Not to sound ungrateful, but we are hardly alone in thinking that there are some 14 long weeks before we get our town back. An Amagansett innkeeper of our acquaintance said that the weekend just past was the strangest he had seen in more than three decades in business. In Montauk by Saturday noon, there were scores of people drinking on the upper deck at one of the more notorious bars. Traffic was terrible — and dangerous. At a grocery checkout counter Sunday evening, the checker helping to load bags looked on in dismay as six young share-house women, obviously a little tipsy, packed a young man into a shopping cart and tried to wheel him out of the store. It all seems a little too much, and too soon.

It is far easier said than done, but the path toward reclaiming this place for those of us who simply live here is clear: Rein in overcrowded clubs and bars, clamp down on illegal group houses and new developments, and put the brakes on the short-term rentals that only add to the frenetic pace.

If this weekend showed anything, it was that even a good thing can be bad when there is too much of it. East Hampton Town already has too much of too many things. It is time to tip the balance back. Sucking it up until September rolls around again, as one former town supervisor once advised, is no longer acceptable.

East Hampton Town officials were on the right track last week when they denied a last-minute request for a permit from the operator of an annual for-profit bicycle ride to Montauk. Unfortunately, with as many as 1,500 participants already having paid up to $300 apiece, officials had little choice but to reach a settlement and allow the ride to go on.

However, the town asked the correct question this time around: Whether big, organized weekend outings with only marginal local benefit should be encouraged. Put another way, the issue was, and is, to what degree should residents have to put up with living in a playground for others.

Most people were only slightly inconvenienced as the Ride to Montauk throngs wound their way east. Still, drivers had to wait on Wainscott Main Street for a turn to get around groups of cyclists, and in some instances, bunched-up bikers swerved into the Montauk Highway traffic lanes. But, unlike last year, there were few calls for emergency assistance.

The intrusions are not limited to roads and bike events, of course. Commercial uses of public spaces are many and include paddleboard outings and kayak rentals at otherwise secluded locations, fitness classes on the sand and in parks, and resorts annexing portions of adjacent beaches for their guests’ exclusive use.

A new town committee has been taking a closer look at permit requests, particularly with an eye toward distinguishing between those that genuinely benefit local organizations and those that make inconsequential charitable donations as a form of cover. One key element of the committee’s work will be to convince officials to resist the temptation to review late permit requests, such as the problematic one from the Ride to Montauk organizers. An encouraging signal can also be found in the recently revised town mass-gathering law, which may soon be used to bring increased scrutiny to crowds at bars and restaurants, particularly outdoors, that are well in excess of those places’ legal maximum occupancy.

We expect to hear “no” a lot more often from Town Hall to requests that might have been swiftly green-lighted in the past. The balance, we hope, may be tipping back toward preserving peace, tranquillity, and less-hectic roads for those who call this place home — and none too soon.

    As the United States involvement in Afghanistan winds down, and in the aftermath of the protracted occupation of Iraq, it is as meaningful as ever for Americans to reflect on the contributions of those who wear this country’s uniforms. Monday’s East Hampton parade will stop traffic on Main Street for a brief time, the temporary silence a tribute in a small way to those who never made it home. This year, too, we will think of three men, two who were killed in combat and one who, though not veteran, touched the lives of many who were.

    The path toward a Medal of Honor for Lance Cpl. Jordan C. Haerter of Sag Harbor and Shelter Island, and a fellow marine, Cpl. Jonathan T. Yale of Virginia, who died defending a post in Ramadi, Iraq, in April 2008, remains to be completed. Representative Tim Bishop has put forward a bill in Congress that would honor them for stopping a truck bomb outside Joint Security Station Nasser, saving an estimated 50 marines and 100 Iraqis. It now rests with the House Armed Services Committee. We, like those in the men’s families and many who knew them, hope that the overdue review comes soon and that the bill advances.

    The other person brought to mind this Memorial Day is Chris Cosich, a competitive bodybuilder and personal trainer who founded Honor Flight Long Island, which takes World War II veterans to Washington to visit the military memorials. Over the roughly eight years the organization has existed, it has transported, free of charge, some 1,000 vets to the capital, many for the first time. As the Greatest Generation ages and rapidly declines in number, it is a race against time. Mr. Cosich died of suicide in April, but Honor Flight goes on.

    The South Fork should be proud to have counted such men as Jordan Haerter and Chris Cosich among its residents as well as the marine from Virginia and the many men and women who have served or are serving today in this country’s armed forces. Monday may be the only official day of the year to memorialize those who are gone, but recognition of what they did for others should be eternal.

