The Eleanor Whitmore Early Childhood Center of East Hampton will benefit from a barn dance on Saturday from 6:30 to 9:30 p.m. at Kilmore Farm, at 15 Town Line Road in Wainscott. Tickets cost $200, $100 for those 34 and younger, and are available via a link on the center’s website, ewecc.org.

Live music at the Spring Into Summer party will be by the Roadhouse Band. There will be Southern-style food, including barbeque from Smokin’ Wolf of East Hampton. Ba and Jim Edwards of East Hampton will be the honorees.

The center provides full-day, year-round care for children ages 18 months to 5 years. It had its start in a building on Cedar Street in East Hampton in 1969. It moved to its home on Gingerbread Lane Extension in 1995. It was renamed the Eleanor Whitmore Early Childhood Center in honor of one of its founding members and most steadfast supporters.

The East Hampton School District now has tougher anti-substance abuse rules in its policy manual.

“This is just tightening things up,” Richard Burns, the district superintendent, said during the May 17 school board meeting before the board unanimously approved the updated language. “I’m very upset. One of my moral imperatives is to make sure the education and well-being of our students is looked after. I’m putting out the message now: Don’t bring drugs to school,” Mr. Burns said.

The school board amended its existing search-and-seizure policy to expand searches to students’ vehicles in the school parking lot. Adam Fine, the high school principal, explained that the district will implement rules requiring students who wish to bring their cars to school to first sign an agreement giving the administration the ability to search cars “by reasonable suspicion, which is our guiding regulation when we search a student.”

The policy will also give students assigned parking spaces. Signs detailing this policy will be posted in the school parking lot, and more security cameras will be added. If students do not oblige, Mr. Fine said, they will lose their parking and on-campus driving privileges and be subject to discipline for insubordination. He said more information would be forthcoming for parents and students.

The school will also expand its use of drug-sniffing police dogs, which previously were used in hallways. Mr. Fine said the dogs will now also be used in classrooms. The district will continue to conduct these canine searches unannounced.

“Not on students, specifically,” he said. “I want to be very clear. We are allowed to sniff the air.”

East Hampton Town Police Chief Michael Sarlo said last week in an emailed statement, “We commend the schools for continuing to look for ways to impact the drug and alcohol problems that are inherent to all high schools. Continuing education, increased awareness, and consistent accountability for teens can only help the situation.”

Mr. Burns said superintendent-level hearings related to drugs are up 25 percent this year over last year, and Mr. Fine said thus far there have been 10 drug-related incidents that have resulted in suspensions.

In March the school district held a community forum on substance abuse prevention, at which Steve Chassman, the executive director of the Long Island Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence, told the crowd that “all of us, collectively, are in the midst of a health epidemic at a rate we’ve never before seen.”

An anonymous bomb threat in a recorded telephone message at the Pierson Middle and High School on Monday caused the evacuation of the school, as well as the Sag Harbor Elementary School, for about an hour and a half while police and firefighters searched the buildings.

The message came in at 10:46 a.m. In a statement about an hour later, Katy Graves, the district superintendent, said police were contacted immediately. An all-clear allowing students to return to classes was issued at about 12:20 p.m.

Sag Harbor Village Police Chief Austin McGuire confirmed Monday afternoon that the anonymous message was a bomb threat. Reached by phone Wednesday he described it as a robo-call. “It was basically happening everywhere the same day. Ohio, Delaware, Massachusetts — unfortunately, Sag Harbor got on their list.” The chief said phone company officials were trying to pinpoint the origin of the call and from what they could tell so far the call came from overseas.

Firefighters from the Sag Harbor Fire Department responded to the threat by putting their trucks on standby at headquarters along with members of the Sag Harbor Volunteer Ambulance Corps. School administrators assisted in checking buildings.

“It’s unfortunate that someone did call in a bomb threat, but I can say that all the parts worked well together,” Chief McGuire said. “We followed the response plan by the book, and it went really well.”

A recorded bomb threat had been received at the John M. Marshall Elementary School in East Hampton on March 16, resulting in its evacuation. Again nothing suspicious was found on inspection. A school in Portland, Me., received the same recorded threat that day, apparently from the same phone number.

The Sag Harbor School Board shifted its attention on Monday back to the hot-button issue of whether to install synthetic turf on the athletic field at the Pierson Middle and High School, a proposal that stalled due to higher-than-expected costs and stiff opposition from parents.

