenses for things such as equipment and supplies, although a Ross School collaboration, which cost the school district $139,120 a year, is also to be stopped.

    “When we started the program,” said Raymond Gualtieri, the district superintendent, “we had 20 to 30 students participating, and we didn’t have the facilities to offer what the Ross School was offering.” Those offerings included courses in advanced photography, landscaping, and culinary arts. This year, there are only three students involved, and with the high school’s renovation, especially in the art wing, the board felt that the collaboration with Ross had run its course.

    Other big changes included cutting the legal bills in half, to $150,000, and a decrease of $360,000 in the Board of Cooperative Education Services contract, due to a portion of students moving out of the district or graduating.

    Members of the audience wanted to see the line items that the board was studying at the meeting. Isabel Madison replied that they would be available for residents on May 2, the day before the district’s budget hearing.

    “Why can’t we see them now?” asked Patricia Hope, a former teacher and school board candidate. “Now is when we want them.”

    “If the board approves it tonight,” said Dr. Gualtieri, “then we can put it up on the Web site tomorrow.”

    The board approved the budget; the public will have its say on May 17.

    Also causing concern at the meeting were a series of change orders for work by a heating contractor at the high schoolTK?, which added up to about $35,000.

    “There have been literally hundreds of thousands of dollars in change orders,” said Alison Anderson, a board member. “How do we know that these are fair prices and we’re not paying for things two or three times?”

    “These are recommendations by the architects and builders that we work with,” replied Ms. Madison.

    “So it’s the honor system?” asked Ms. Anderson.

    J.B. Dossantos spoke from the audience. “There seems to be no oversight on Park East [the construction company],” he said. “It may seem like it makes sense go with the lowest bidder, and then they hit us with all these change orders, so maybe the next lowest bidder would have been less expensive.”

    “If there’s no oversight, the cost will keep going up,” Mr. Dossantos said.

    Ms. Anderson echoed his concerns. “Who’s overlooking Park East?” she asked. “We just spent $80 million and I’m not sure who’s in charge.”

    Along with the extra charges, however, the superintendent also reported that the district will receive almost $10,000 back from a subcontractor following water damage in the high school guidance offices earlier this school year.

    The middle school asbestos issue was also addressed again by J.C. Broderick, a consulting firm from UpIsland. The board decided that air samples would be taken in both of the basement-level art rooms, the faculty lunch room, and a storage closet all near a basement room where a small amount of asbestos-containing material was found in a debris pile after two custodians removed a wall.

    “When I was there the other day,” said Patricia Stanis, a school parent and co-chairwoman of the district’s citizens advisory committee, “the kids were in the basement, and the workers were changing the ceiling tiles. My daughter watched them being taken down.”

    “Even if they were brought to another area while the work was done, there was still dust in the air.”

    “Nothing should be done while the kids are in there,” agreed James Amaden, the board president.

    Wendy Geehreng, a school parent, spoke up. “There seems to be a total disregard for the kids and the faculty at the middle school,” she said. “Who’s watching out for them? No one is taking responsibility here.”

    “I just want to see that the board is as committed to the middle school as it is to the elementary school and the high school,” said Meredith Cortes. “The middle school is the heartbeat of East Hampton, most of the people have passed through there. I just want to make sure it’s safe and it’s there,” she said to applause from the crowd.

    Ms. Anderson offered an apology to the public, the faculty, and the students and teachers at the middle school. “I am embarrassed,” she said. “I wish I could give you all an answer right now, but I can’t.”

    She did suggest that when the district hold a community open house on April 30 — inviting the public to see the new construction on the high school — it should also hold open houses at the two other schools in the district.

    It was decided that open houses would be held, but a few weeks after the one at the high school.

    In other news, Chris Jones of the MTK: Music To Know festival spoke to the board about allowing festivalgoers to park in the high school parking lot and be shuttled to the Aug. 13 and 14 event, should it be moved from Amagansett to the East Hampton Airport. He said that whatever money was made for parking could be kept by the school, and he estimated that number at about $10,000.

    The board agreed to consult legal counsel and get back to him.