The East Hampton Town Republican Committee has come up with an idea worth considering about the Peconic Bay Region Community Preservation Fund, the 2-percent tax on a portion of most real estate sales that is used by the East End towns to buy farmland, other open space, and historic properties. The committee has suggested adjusting upward the preservation fund thresholds to make it easier for homebuyers shopping at the lower end of the spectrum to close deals.

When voters approved the C.P.F back in 1998, two key caveats were included. The intention was that only higher-priced purchases would be subject to the 2-percent tax. In most of the five towns, the first $250,000 of the cost of a house or $100,000 of vacant land were not subject to the tax. The dollar amounts have been fixed ever since.

A huge sum of money isn’t being talked about here. However, with the first $250,000 exempt from the 2-percent transfer tax, buyers of the least expensive East Hampton houses might be responsible for paying less than $3,000 into the fund. A sum of that kind could make the difference between being able to cover closing costs or secure a mortgage. Back when the C.P.F. began, $250,000 could just about buy you a house in East Hampton; today, the absolute bottom of the market is roughly $475,000. Considering this, some adjustment appears overdue, although first-time buyers who meet certain income and eligibility limits already avoid the tax.

Another suggestion from the committee, however, would be counterproductive. It has been suggested that all town purchases with the C.P.F. be subject to optional public referendums. This appears to come as much from longstanding denigration of the value of land preservation as anything else and should be rejected. Getting land buys onto ballots, most likely only in November, could effectively shut the C.P.F. down. Only the most patient landowners are likely to be willing to wait and see the outcome of a vote before opting for a private sale.

Changes in the 2-percent transfer tax would require state legislation. Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr. should follow up on the first recommendation, but leave the second one on the cutting room floor. 

A citizens group that advises the Southampton Town Board on matters concerning the hamlet of Bridgehampton has mobilized to fight a new CVS pharmacy at the intersection of Main Street and the Bridgehampton-Sag Harbor Turnpike. Southampton Town Planning Board review may delay what appears inevitable, but from our perspective the property is a perfect candidate for public acquisition using money from the  Community Preservation Fund.

For an example of how this could be in the community’s best interest, Southampton officials could take a look eastward. East Hampton Village bought the former Mark R. Buick car dealership at the corner of Accabonac and Pantigo Roads some years ago and removed the building. The result is a wide green lawn at the village’s eastern approach, a far-better outcome than the commercial shopping center that had been planned. And a CVS just happens to be nearly across the street, adjacent to the post office, with all the attendant traffic confusion and the bicycling death of a teenage girl in 2013.

Developing the Bridgehampton site to the extent apparently now planned would be terrible. The intersection is already one of the most dangerous in that part of town. It would be a shame to allow a commercial building to denigrate the aesthetic improvements at the Topping Rose House and, slowly, across Main Street at the Bridgehampton Historical Society’s Nathaniel Rogers House. Seen from the Ocean Road side, the now-vacant lot  would be welcome open space.

Southampton Town has, unfortunately, allowed Bridgehampton’s western approach to become an ill-managed  jumble of shopping centers and development, which incidentally already has a Rite-Aid pharmacy. The town now may have a chance to protect and enhance the other end of the hamlet. That opportunity should not be squandered.

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An earlier version of this editorial misidentified the Bridgehampton parcel's owner as Leonard Ackerman of East Hampton. Mr. Ackerman sold his interest in BNB Ventures, the partnership that controlled the property, to Paul Kanavos and Adam Raboy of Flag Luxury New York City in 2012.

Make no mistake, a significant change in East Hampton Airport policy appears in the offing. After years of confrontation, pilots groups and anti-noise activists are talking to one another at last, with a sense of purpose and optimism about the future.

For far too long, much needed and sensible discussions about noise limits and the size of the airport were close to impossible. Some involved in the debate, including the majority of the previous East Hampton Town Board, clung to the idea that the only way to keep the airfield alive and well was by taking money from the Federal Aviation Administration even though accepting Washington’s money required so-called grant assurances that the airport be operated as the agency saw fit. A number of pilots and owners of aviation businesses, whose livelihoods depend on the airport, believed that the federal obligations were their only hedge against catastrophe. They would tell you in all seriousness that the ultimate goal of the anti-noise movement was shutting the field down altogether.

The old assumptions are now changing, thanks in part to the heavy use of the airport by commercial helicopter companies whose noisy aircraft run passengers in and out of the city at rates running into the thousands of dollars each way. This has made allies of former adversaries. Most of those concerned, including residents and elected officials of other neighboring communities, now agree that helicopters are the real problem and that unless their effects are lessened, public opposition to the airport is destined to reach a tipping point.

