A proposal being worked on by East Hampton Town officials to clarify the law on outdoor seating at restaurants has caused confusion. The misunderstanding seems to have come from those who are unfamiliar with how the process of revising the town code works and who misread a draft described at a May 2 town board meeting by NancyLynn Thiele, a town attorney, which had been circulated to stimulate discussion. Steve Haweeli, the president of the East Hampton Chamber of Commerce, has been sounding the alarm and has urged restaurant owners and their staffs to attend a June 1 hearing.

The draft repeats a provision in the current law that allows up to 30 percent of a restaurant’s seating capacity to be outside, pending an okay from the fire marshal’s office. The change proposed is to set up a process by which restaurants could have even more seating outdoors by obtaining site plan approval from the planning board and meeting County Health Department and parking requirements.

That said, the town really did blow the roll-out. For example, a section about waiting areas for restaurant patrons was ambiguous and led to un-called-for panic even though the intent behind it was sensible. Also, the attorneys should have circulated a draft early on to the town business committee, whose members might have noticed this and made other valuable suggestions. 

Contrary to the assumption of the worst, the draft is actually intended as an orderly way for restaurants to gain outdoor tables and chairs. There is plenty of time for restaurant owners to get their views heard, beginning at the June 1 hearing. In the meantime, those who would be affected by changes in the law should take a more careful look at what Ms. Thiele had to say.

By the time this edition of The Star is in your hands, the South Fork will have undergone its annual transformation from slow-moving suburb by the beach to frenetic resort. As if from nowhere, the overnight population of East Hampton will jump from the low 20,000s to, by some estimates, 100,000. Roads and restaurants will fill up. The line for bagels will be long and tense. Inevitably, someone will overhear someone at the supermarket huff, “The locals should shop during the week.” Those of us who live here year round will turn to one another and say, “This is the worst I have ever seen it.”

So what is one to do when the hordes roll into town? Well, some of us hide, bidding friends goodbye until September. Others, who have no choice or are willing to brave the onslaught, venture forth into the maelstrom, wearing “Local!” T-shirts and expressions of grim determination as a sailor wears foul-weather gear.

Someone years ago thought he had the answer and had a large number of buttons made with an exhortation to all to be nice. If they made a difference that summer, we cannot say. The sentiment was commendable, though, and worth embracing. 

Folks from away, feeling the pressure of the clock ticking on their three precious days of holiday, will be on edge this weekend; those of us lucky enough to stick around after Monday will be counting the hours. But there is no reason we all can’t take it down a notch. An extra five minutes’ wait for a Villa Combo isn’t something to get worked up about. Setting aside the situation on our roadways — which can be genuinely dangerous — overcrowding and obnoxious attitudes never killed anyone. Be nice.

Eight million dollars seems like a lot of money for where the Sag Harbor Cinema lobby stood until it was destroyed in fire in December. However, the sum a civic group has pledged to buy the site and the relatively unscathed theater behind it and eventually build a new cultural center will prove well worth it in the long run.

In a deal announced this week, the Sag Harbor Partnership intends to raise what is needed to buy the property and continue and expand on the cinema’s reputation as a place to see smaller, art films by also offering educational programs. Conceptual plans call for two theaters as well as a screening room-classroom on the second floor.

With uncertainty about the Bay Street Theater’s long-term lease on Long Wharf, Sag Harbor and the surrounding communities should be especially eager to support what could be a new and vital cultural asset.

As the United States enters a dark age for environmental protection by Washington, the job has come down both literally and figuratively to our own backyards. 

A Republican Congress eager to remove what it views as unfair impediments to business has gained an eager champion in President Trump. The suppression of climate change programs and funding cuts are causing great alarm. A former anti-Environmental Protection Agency state attorney general has been put in charge of that agency. A lifelong oilman is the new secretary of state. Mr. Trump has vowed to return the coal industry to its lightly regulated glory days. 

Other moves have included a proposed $1.5 billion cut in the National Park Service allotment and hints that the administration will dump Obama-era vehicle emissions standards as well as longstanding water rules. The damage could take decades to undo.

States have taken steps of their own. New York is set to become only the second in the nation to get nonpolluting electricity from offshore wind turbines when the Deepwater project 30 miles east of Montauk goes online in 2022. Important, too, is $2.5 billion in the new state budget for clean water, including $110 million for land purchases.

On Long Island, the East End towns and Suffolk County have recently accelerated water-quality programs. East Hampton is finalizing the rules for septic system upgrade rebates. County Executive Steve Bellone has announced that grants and loans for homeowners will soon be available for new high-tech, low-contaminant systems.

The goal of all these efforts is to protect drinking water in this crowded county, as well as to reduce the nutrient pollution that is overpowering marine and freshwater ecosystems, killing fish, shellfish, and the micro-organisms on which they depend. In some cases, algal blooms can lead to elevated toxins and bacteria that are dangerous to humans. There are even atmospheric effects, particularly linked to nitrogen, that can raise ammonia and ozone, which can impair breathing, limit visibility, and hamper plant growth.

