Local officials and community activists might have been a bit premature in declaring that recent measures designed to tame the summer party scene are a success. In the week and a half since Memorial Day we have heard variations on the theme of “it wasn’t so bad.” To those who might think this is the real story, we have one thing to say: You haven’t seen anything yet. 

Recall for a moment that on the Tuesday following the Fourth of July last summer an estimated 300 people turned up at a town board meeting in Montauk to demand action. Over the course of a four-hour session, complaints were about noise, trash, crowds, drunks, group rentals, public urination and defecation, and environmental damage. 

The town board appeared blindsided by it all back then. In response, however, the board enacted a rental registry, which is supposed to make enforcement of housing laws easier. More recently, the town has begun to ask state officials to look at the alcohol permits of a handful of places that feature live music. This could be seen as passing the buck, as it really should have fallen to town officials to have long ago prevented places like the Surf Lodge, 668 the Gig Shack, and Sole East in Montauk from becoming de facto concert venues. And, just under the town board’s noses, Moby’s on Pantigo Road in East Hampton appears to have begun bringing the party west.

State law regarding live music does nothing when the performer happens to be a D.J. playing recorded music, an oversight since some D.J.s, like their guitar-strumming and microphone-wielding compatriots, enjoy superstar status these days. Considering that, and the calendar, it would be foolish to declare the war over, and sit back.

Look, we just run a newspaper here; we’re not public policymakers. But from where we sit, it seems the town board still has a way to go before it can say the town has regained the peace and charm that the majority of residents — and likely the bulk of summer visitors — desire. Get on it, people: The Fourth of July is approaching fast.

Several contested races will be on the ballot when annual voting for school board members and district budgets takes place on Tuesday. Would that there were more challengers; the status quo isn’t apt to result in a fresh look for a solution to the growing inequities between rich and poor districts, and new blood might speed the way. 

That said, in the case of the East Hampton School Board, there is actually only one challenger, Alison Anderson, a former board member who now wants another term. She declined to answer a reporter’s questions about her goals and instead sent a prepared statement, which raised our doubts about her intentions. Instead, three incumbents, J.P. Foster, Richard Wilson, and Wendy Geehreng, should be re-elected.

Springs has two seats in play, with one board member seeking to return: Adam Wilson. The newcomers are Amy Rivera and David Conlon. Our endorsements go to Ms. Rivera, who works in the East Hampton Town tax receiver’s office, and Mr. Conlon, a seasoned professional and member of the district’s facilities committee. Mr. Wilson has never tried to offer much as a board member, from what we have been able to observe.

There is a real race on in Sag Harbor, with four qualified candidates battling for two board seats. Roxanne Briggs, who is a parent and businesswoman and who was once a member of the board at the Hampton Day School, and Susan Lamontagne, a marketing consultant and former press secretary for Senator Arlen Specter, are seeking seats. Susan Kinsella, who is now the school board president, and Chris Tice, its vice president, hope to remain on the board. Between the two challengers, we liked most what Ms. Lamontagne had to say, especially about the board’s questionable closed-door sessions when it was batting ideas around about whether to try to buy the former Stella Maris School. Her shake-it-up attitude would be welcome. Ms. Tice has made positive contributions on the board and seems to make her decisions in a reasoned way. Our endorsements go to Ms. Lamontagne and Ms. Tice.

In Montauk, Patti Leber, the board vice president, should be returned to the board, and Tom Flight, a business owner with corporate strategy experience, would be an excellent addition.

The elections in Amagansett, Bridgehampton, Sagaponack, and Wainscott are uncontested.

As to the budget votes, the Springs board and administration did everything they could to stay within the tax levy increase limit, and the spending plan proposed should be approved in recognition of that effort. 

Bridgehampton is asking voters to okay exceeding the cap, which would add about $117 a year in taxes to a $2.5 million property. While it is not clear that the board and administration did enough to hold the line, it is difficult to suggest a no vote, which would have serious consequences. Amagansett also hopes to be able to pierce the cap, but by a small amount, which appears justified, though its budget process was poorly explained to voters.

The annual school district meetings next week are one of the rare times that taxpayers get to actually vote on budgets. With the presidential election stirring things up, we expect good turnouts.