In the context of a new, more conciliatory town board, progress is being made. A committee coordinated by Councilwoman Kathee Burke-Gonzalez recently determined that the airport could actually fund itself. This is critical, as several F.A.A. grant agreements are set to expire soon,  which will give the town a better chance of placing limits on helicopters.

A subcommittee of the group Ms. Burke-Gonzalez assembled told the town board that airport income from landing fees, rents, and fuel sales, among other sources, would be enough to cover borrowing more than $4 million this year and even more in 2015 and beyond. The math says that repairs and modest upgrades can be accomplished without taking another cent of Washington’s money, freeing the town from some regulatory oversight and increasing its options on noise control.

Ms. Burke-Gonzalez, in just her freshman year as a town board member, is to be congratulated for making the apparently impossible — getting both sides to sit down together — a reality. The difficult work of coming up with meaningful policy changes is yet to be done, but the groundwork appears to have been set.

    East Hampton Town Supervisor Larry Cantwell expressed the feelings of many residents this week when he sent a strongly worded letter to Gov. Andrew Cuomo objecting to PSEG Long Island’s ongoing project to run new, high-voltage power lines between East Hampton and Amagansett. We applaud his effort and hope that he is joined by others, such as State Senator Kenneth P. LaValle and Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr., in calling for a different approach.

    PSEG Long Island, a subsidiary of a for-profit New Jersey company, Public Service Enterprise Group, has a 10-year, $5 billion arrangement with the Long Island Power Authority to operate the electric system in Nassau and Suffolk Counties subject to state oversight.

    Calling the work a “travesty,” Mr. Cantwell cited the town’s comprehensive plan and inclusion in a statewide scenic areas inventory as ample justification for a halt to the project, in which the utility has been installing tall poles in residential areas. Mr. Cantwell said the new lines should be buried underground and out of sight.

    At a meeting in East Hampton Village earlier this year, PSEG Long Island representatives said that burying the lines would be too expensive, but they did not provide dollar estimates to back up the claim. Whether or not this is true, they made clear that they were not going to do it.

    Elsewhere, the company has angered Montauk residents by embarking on drastic tree-cutting with scant advance notice. One suspects that such aggressive work would save the company money by increasing the length of time between prunings, hence making things look better for investors and shareholders.

    Under the terms of the LIPA deal, PSEG Long Island agreed to a rate freeze through 2015. You don’t have to look too deeply to see that without a way to pass on expenses to its customers, the company is trying to contain costs wherever possible, including by not burying lines despite a community outcry.

    Officials should press Mr. Cuomo, who can wield influence with the New York Department of Public Service if he so chooses, to force the issue. An out-of-state company cannot be allowed to run roughshod over East Hampton’s long history of preservation, and then hide behind vague claims that doing the right thing would cost too much money.

    Mr. Cuomo, are you listening?

    Following House passage earlier this month of a bill that would repeal some of the sharpest rate hikes in the federal flood insurance program, pressure is building in the Senate to rapidly approve the measure without amendment.

    The matter is of tremendous importance on eastern Long Island, where second-home owners and new buyers have had to deal with huge increases in annual premiums. This not only affects waterfront properties; residents, heirs, and would-be sellers in many of the town’s, and the country’s, low-lying areas must now deal with sudden, surprising, and in some cases, unbearable costs.

    A change of ownership even after a family member’s death or the re-mapping of risk areas now triggers rate hikes of as much as 100 percent in the first year, with more to come unless Congress acts. The rules are brutal, unfair, and make no sense.

    The changes came from the 2012 Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Reform Act, which attempted to close a deficit in the program that only worsened after payouts for Hurricane Sandy. But the revision, which sought to end a taxpayer subsidy, came at too high a cost. The outcry was immediate as those impacted realized they were being asked to pay to cover gaps in the program as a whole.

     Representative Tim Bishop, whose district includes East Hampton, was among the sponsors of the House’s Flood Insurance Affordability Act (H.R. 3370), and said in a release that it would prevent rapid leaps in premiums. It seeks to balance the books through annual surcharges on everyone in the program, which covers 5.6 million properties. The surcharge would be $25 for owner-occupied residences and $250 for vacation houses and commercial sites. This is far more even-handed than penalizing the relatively few people every year whose houses change hands or whose property statuses are altered in revised flood maps.

    The Senate appears ready to quickly pass the House bill instead of seeking to reconcile it with its own, which was approved in January. Senator Charles E. Schumer, who has spoken out on behalf of Rockaway residents and others hurt by the new rules, is a strong backer of the reform effort.