Voters had approved the use of $1.62 million from the district’s capital reserve fund in 2013 for a synthetic field. Using that money to pay for an organic field would require special state legislation, while supplementing the approved amount to cover the unexpected costs of an alternate kind of synthetic turf would require another public hearing and vote.

Jennifer Buscemi, who heads the district’s educational facilities planning committee, said the committee had initially hoped for a community vote to see whether people favored synthetic turf or natural grass. But, she said, “You can’t have an either-or vote for this.”

Ms. Buscemi said the facilities committee had received word that the $1.62 million earmarked for the turf field would be more than enough to upgrade Pierson’s existing grass field to a better, organic one. She said the district could ask its state legislators, Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr. and Senator Kenneth P. LaValle, to push for special legislation to allow the use of the money for organic instead of synthetic turf, but she warned that because the legislative session ends in June, the district is running out of time. The committee had explored a synthetic option made from manufactured rubber byproducts rather than controversial crumb rubber, which had been proposed and is made from recycled tires.

The board ultimately directed Ms. Buscemi to consult the district attorneys to find out if it even would be possible to get special legislation on the state’s schedule before its session ends.

The options facing the district were made clear just after the board accepted donations of services and materials worth about $16,000 from the Bridge Golf Club in Bridgehampton. Included are treatments such as aeration, feedings, and soil testing, and materials such as gypsum and organic fertilizer. Chris Tice, the school board vice president, explained that the donations would “kind of Band-Aid the field” while the district explores its options.

Gregg Stanley, the superintendent at the Bridge, called the club’s contributions the right thing to do. “I hope to create, and I’m confident we can, a very good, natural stand of grass,” he said by phone on Tuesday. “Really what it appears the property needs is the ability to alleviate the compaction and improve the soil structure. You can do that with new cultivation equipment and methods. It’s technology common to golf courses but is out of reach for a public school.”

During public comment, Susan Lamontagne, a parent who was elected to the school board last week, urged the board to abandon the idea of synthetic turf even if it meant not having a perfect field 12 months a year. “I know you all really care about the health of our kids,” she said. “More research keeps coming out and more questions keep getting raised. . . . At least make an attempt to have a spectacular organic grass field.”

Ms. Tice said one of the next steps should be  “a robust public discussion, which I think we need and I think the community has told us they expect.”

 The board will meet again at 6 p.m. on Tuesday, during which it will hold a public hearing on the use of reserve fund money for site work related to construction projects.

Saying the Montauk Teachers Association had abused public comment sessions at school board meetings while contract negotiations were underway, the Montauk School Board axed public comment during the three most recent board meetings.

“We’re not supposed to speak about contract negotiations while they’re ongoing, and it was happening with the Montauk Teachers Association,” Diane Hausman, the school board president, said yesterday by phone. “We never have any members of the public there, anyway. It will be back on the agenda next month, at the next meeting.”

The last meeting that had a public comment session was on March 22. During it, Laura Schilling, the head of the teachers union, read a statement that said, “We continue to work without a contract since June 30, 2015. The message conveyed is that you do not value us, and you do not wish to compensate us in a manner that is reasonable and reflective of the budget that is being proposed.”

Dr. Schilling said in an email yesterday that the association disagrees that it has abused public comment sessions. “The M.T.A. has done nothing more than exercise its right to encourage the district to continue fair contract negotiations. This right has been exercised in the past at the Montauk Public School and neighboring school districts. The teachers continue to work without a contract while maintaining our high level of professionalism.”

Public comment sessions at the district’s board meetings are a “privilege, not a requirement,” Ms. Hausman said.

In lieu of public comment, she said she and other board members, as well as Jack Perna, the superintendent, could be reached by email. She said she makes her personal cellphone number public and that the district clerk also can be contacted with inquiries.

“They know how to get in touch with us,” Ms. Hausman said, adding that the public could ask the district clerk to “put something on the agenda.”

Robert Freeman, executive director of the New York State Committee on Open Government, confirmed yesterday that boards may choose whether to allow public comment.

“The open meetings law gives the public the right to be present. It says nothing at all about the public’s right to speak or otherwise participate,” Mr. Freeman said, although most boards permit limited public participation.

“For what it’s worth, it seems to me that the school board could have established a policy that would limit public participation based upon subject matter. In this instance, it could say, ‘Public, we still want to hear from you, but we will not take comments related to our bargaining process.’ ”

The Montauk School Board will meet next on June 14 at 4 p.m.