Judging from the Memorial Day weekend crowds, East Hampton Town should adopt a zero-growth strategy. Unfortunately, the approach evident in a new round of official advisory studies is to encourage increased development, with commercial sprawl extended in some cases into predominantly residential areas under a smokescreen of “smart growth.”

East Hampton’s recently initiated hamlet studies, one for each section of town, have the makings of disaster. Instead of taking a macro view of existing development and coming up with overall guidelines for the future, the hamlets seem to be being reviewed in isolation. The net effect could well be to recommend zoning changes that add to commercial activity in some areas, without a clear understanding how they might link together or — what is most important — if the current road, water, power, and emergency systems can handle it all.

While it is difficult to assign responsibility to any single era of elected officials, it is clear that decades of poor foresight and outright, if not deliberate, mistakes have created the current untenable conditions. Some bad decisions include then-Town Supervisor Jay Schneiderman’s watering down of multiple occupancy enforcement, particularly in Springs, which helped create the school overcrowding crisis the district now faces. Later, financial mismanagement overwhelmed Town Hall during the Supervisor Bill McGintee years. And then, Supervisor Bill Wilkinson and a mostly like-minded town board basically gave Montauk away, implying that to seek peace and quiet was to be against “young people having fun.”

As we have been saying for a few weeks now, development pressures are coming so fast that town officials may find it so hard to keep up that a commercial moratorium is the only choice. With massive sums of corporate money flowing into town, particularly in Montauk, we appear poised to see even more visitors in coming summer seasons. 

Think about one fact: According to a county estimate, the overnight population of Montauk alone can leap from 3,400 to 27,000 on a peak weekend. 

That number places burdens on services and makes year-round residents feel like strangers in their own community. If that isn’t a definition of governmental failure, we don’t know what is. All money is not necessarily the same, and any of it that diminishes our quality of life should be discouraged. To the extent possible, this town should cease being an eager playground for Wall Street vanities and a willing partner in cold, corporate despoliations.

The time to get on top of it is nearly past. Chipping away around the edges with well-intended but inappropriate hamlet studies will not get the job done by any stretch of the imagination. Zero-growth, or figuring out how to actually turn back the clock through the aggressive use of the community preservation fund to buy and neutralize as many properties as possible, must be a key part of any effort to, as the town Democrats used to say, save what’s left.

The past weekend’s reopening of BookHampton on Main Street in East Hampton Village, under new ownership, is worth celebrating. For years, we’ve heard new-technology enthusiasts say that print is dead, but what with BookHampton re-establishing itself, a couple of lively bookshops in Sag Harbor, a cozy and delightful one in Montauk, and others thriving elsewhere on the South Fork, it seems that reports of print’s demise have been exaggerated.

Holding a beloved book in the hand is a distinct pleasure, and, for many readers, retention and understanding just seem better with a hard copy than with a screen. Plus, and hereabouts this is a big thing, e-readers just don’t cut it on the beach. Under the sun and on the sand, there’s no substitute for real, old-fashioned books.

There’s evidence that the trend away from digital reading may be more widespread. In the United Kingdom, e-book sales have dropped, while traditional bound-book sales have risen. In the United States, Kindle and other e-reader content sales dropped 13 percent last year, with print books jumping about 2.8 percent. Noting the trend, perhaps, Amazon, the behemoth online marketplace, has opened its first brick-and-mortar bookshop.

Maintaining vibrant, welcoming places of commerce is important for our downtowns. Bookstores, which stay open late and frequently host talks by authors, reading marathons, and signings, are a crucial antidote to a problem we are all painfully aware of: Main Streets that have been held hostage by fly-by-night designer boutiques and corporate-fashion outposts that function more as million-dollar billboards than useful stores. We wish BookHampton and the rest all the very best.

East Hampton Town has begun work on a set of so-called hamlet studies. Six in all, they are supposed to result in recommendations for the town’s commercial areas. The objective is to produce a document that will guide future land-use decisions and allow commerce to function while avoiding sprawl and other negative effects of growth. So far, the effort has consisted of forums at which interested residents have weighed in. These have been worthwhile, but we worry that the planners are missing a key element: the nature of the town itself.

In a statement of goals for the studies, the town and its consultants have evinced a fundamental misunderstanding of the local business environment. In materials provided at the forums, references are made to a “thriving tourist economy” and to East Hampton as a “premier international resort community.” We are troubled by these characterizations.