    Beyond the question of fairness, the Biggert-Waters rules threaten to erode the flood program if too many property owners opt out. Insurance only works when there is a big enough pool to cover potential losses. Keeping as many people in the program and spreading the costs as widely as possible appears the only course toward solvency. Saving the program and helping homeowners is the right thing to do.

    That East Hampton is divided into two camps these days — those who want to live here and those who simply want to make a buck — is worthy of particular concern as summer approaches. Finding a balance between them is what makes the job of those in Town Hall and the village’s Beecher House so tough. It is up to them to make decisions about the direction of the community and to keep in check those of a more, shall we say, extractive mind-set.

    Montauk has become the front line in this fight. As the hamlet has grown more popular, so too have the pressures on officials to find that elusive balance. Recent history and the scale of wealth among some here make that even more difficult. In an astonishing passage in a recent New York Times profile of Michael Walrath, the 38-year-old tech millionaire and owner of the Montauk Surf Lodge, he was described as having “befriended” then-East Hampton Town Supervisor Bill Wilkinson and, by implication, was able to use that relationship to resolve the bar and restaurant’s numerous code violations with a $100,000 settlement in town court.

    The article went on to describe how Mr. Walrath “reduced capacity” at the Surf Lodge from 1,500 customers on some nights to 500. By any measure, 500 people is still too many by more than half for the Surf Lodge’s sensitive site on the edge of Fort Pond in a residential area. Of course, the Surf Lodge is hardly the only gathering place that’s gotten too big.

    Plenty of residents have wondered how the Montauk Beach House was allowed to expand, becoming a club and music venue hosting hundreds of people without providing more than a scrap of off-street parking. Ruschmeyer’s Inn is another hopping nightspot, while Solé East’s bands and D.J.s provide an unwelcome nighttime beat in the old Shepherd’s Neck neighborhood.

    Cyril’s Fish House on Napeague has been allowed to operate a bar with hundreds of patrons spilling onto the state Montauk Highway right-of-way. Only a short distance from Town Hall, vehicles of summer patrons at Bostwick’s Chowder House regularly overflow into no-parking zones. Meanwhile, an avoidable turf war between the East Hampton Town Trustees and the town board may prevent a solution for Indian Wells Beach in Amagansett, which has taken on a Florida spring-break atmosphere on high-season weekends to the dismay of regulars. We’re probably forgetting a few, too.

    None of these enterprises adequately compensates the community for the disturbances they cause. The jobs they create are generally seasonal and much of the money flows out of town as quickly as it flows in. They also create long-term risks to real estate values and rental rates. Officials are definitely trying to improve things. In East Hampton Village, serious consideration is being given to new rules on mechanized noise. The town board is taking a hard look at large, outdoor parties and other events.

    Going into summer 2014, the yardstick with which to measure policy is to ask: Who benefits and who pays?

    Officials must keep in mind that East Hampton is not dominated by the resort and nightlife sections of its economy. Residents, renters, and second-home owners keep this place going. Operations that flout local laws and diminish the attractiveness of this area for those who really pay the bills should be strongly discouraged.

    The East Hampton School Board announced last week that it is likely to seek voter approval to exceed the state cap on tax increases for 2014-15. The move is not entirely unexpected, and appears justified, at least for the coming year. But this should not be the end of the discussion about taxpayer support of public education.

    Thanks to holding expenses in check for several successive years, the district has been able to meet the so-called 2-percent cap, but there is very little left now to cut from the budget in East Hampton — or in other large South Fork districts that have met the cap. Students already seem to have been negatively affected. Going further would mean seriously undermining educational quality.

    As we have noted before, the pressure comes from the top, specifically from New York Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s often-stated interest in property-tax relief. As Mr. Cuomo sees it, the state has too many small taxing entities, which results in too much money coming from state residents’ pockets. The governor believes that trimming school spending through shared services is the best way to meet the challenge.

    On eastern Long Island, where the schools take in the largest portion of the money raised by taxes, the governor’s ideas for reform appear to have plenty to recommend them. Each of the often small districts seems top-heavy with administrators pulling in six-figure salaries and ample benefits. While some resistance is to be expected from those who might see their fiefdoms reduced, a new, hard look at consolidation, particularly at the top of the pay scale, should be taken.

    Voters, we suspect, will be supportive of districts that seek to go above the tax cap this year, and perhaps for one or two more cycles. Beyond that, however, patience as well as wallets will begin to get thin. Looking toward the long term, seeking ways to reduce the administrative costs of education by consolidation is something that must be considered.