The East Hampton School District’s lawsuit against Sandpebble Builders has finally come to trial in New York State Supreme Court in Riverhead. After several years of delay, jury selection was on May 9, attorneys’ opening arguments were on May 10, and the trial has been underway ever since.

The lawsuit stems from a 2006 dispute over a multimillion-dollar construction contract that East Hampton awarded Sandpebble Builders, which is based in Southampton, in 2002. When the scope of the work increased, East Hampton chose a different construction company, and Sandpebble sued the district for $3.75 million, alleging its contract had been wrongly terminated. East Hampton countered with a lawsuit of its own.

Richard Burns, East Hampton’s superintendent, said during Tuesday’s school board meeting that the trial may last another week or so, but he could not be certain. For what he described as legal reasons, he would not provide details.

The attorney representing East Hampton, Steven G. Pinks of the Hauppauge firm Pinks, Arbeit & Nemeth, and the attorney for Sandpebble, Stephen R. Angel of the Riverhead firm Esseks, Hefter, Angel, Di Talia & Pasca, did not return several calls.

Teen Films

High school students who participated in the East Hampton Library’s teen film contest will screen their work on Monday at 3:30 p.m. at the library. Students made music videos, public service announcements, and short films in teams or individually. Awards will be given out for the best of them.

CMEE Sneak Peek

The Children’s Museum of the East End in Bridgehampton has added some new interactive science-themed installations to its holdings and will give museum members a sneak peek on Saturday from 9 to 11 a.m.

At noon that day, children 3 to 6 can work with Frank Trentacoste of Bhumi Farms in Amagansett and the museum’s gardener to ready the gardens for the growing season and learn the basics of planting, transplanting, and keeping a plant healthy. Participants will leave with a potted flower of their own. The cost is $17, or $5 for members.

Jamming and Tie-Dye

On Sunday, the final day of the Montauk Music Festival, Camp SoulGrow will be jamming and making tie-dye shirts with kids 7 and up and enlisting them to help keep the downtown green clean during the festivities. Camp SoulGrow will be headquartered in a tent set up on the green from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Kids who wish to take advantage of a free lunch provided by the Montauk Friends of Erin or those who want to sign up for specific shifts — 11 a.m. to 1 p.m., 1 to 3, or 3 to 5 — can do so online at campsoulgrow.org. Activities are free, but a suggested donation of $10 helps to support the nonprofit camp.

On Wednesday, Camp SoulGrow will celebrate the opening of its downtown office, studio, and winter headquarters on Carl Fisher Plaza from 2 to 6 p.m. Kids and their adults have been invited to stop in for activities or to just say hello.

Paint That Goes Boom!

Not all paint sits quietly on a canvas or piece of paper. Some fizzes and explodes. On Saturday from 2 to 3 p.m. at the Montauk Library, Cheryl Frey Richards will work with children in kindergarten through fifth grade to make paints that erupt using everyday household ingredients.

Little ones 2 to 5 years old and their caregivers can get their groove on during Toddler Tango at the library on Friday, May 27, at 12:30 p.m.

With 52 children signed up by the May 20 deadline for full-day prekindergarten next year, the East Hampton School District has avoided a lottery to decide who would fill the 54 places it contracted for at the Eleanor Whitmore Early Childhood Center.

Robert Tymann, the district’s assistant superintendent, said the two remaining seats would be filled on a first-come, first-served basis. Anyone who enrolls after those seats are taken will be placed on a waiting list, Mr. Tymann said in an email. “The waiting list will also be prioritized on a first-come, first-served basis.”

East Hampton will pay the Eleanor Whitmore Center $9,100 per student, for a total of $491,400.  East Hampton had also signed a contract for 54 students  for the school year now ending, but eventually more than 60 were accommodated. The decision to limit prekindergarten to 54 students next year was based on cost rather than physical space.

When it renewed its contract with the center in April the district advised residents that it would only have funding for 54 children in the center’s classrooms. Officials announced that if more than 54 students wanted to enroll, a lottery would take place, in which each student would be assigned a number and the numbers randomly drawn.

“The East Hampton School District is pleased that we were able to meet the needs of our pre-K students without being required to conduct a lottery. A lottery may be necessary in future years but it will never be a comfortable means for selecting students,” Mr. Tymann said.

Just days after the Child Development Center of the Hamptons announced it would close at the end of the school year, an online petition surfaced seeking support to keep the school open.

Emily Eggers, a C.D.C.H. parent, launched the petition on Change.org on May 11 following a school spokesman’s confirmation of the closure two days earlier.