The greatest irritations to year-round and summer residents alike in recent years have come from transient visitors and the businesses that cater to them. These give very little back to the community, both in social terms and in terms of dollars, and yet the costs they engender are high. It is no longer correct to call a community with a majority of second homes a resort, international or otherwise.

Unlike the hamlet studies organizers, it is our belief that the truly important commercial activity within East Hampton Town is related to houses, landscaping, and people who spend a meaningful amount of time here. The so-called resort economy, by contrast, is dominated by seasonal businesses whose suppliers and work force are from away, and whose profits flow to distant corporate offices. Meanwhile, ordinary residents are left to deal with noise, litter, traffic, and a good hunk of the costs, through taxes, of cleaning up the messes and law enforcement.

Public meetings are to start in late May at which the hamlet studies will begin to take shape. Before that happens, town officials and the consulting firm must think long and hard about what kind of community this really is and in whose interest the forthcoming recommendations should be. 

For our dollar, the answer is that residents and people who make long-term commitments to this place must come first. The indifferent, extractive tourist industry cannot be allowed to lead the discussion without a full accounting of its real impacts and, as we see it, minimal benefits.

The osprey were a couple of days late this week — or they were right on time. It depended on whom you asked and where, in turn, they were looking.

Two seen on March 26 appeared to be checking out the suitability of a nesting platform along the side of Napeague Meadow Road. They landed and perched tentatively, then rose and did it again, appearing unsure of whether this would make a good home for the summer. In Water Mill, two osprey appeared to joust over the attention of a third, which had settled comfortably onto her own platform with the intention perhaps of nesting and laying her eggs.

Time was that osprey, or what locals call fish hawks, were few and far between on the South Fork. The widespread use of D.D.T., an effective pesticide to control mosquitoes, had the terrible effect of weakening their eggshells, and their population plummeted. Gardiner’s Island became one of their only breeding grounds. After D.D.T. was banned in 1972, their numbers began to increase. Today, osprey are common again — a testament to sensible regard for the natural world. So, too, has the number of bald eagles grown, among other birds of prey.

But threats remain for the osprey. They are top-level predators, which means that the contaminants that fish lower on the food chain consume accumulate in their bodies. Though D.D.T. is gone, plenty of other pesticides, manufacturing agents, furniture flame retardants, and pharmaceuticals continue to pour into the environment here — many via inadequate residential septic systems. Elsewhere, osprey are used by researchers to monitor contaminants. For example, the chicks in an osprey population in Montana were found with off-the-charts levels of mercury related to copper mine sludge.

Local governments on the East End are studying options, including remediation projects already begun or in the planning stages, as in the Hook Pond and Georgica watersheds in East Hampton. As we look at osprey this spring and marvel at their lengthy migration and stunning efficiency at catching fish, we should think as well about the world that they — and we — live in, and if we all can do more to keep it — and ourselves — well.

Attention to environmental concerns is growing here, with some positive results. We are enthusiastic about a $100,000 study of an electric “microgrid” in East Hampton Town, which could provide clean power and better electrical service during outages. At the same time, PSEG-Long Island is reviewing proposals for load-reduction and renewable generation to deal with soaring summertime demand on the South Fork. One of the companies seeking a deal with the utility, Deepwater Wind, is pushing hard for an offshore turbine contract, something that deserves support if the numbers work.

Also moving along are several proposals regarding wastewater in the town. We have expressed doubt about certain aspects of a plan by an outside consultant for a treatment plant that somewhat inexplicably would serve downtown Montauk, for example, but other suggestions are worthwhile. One is to require improved septic systems in all new housing developments, which would cut down the nitrogen reaching ground and surface waters. A draft law setting a higher standard than allowed now by the Suffolk County Department of Health Services is expected soon. 

Also taking place is a joint effort among the town, U.S. Department of Agriculture, and the Nature Conservancy to buy and return to nature low-lying house lots on Lazy Point. The money, nearly $10 million, will neutralize as many as 16 houses in a known floodplain, helping to reduce future demands for infrastructure improvements, such as raised roadways or bulkheads. The plan should be a model for other at-risk parts of town, where officials will be soon asked for erosion-control measures that will put traditional public passage along the beaches in jeopardy.