    It took a ruling from the State Supreme Court, but c/o the Maidstone finally won approval from East Hampton Village last week to offer outdoor dining to patrons of its Living Room restaurant.

    The inn’s owner, c/o the Hamptons, had an outdoor-dining application before the village’s zoning board of appeals and design review board in 2009, but the East Hampton Village Board quashed its plans by adopting a ban on new outdoor dining in residential districts that fall. The Maidstone, the Palm at the Huntting Inn, and the Hedges Inn are all in residential districts. The 1770 House, which is also in a residential zone, had gotten approval for its outdoor seating in June of 2008.

    The Maidstone sued the village, the village board, and the design review and zoning boards, as well as Mayor Paul F. Rickenbach Jr., in February of 2010, claiming that the ban was unconstitutional and should not apply to the Maidstone property. The company’s attorneys in the firm Farrell Fritz of Bridgehampton alleged that the village had unfairly delayed its processing of the application in order to pass the ban and asked a judge to direct the zoning board to approve outdoor dining at the Main Street inn and restaurant.

    In December, State Supreme Court Justice Melvyn Tanenbaum ruled in favor of the Maidstone, ordering the village to issue a special permit for the outdoor dining “subject to reasonable conditions” consistent with those imposed on the 1770 House.

    Ordinarily, when the law changes, even those who have already applied for approvals are subject to the new rules, except “in certain instances where an applicant is entitled to a permit as a matter of right and where the administrative body has acted in bad faith,” Justice Tanenbaum wrote in his decision.

    Because the village granted a special permit to “a similarly situated historic inn” — the 1770 House — and concluded in that decision that outdoor dining there “would not adversely affect the quality of life in the adjacent residential neighborhood,” it could not deny the Maidstone’s request for “identical relief,” Justice Tanenbaum wrote.

    Further, he found that the village “clearly targeted [the Maidstone’s] special permit application and used the change in zoning as a mechanism to deny the relief sought.” Delays in scheduling a zoning board hearing and design review board determination “coupled with the expeditious manner” in which the board scheduled a hearing on and enacted the ban “is evidence of the respondents’ bad faith and clear intent to target and deny” the Maidstone’s permit, Justice Tanenbaum concluded.

    The village is appealing the decision. “The village board felt that the judge did not give due consideration to the longstanding ability of the village board to enact legislation despite pending applications,” Larry Cantwell, the village administrator, said Tuesday.

    An appeal would normally put the court’s order on hold, but after a successful motion from the Maidstone, the Appellate Division vacated the automatic stay, forcing the zoning board of appeals to approve the outdoor dining, pending the outcome of the appeal.

    It did so on Friday “for the sole purpose of complying” with a State Supreme Court ruling, the determination noted. The Living Room will be able to set up 11 tables outside with no more than 34 seats. There is to be no outdoor lunch service, music, or catered parties or events. When tables are placed outside, an equal number are to be removed from the inside dining areas. The outdoor dining area is to be screened with plantings, and the Maidstone will have to erect a six-foot double fence with sound baffling along portions of the property. Finally, the outdoor dining area is to be closed to all activity, including cleanup, by 11 each night.

    “I am so happy that they’ll have outdoor dining,” said Marina Van, the executive director of the East Hampton Chamber of Commerce. She expressed some surprise that the outdoor dining would not include lunchtime, but applauded the decision nonetheless.

    While other diners might also applaud the news, the village continues to hold out hope that it will win the case on appeal. “The village litigated the issue with the Palm and the Hedges Inn,” Mr. Cantwell said, and in both cases the court found that an “expansion of dining was an expansion of use and was not a matter of right.”

    “The history of the village limiting expansion of pre-existing, nonconforming inns is an important part of this whole thing,” Mr. Cantwell said, and is motivated by concern for residential neighbors.

    The inn referred questions to its corporate office, but calls to that office and to Farrell Fritz had not been returned as of press time.

    In other zoning board matters, Dale Burch has withdrawn her application to construct a second kitchen in an addition to her Terbell Lane house, and Howard Schultz, the C.E.O. of Starbucks, and his wife, Sherri Schultz, got the board’s official go-ahead for an addition to their house on Gracie Lane.

With Reporting by Bridget LeRoy