The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation began a campaign this week to encourage the use of phosphorus-free lawn fertilizers and native plants and grasses. It also is promoting letting lawn clippings remain in the yard and maintaining grass at a height of at least three inches to allow deep root growth, which is more able to withstand weeds and drought. These are steps in the right direction. 

Advocates of a soft approach to the home landscape say slow-release fertilizer, or, better, organic compost, is preferable to aggressive treatments aimed at getting the lawn emerald green by Memorial Day. The Perfect Earth Project, based here, has tips on more environment-friendly methods of lawn care — and favors a three-and-a-half-inch height for grass, among other things. The Peconic Land Trust offers free organic lawn-care advice on Wednesdays at Bridge Gardens in Bridgehampton; it also will answer questions at [email protected].

Earth Day is Saturday. Given the weather, many of us are likely to be tending our lawns and gardens and making choices about what products to use. This year, perhaps more than ever, organic, earth-friendly solutions are essential.

John Keeshan, who was in the news last week for folding his eponymous real estate agency into the Compass group, made the papers some years back with his push to get rid of the welter of utility lines that mar the view as one approaches Montauk’s commercial center from the west. The effort to bury the wires stalled, as do many such things, because of money, or, more accurately, the lack thereof. Elsewhere, well-heeled residents have banded together to create special tax districts to pay for taking down the poles; in Montauk that prospect was never good.

State Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr., who has long heard complaints about the ugly overhead lines, and more recently the extension of utility poles, has offered a variety of solutions, which for the most part went nowhere. Now he has taken a different tack, presenting a bill that would create a statewide fund using money from the Federal Emergency Management Agency. His argument is that underground utilities are far less vulnerable to outages in storms. Long Island, with its susceptibility to hurricanes, and upstate, where ice storms frequently take down electrical service, would both benefit. And more and more violent weather events caused by global warming give greater urgency to fortifying New York’s utilities.

In the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, electricity on much of Long Island was cut off for up to two weeks, with damaging economic effects. Underground power lines would help avert that the next time. As a bonus, the entry to Montauk would sure look a heck of a lot better. 

Many in the commercial fishing industry are frustrated with the pace of planning a planned wind farm in the Atlantic east of Montauk. The project, they say, will hurt their ability to make a living and they are feeling left behind by public officials and by public sentiment, which appears largely supportive. Aware of these concerns, Deepwater Wind, the company planning the turbines, wants to hire a handful of local representatives to help smooth the waters.

Balancing the needs of fishermen with the increasing call for renewable energy is a tough order. Seafood harvesters here have long expressed displeasure at what they see as excessive and unnecessary regulation. Now, with the industrialization of portions of their fishing grounds, they fear a slippery slope in which productive areas are put out of reach. Their concerns are important and have to be weighed carefully.

There are no easy or cost-free solutions to the soaring electricity demands of our modern society. Traditional fossil-fuel power plants are among the largest sources of damaging emissions. Wind is part of a less-polluting future that will also have to include the reduction of demand as well as land-based generation by solar and other “green” methods. 

Given the dire predictions on the effects of global warming, ocean sites for wind farms will have to be part of the answer. As the calls for tapping the consistent offshore winds grow, we must keep in mind the people who make their living from fishing. At this point, Deepwater’s search for the $50-an-hour representatives seems more for show than an indication of substantive concession to the industry’s legitimate concerns. 

Assuming that offshore wind will inevitably be utilized on a large scale, much more effort should be made to place turbines away from important fishing areas — including the site in Deepwater’s plans on the traditionally productive Cox’s Ledge. In addition, members of the commercial fishing industry who are displaced or suffer economic losses must be compensated, either through subsidies or tax breaks. 

The fishing fleet will enjoy the benefits of a greener planet, along with the rest of us, but it should not have to endure a disproportionate part of the cost.

Expressions of outrage this week about an announcement by the Corcoran real estate firm that it would fly select potential clients by helicopter from Manhattan to the South Fork to view properties was predictable, if somewhat overblown. While the promotion might well add to air traffic, its effect will be negligible when compared to the ever-increasing use of East Hampton Airport by noisy aircraft of all sorts.

Hopes for a quieter airport were set back last year by the helicopter industry’s court case against the Town of East Hampton. The United States Supreme Court now may or may not take up the town’s final appeal of the Court of Appeals ruling that rejected its contention that it was free to set operating hours at the airport independent of Federal Aviation Administration approval. There is a high probability that the court may decline to consider the case, which would mean that the decision against the town’s home rule would stand.