Separately, the town’s just-started hamlet studies, though billed as centered on the needs of businesses, might well be forums at which environmental concerns are raised. Certainly, any big-picture look at land use here would have to take into close consideration the fragility of natural resources and whether there really is any capacity for additional development without tipping the balance into irreversible damage to our surroundings. One truly cannot imagine a thriving community and visitor industry here without healthy waterways, clean air, and pristine beaches.

Important, too, is renewed interest among officials and a new citizens group in restoring Georgica Pond. Georgica, which once supported a modest, if viable, commercial fishery for white perch and blue-claw crabs, has been the site of repeated closures for bacterial contamination and is perhaps the body of water most in need of immediate attention.

We are less enthusiastic about East Hampton Town’s new look at coastal erosion policy. Work is expected to begin soon on an updated resiliency strategy in response to predictions of sea level rise. However, the effort will amount to little unless the town’s erratic-at-best enforcement of existing laws and the counterproductive actions of state and federal authorities change. One can’t fault officials for trying, but the proof will be in implementation — and assurances that future town boards will not simply toss the recommendations aside, as the current board did in downtown Montauk.

That said, these electricity and water quality initiatives represent progress at a time when stresses on our natural surroundings only seem to be growing. Taken together, the picture is promising.

The South Fork’s school districts are beginning to finalize proposed budgets for the coming year, and some boards appear willing to ask voters to authorize going above the so-called 2-percent tax cap. As tough as this might be for some residents, it reflects the fact that in most cases there are few places to make further cuts in spending after years of forced belt-tightening. Ultimately, districts and taxpayers alike will have to wait for an overhaul of the way public schools are funded in New York State to get relief — and that could be a long time coming. 

Bridgehampton has said it will bring a roughly 9-percent tax levy increase to voters on May 17. It is anticipated that Amagansett also will seek to pierce the cap, with a 3.7-percent increase. Although all local districts will have annual balloting that day, it is not clear what the story will be in the other districts; more will be known by next week.

So far, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s tax cap has been all stick and no carrot. When he imposed it in 2011, the intention was to force local governments, municipalities as well as schools, to cut costs and perhaps to begin thinking about joining forces. From the outside, this seems to make sense, particularly on the administrative side. There is almost no plausible justification for the Wainscott School District to have its own part-time $55,000-a-year superintendent while the equally microscopic Sagaponack School District has its own superintendent, pulling down $53,793 annually. Then there is Amagansett, whose superintendent gets $188,000 a year plus a house and equipment allowance. Speculating about what would happen if districts were to merge, it’s clear that some people would lose jobs but the real cuts would most likely be made at the top. Perhaps this is why some administrators jealously protect the status quo.

More than tax levies, though, it is contrary to the very spirit of public education that some districts are swimming in money and enjoying adequate space in well-appointed buildings, while others, like Springs and to a certain measure East Hampton, are forced to struggle with growing populations and students with widely disparate abilities. As voters think about the tax hikes next month they might also ask themselves whether the time for far greater changes has finally arrived. 

Plum Island, a federal facility off the North Fork within eyesight of the South Fork and coastal Connecticut, could soon be sold to private interests unless a broad effort by officials at several government levels and environmental groups succeeds in having it set aside for preservation, most wisely as a national wildlife refuge. 

In a plan approved by Congress to move the animal disease laboratory there to a site in Kansas, the 840-acre island would be disposed of at auction. Opposition to its sale is considerable in the region, and many residents hope the auction can be blocked and the island returned to a more natural state as parkland or a wildlife reserve. 

According to the Group for the East End, Plum Island provides critical nesting sites for the federally threatened and New York State endangered piping plover and is seasonal home to as many as 190 other bird species. If that weren’t convincing enough, 40 rare or protected plants can be found there. In addition, there is history, in the form of the 1870 Plum Gut Lighthouse and the 1897 Fort Terry army barracks and weapons batteries. 

The push to prevent the sale of the island received additional support this week when Representative Lee Zeldin renewed a House bill that would block the planned auction. Mr. Zeldin, who is seeking re-election in the fall, has been a consistent backer of conservation efforts, picking up on the work of former Representative Tim Bishop, an advocate for preservation whom he defeated in 2014. New York Senators Charles Schumer and Kristen Gillibrand, along with Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut, also have introduced a bill like that of Mr. Bishop and Mr. Zeldin, transferring the island to the Fish and Wildlife Service or National Parks Service. 

