The longer the discussion continued, the clearer it became that neither the panelists nor the audience at a New York Health Act forum on Saturday afternoon had come to debate the merits of the proposed bill. Rather, they had come to talk about why it finally needs to become law. 

The panelists at the event, held at the Stony Brook Southampton campus, spoke about the bill’s revolutionary promises and lamented “misinformation” campaigns against it that, they said, were motivated primarily by a simple fear of change. And the audience, judging by the questions asked of the panel, seemed to find little downside to the bill, which was reintroduced in the New York State Assembly on Monday. 

The health act had repeatedly stalled in the state senate in recent years but, now that both chambers of the state legislature are controlled by Democrats, it is given a strong chance of passage.

“Remember how Churchill said Americans can always be counted upon to do the right thing — after they’ve exhausted every other possibility?” said panelist Martha Livingston, a professor at SUNY-Old Westbury and chairwoman of that university’s public health department. “I think we’ve exhausted every other possibility.”

Ms. Livingston and Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr., a co-sponsor of the bill, stressed the many benefits of the proposed legislation. So did the moderator, Cheryl Cashin, a health economist and managing director of Results for Development, a global nonprofit. Amy Reich, a nurse at East End Pediatrics with deep experience in hospital and oncology settings, and David Mayer, the owner of a prosthetics company, also shared their firsthand experiences and critiques of the current system.

The forum was co-sponsored by Progressive East End Reformers (PEER) and more than 20 East End organizations and churches.

The panelists were in agreement that the public should be made aware that the N.Y.H.A. would not change the health care delivery system in New York. The proposed system would be composed of the same networks of doctors and hospitals that New York residents already rely on. What would change is how those places get paid. The act would create a “single payer” — i.e., the State of New York — that would reimburse health care providers much in the same way that the federal government pays Medicare patients’ bills now.

The big shift would be the disappearance of health insurance companies, which would be pushed out of New York State. 

They are not expected to go quietly.

“The insurance industry is massing at the border of Albany, even as we speak,” Mr. Thiele said. “This time [the chance of passage] is real. . . . And the insurance industry will be lobbying with full force.” 

By Mr. Thiele’s count, 35 of the 63 members in the newly elected, more progressive state senate have expressed support for the N.Y.H.A. 

Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo has not yet indicated if he would sign the bill. 

The panelists cited numerous reasons why the N.Y.H.A. plan makes sense for everyone — everyone except the insurance industry, which, Ms. Livingston said, currently enjoys profit margins of 15 to 33 percent and freer rein to charge what she termed “obscenely high prices” for premiums, services, and medications.

Ms. Reich detailed some of the roadblocks to care she has seen during her nursing career. She spoke about the stress endured by sick patients and their families, who often have to battle insurance companies for coverage and payments, and about doctors and nurse-practitioners who are often forced to spend a great deal of time negotiating with insurance companies to justify the treatment plans they have prescribed.

Mr. Mayer nodded as Ms. Reich spoke, then gave a real-life example: He said his company was contacted by an insurance company once and asked why a patient who had just undergone a leg amputation would need a prosthetic limb.

“That was literally the question,” he said.

Such challenges to the judgment of the provider and similar bureaucratic hurdles to treatment are “not present in any other country I can think of,” Ms. Cashin said, noting that America is one of the last affluent countries to resist a universal health care system. Canada has had one since 1962.

The proposed N.Y.H.A., as currently written, would provide all New Yorkers with cradle-to-grave coverage regardless of their age, wealth, income, or pre-existing conditions. Coverage would be provided for primary and preventive care, all medically necessary inpatient and outpatient care, as well as prescriptions, vision, hearing, and dental costs. 

There would be no co-pays, deductibles, or other charges for patients beyond their insurance premium. Participants would also be free to choose whichever doctor or health provider they wanted, rather than choosing from an insurance-company network list.

  Coverage for long-term care was added to the latest version of the bill, which was re-introduced on Monday. 

A state agency, called New York Health in the proposal, would administer the program. It would be paid for through a progressive state payroll tax on employers and employees that supporters contend would work out to a smaller percentage of an individual or family’s income than they currently spend on health care. One potential sticking point is that the state would have to seek a federal waiver to combine this funding with the federal money it currently receives for Medicare, Medicaid, and Child Health Plus. 

As Mr. Thiele said, “We are mindful of who is in Washington right now.”

Critics of the N.Y.H.A. question if it would really deliver the boon of market efficiencies, services, and savings as claimed. They also charge it could be a nightmare to administer and would cripple businesses that currently do not provide employee health insurance. 

A few of the panelists acknowledged that battle-weary residents, worn out by decades of trouble in the health care sector and ever-escalating medical bills, might find it hard to believe that they would suddenly be blessed with far better coverage and lower costs if the health act were to pass. As Ms. Livingston deadpanned, “The guys on the other side of this argument will like you to believe every pregnant woman in Canada waits 10 months for prenatal care.” She insisted, however, that other countries’ universal care systems do work: “If you’re sick, you’re covered. And last I checked, only 106 doctors in Canada opted out.”

Mr. Thiele noted two recent independent studies that have shown that 90 to 98 percent of all New Yorkers would pay less for health care if the N.Y.H.A. passes. Passage, he said, would help not only the 5 percent of state residents who have no insurance but also the 95 percent who do.

Several panelists said the Affordable Care Act that was passed during the Obama administration was a good start, but that it did not go far enough, because the for-profit insurance industry was not cut out of the equation.