The school, which is the South Fork’s only charter school, released an official statement on May 11 saying financial difficulties and declining enrollment were to blame. A potential takeover by the Gersh Academy, which runs several private schools for autistic children, failed to materialize after several months of discussions.

In the petition, Ms. Eggers asked the Gersh Academy “to uphold the promises made to the students, families, and staff . . . and honor their commitment to partner with C.D.C.H.” As of yesterday morning, the petition had 228 signatures and dozens of comments.

The school “has played a vital role in the lives of many students and their families, past and present, and we know that with the partnership of the Gersh Academy, C.D.C.H. can continue to do so,” Ms. Eggers wrote. “We ask that the Gersh Academy does not turn its back on our school and our children.”

In response to the petition, Gersh Management Services, which runs the Gersh Academy, said in a statement that while it appreciates “the community’s passion and concern,” the parents need to directly address their issues to the current administration and management of C.D.C.H.

“Good faith efforts were made during the evaluation process,” the statement said. “However, information which was received during this effort required all parties to agree to end the process.”

The nature of that information is unclear. A spokesperson for Gersh Management Services could not be reached for comment, nor could anyone at the school.

The fate of the school facility is also unclear. The property and the building are owned by East Hampton Town, which leases them to the school.

C.D.C.H. began as a toddler program in a parent’s house in the mid-1990s and officially opened as a charter school in 2001. A public charter school for both general education and special needs students in kindergarten through fifth grade, it draws students from local school districts, whose home districts pay tuition. It also operates a private, tuition-based prekindergarten program.

The State University of New York Charter School Institute, which approves and accredits such schools in New York State, found C.D.C.H. to be in good academic standing during the 2014-15 school year and in several prior years, and in February of 2015 it renewed the school’s charter for another five years.

Parents of some of the Amagansett School’s youngest students reported last week that the school administration had restored the swimming program at the Y.M.C.A. East Hampton RECenter for 4-year-olds in the school’s prekindergarten program.

The program had been suspended in mid-April, with Eleanor Tritt, the district superintendent, sending a memo to prekindergarten families saying the school would not be participating this year. She cited “certain issues concerning ventilation in the pool area as well as overall water quality” as the reasons for stopping the swimming lessons.

“These concerns have been documented by the Suffolk County Department of Health and reported in the local press,” the memo read. “We have been advised that the Y.M.C.A. is planning to correct these deficiencies in the coming months. Therefore, we feel it is in the best interest of the health and safety of our students to postpone the swimming program for pre-K until these concerns have been addressed.”

However, in response to a parent inquiry with the Suffolk County Department of Health Services, Jane Sisalima, a representative of the Division of Environmental Quality’s swimming pool program, said inspections conducted in January and February found “no public health hazards.” The Y.M.C.A. closed for a week in mid-March for routine maintenance and a few upgrades. Complaints about air quality at the Y.M.C.A. pool have persisted for several years.

“The Y.M.C.A. East Hampton RECenter continues to be compliant with Suffolk County Department of Health and a leader in national Y.M.C.A. standard operating procedures,” Glenn Vickers, the center’s executive director, said in an email. “In addition to several scheduled capital improvements, ranging from new heating, ventilating, air-conditioning, and ultraviolet filter, both the Y and our partners continue to enhance our operations as we serve record high year-round usage from our entire community.”

Some parents were informed that the program had been reinstated via phone calls. Britton Bistrian, who is an emergency medical technician and was a member of the first class of junior lifeguards in the town’s lifeguarding program, said in an email she was thrilled the program will continue.

“It is a disservice to our children to discontinue a program that does nothing but teach them a necessary life skill,” Ms. Bistrian said. “Further, as an E.M.T., I have witnessed firsthand what a danger, and sometimes ultimate tragedy, water can pose to our youth. We should arm them with education, skills, and respect for swimming at every opportunity that we have, especially living in a town surrounded by water.”

Christine Sciulli, another parent, said she hopes the program will help better acclimate her daughter, a hesitant young swimmer, to the water.

“I’ve tried swimming lessons — private lessons, group lessons, solo lessons. Nothing has worked. I think being with a group of her peers will make a difference,” Ms. Sciulli said. “To me it is actually an important program for her to be a part of, especially before the summer. Trying to prevent drowning and promote water safety is more important than concerns about water quality issues that are nonexistent.”

Ms. Tritt responded to a request for comment by saying in an email, “Children are enjoying swimming, and we do believe that it is very valuable for all children to learn how to swim.”