The immediate effect of the Supreme Court’s declining the matter or agreeing with the earlier decision would be that the town would have to seek the F.A.A.’s blessing for any future limits. A degree of hope can be found in the supportive views of Representative Lee Zeldin and Senators Kirsten Gillibrand and Chuck Schumer, who could advocate on behalf of East Hampton — and other noise-affected communities nationwide — in Congress. However, they will face a formidable adversary in the aviation industry, which fiercely opposes what it sees as patchwork regulations.

What the helicopter companies and its allies have never understood is that their refusal to do enough to reduce noise could trigger a nuclear option — the town’s simply shutting down the airport for good. It was notable last fall when State Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr., not known to be an anti-aviation firebrand, suggested that there might be reason to doubt that East Hampton Town should be in the airport business at all. 

What was once unthinkable, except to an enraged few, has now become something worth considering. With helicopter noise likely to return to pre-curfew levels at all hours of the day and night, expect the close-the- airport drumbeat to get louder. With an important local election in East Hampton in November, how the candidates for supervisor and town board propose dealing with it will be something to listen for closely.

East Hampton Town Trustee Pat Mansir’s surprise resignation last week presents a good opportunity to make some general observations about the town’s oldest continuous government body and how it must now change to keep up with the times.

The trustees date back to the early Colonial era and, at that time, were East Hampton’s only local government. Authority was conferred by charters handed down with British crown authority. The most important, the Dongan Patent of 1686, established the Trustees of Freeholders and Commonalty of the Town of East Hampton, whose successors are the trustees we now know.

Ms. Mansir’s departure brought the trustees’ ranks to eight members, down from its customary nine. This is a step in the right direction, we believe, because of the unwieldy nature of an elected board of that size. The nine-justice Supreme Court stands in contrast; its members serve for life but don their robes only after presidential nomination and an exhaustive Senate confirmation process. The East Hampton Town trustees are elected in one fell swoop, which asks the average voter to do the impossible: Make an informed choice among as many as 18 candidates. As a result, there have been plenty of duds and no-shows among the trustees over the years, as voters have had to resort to following the party line or picking a candidate whose last name sounds as if it is from a local fishing family. It would be far better to stagger their terms, so that only a portion of the seats would be in play in any one election.

The trustees should also take this moment to assume a more professional operating procedure, sticking to agendas and empowering its chosen clerk to rein in disruptive members in the interest of decorum and everyone’s time. More staff might help, too, as would a clearer definition of what a trustee’s job entails. Ms. Mansir’s resignation indicates that the trustees could use a tuneup, but they are definitely worth keeping around. 

A mailing from the Garden Club of East Hampton with pretty painted images of plants native to this area arrived this week and piqued our interest. There, arrayed on a folding card announcing the club’s upcoming annual sale, were milkweed and arrowwood, viburnum, columbine, eastern shadbush, cardinal flower, New England aster, and bearberry — which hungry deer avoid and are in their own ways important parts of the ecosystem, enjoyed by bird and bug alike. 

’Tis the season. A day later, flipping through the most recent Audubon magazine, we read a statistic that a native oak tree can support at least 557 species of butterflies and moths — and myriad birds for which the butterflies and moths may be lunch. By comparison, a non-native ginkgo tree sustains just five butterflies and moths.

A nifty tool on Audubon’s website provided more information. The red-blossomed cardinal flower on the Garden Club’s mailing is like candy to hummingbirds, and it pleases wrens, grosbeaks, chickadees, and thrushes, among others. Sparrows like yarrows, and jays will gorge among the goldenrod. Enter your ZIP code and you can download a shopping list of sorts to take to local nurseries to turn your garden into an insect and bird-welcome zone. The Garden Club’s May 27 sale is, of course, another fine source.

In Riverhead, an organization will welcome volunteers this weekend and through next month to help germinate seeds and tend to young plants. This is in advance of the Long Island Native Plant Initiative’s sale days in early June at Suffolk Community College. Into the flats will go joe-pye weed, boneset, and germander; out to new sites will go the plants to attract insects and birds. 

If you are planning a garden this year or hope to do a good deed, consider going native. Hardy blooms and the creatures that thrive among them will thank you.

School district budget planning has recently been without customary fireworks. In part, this is because a state cap on how much taxes can be increased has taken the heat out of the process, with a supermajority of voter approval necessary to pierce the cap. This is not to suggest that school spending is unimportant; rather, as the work educators do gets ever more complex, how money is allotted remains key.

Hearings at which the budgets are officially presented to the public will be held on Monday in Sag Harbor, Tuesday in Wainscott and East Hampton, and Wednesday in Bridgehampton and Montauk. Springs residents will get their turn to learn about the 2017-18 budget on May 8, and in Amagansett and Sagaponack on May 9. In all districts, budget voting takes place on May 16. 

The hearings are excellent opportunities to find out about the respective districts’ plans for the year ahead. Parents and other interested residents should make every effort to attend.