When the Department of Homeland Security recommended to Congress that the lab should be moved to Kansas, years ago, the thinking was that the money raised by selling Plum Island to the highest bidder would help offset the cost of the new facility. However, Southold Town changed the island’s zoning in the hope of dissuading developers. A Southold law passed in 2013 would allow for only education, research, or recreation on the portion of the island now used for the animal disease lab, and it prohibits development of any kind on a remaining 600 acres. This was a shrewd move, effectively slashing the potential value of the island by severely limiting its possible use for housing or even as an exclusive golf course and resort, as none other than Donald Trump at one time was said to have contemplated.

Those favoring the island’s preservation say that because the potential income has been reduced, the island’s sale is no longer worth the cost of losing such a precious asset. The Senate and House bills would remove a stipulation that it be sold.

It is almost unthinkable now, as interest in improving Long Island Sound’s water quality — and in tamping down traffic and infrastructure demands on the twin forks — is on the rise that any form of new, intensive use could be tolerated on Plum Island. In decommissioning the laboratory and restoring as much as possible of the island’s natural state, there is a rare opportunity to turn back the clock, protect the Sound, and create something that can be enjoyed for generations to come. Doing everything possible to save Plum Island should be at the top of the priority list for the region.

Pity the poor person who tries to do something nice for children in these parts. Case in point: the East Hampton RECenter.

Twenty-odd years after taxpayers defeated a swimming pool at East Hampton High School, there is still no indoor public swimming facility within how many miles? No swim-team scholarships. No indoor training to supply lifeguards at public beaches and private pools. No place where those who ply the seas can learn to swim. No place that offers aquanautics for seniors.

A pool, of course, is only one amenity of a phantom youth center that has been needed for generations. At long last the East Hampton Youth Alliance takes on the task, energetically raising funds for a first-class center across the street from a public school.

Delighted Main Street merchants rub their palms, anticipating the day when adolescents will repair to the new center instead of to their traditional hangout on the steps of the old V.F.W. Building. Then, three weeks ago, five years into the planning stages of the center, for which ground is to be broken this month, neighbors emerge to oppose the project:

"It's frightening. This is our backyard."

"The majority of neighbors do not want this in this area. It does not belong here."

"The bad kids will be expelled from inside, spill out to the neighborhood, and there will be vandalism."

"How late at night will kids be able to use the steps?"

Case in point: Lions Field in Montauk. An expansion is proposed that would create the only community playground in the hamlet, enough space for its popular soccer and softball leagues to coexist without rancor, and an in-line skating rink, all conveniently near the center of town.

The town agrees to fund the project, but the plan is opposed by those who fear that youths will, among other things, intimidate homeowners in a nearby apartment complex and create too much noise outside a seasonal movie theater.

The proposed solution? Move the facility to Camp Hero, a remote park about seven miles east of almost everything else in the community, where supervision and transportation are guaranteed to pose problems.

Case in point: the Sag Harbor skateboard park. Skateboarding is banned on the streets and sidewalks of Sag Harbor and East Hampton Villages, and from the sidewalks of downtown Amagansett and Montauk.

A group of Sag Harbor skateboarders persuade the Sag Harbor School District to set aside a small area for skateboarding and manage to raise thousands of dollars for the park. There is talk of making the park "a generational bridge" by eventually adding shuffleboard, boccie, and chess, and of fencing the facility at night to insure its security.

Again, neighbors protest, insisting that a better place can be found. The insurer backs off on its promise to cover liability, and the plans continue to collect dust.

In the case of each project there are legitimate concerns - about traffic, safety, and/or damage to the environment - which deserve to be addressed. Nor can the impact of noise and lights on those who live nearby be underestimated.

But fear is also at work - and a mentality that says keep those you fear out of sight. What are our young people to make of this? Where, exactly, would we like them to go?

On a barge to nowhere or a satellite orbiting the globe?

Adequate recreational facilities and well-run youth centers should be basic ingredients of small-town life. Vandalism and intimidating behavior by youngsters in public places are best approached by offering them something better to do.

It takes a village to make its youngsters feel like members of a happy and healthy community instead of lepers. We've got the choice.