Ms. Livingston said health care in America was a $3.3 trillion industry last year that ate up one-sixth of America’s gross domestic product — that is, one of every six dollars spent.

“And yet all of that money isn’t actually going to health care,” she said, referring again to the double-digit profit margins insurance companies take off the top. “The bottom line here is there is no scarcity [of money] in this system. We could cover everyone for everything and pay everybody for doing it. But we need to get the insurance companies out.” 

Mr. Thiele agreed.

“The bottom line is we’d have better health care, period, with this act,” Mr. Thiele said. “We think we can get better care, provide more coverage, and save money.” 

A video of the entire N.Y.H.A. forum can be seen on the PEER/NYPAN Progressive East End Reformers Facebook page.

The owners of an oceanfront property on Lily Pond Lane, who are seeking permission to tear down a house in a coastal erosion hazard area and construct a new, larger one, presented a revised and pared-down building plan to the East Hampton Village Zoning Board of Appeals on Friday. At the initial hearing for the application on Jan. 11, the owners, Helene and Norman Stark, had sought 54 variances.

The Starks’ existing house, at 33 Lily Pond Lane, is approximately 4,600 square feet; the property also has a pool and a patio that overlooks the beach, as well as a tennis court, a tennis house, and a koi pond. The Starks want to replace the house with one that measures more than 7,000 square feet, with attached decking. Although the house would be sited farther landward, much of the building plan — including the installation of a swimming pool and hot tub, a patio, retaining walls, staircases, and dry wells — would necessitate variances from the section of the code that is meant to preserve ocean dunes. The code requires a 150-foot setback from the southerly edge of beach grass, and a 100-foot setback from the 15-foot contour line of the dune. The legally pre-existing coverage for the property (including an earlier variance) is about 17,000 square feet.

Richard Warren, an environmental consultant from InterScience Research Associates who is advising the owners, presented the new plan to the board, and said it was designed to eliminate a significant number of requested variances. 

The application, he said, has two main goals: to bring the property into conformity with the code, and to build a new home. 

Addressing the former, he said, the owners now intend to remove certain existing features (including the koi pond, to eliminate five variances), as well as shelving a number of previously suggested improvements that would have pushed the permitted coverage over the top (these include a deck addition, a trellis, part of a brick patio, a walkway, and a play set). The tennis court, which encroaches on a setback, he said, will be reduced by 10 feet.

The owners are still seeking variances to legalize a 77-square-foot addition to the existing residence, as well as a 100-square-foot storage shed, a 303-square-foot addition to a tennis house, steps built into the landscape on the east side of the property, and an existing generator. 

At the Jan. 11 hearing, Mr. Warren said that the Z.B.A. in 2005 had granted the Starks permission to expand the existing house. On Friday, he said the coverage in the newly revised application was equal to the amount allowed by the board in 2005.

As for the the new house, Mr. Warren said the plan calls for siting it and the swimming pool even farther landward than first proposed. “We took three feet off the house, and two feet off the swimming pool,” he said. “We moved everything back five feet.”

The placement of the house would still lie within the coastal erosion hazard area, he said, but it would provide the owners with a view of the ocean, and allow for a “graceful” rather than “cramp-ed” development of the property.

“The plan is reasonable,” he said. He also cited analysis from experts on coastal erosion such as Henry Bokuniewicz, a professor in the school of marine and atmospheric sciences at Stony Brook University, and Dr. Lee Weishar, a senior scientist and coastal engineer at the Woods Hole Group, an environmental services organization headquartered in Massachusetts, who determined that construction on the property would not affect the dune or the shoreline. 

After Mr. Warren’s presentation, Brian Matthews, a lawyer representing two of the Starks’ neighbors, said that his clients objected to the application because of the size of the house and its placement seaward of the coastal erosion line.

Jeff Bragman, a lawyer and town board member who was representing Mortimer Zuckerman, the real estate developer and media mogul who is another neighbor, said he would consider the latest plan and return at a future date to offer his opinion.

Since board members, including Lys Marigold, the chairwoman, had been presented with the plan for the first time at the meeting, they also decided to study the details and weigh in later. The hearing was adjourned to March 8. 

Also on Friday, the board passed a resolution, and announced three decisions on earlier applications.

The resolution approved a settlement of the lawsuit between the village and Molly Zweig, a resident of 11 West End Road who had constructed a revetment in front of her house in 2013 after receiving required permitting from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation and the zoning board. The East Hampton Town Trustees had filed a court challenge to the Z.B.A.’s decision, seeking to stop the construction, and litigation between the parties had been ongoing ever since. (More details appear elsewhere in this issue.) 

The Maidstone Club was granted a wetlands permit and special permit to install various drainage structures within wetland setbacks, on the condition that wire-backed silt fencing be installed during construction between the disturbed area and the wetlands.

Joe Quinn, the owner of 11 Talmage Lane, was granted permission to construct a 591-square-foot detached garage some 7.3 feet from the side lot line, where the required setback is 15 feet, and to install swimming pool equipment 21 feet from the side lot line, where a 30-foot setback is required. 

Judith H. Hope, the owner of 26 Dunemere Lane, was granted area variances to construct a swimming pool 20.2 feet from the rear lot line, and 27 feet from the side lot line, where the required setbacks are 30 feet, on the condition that a six-foot hedge and six-foot stockade fence be maintained along the property’s northerly boundary.

Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr., who withdrew his support for the proposed South Fork Wind Farm last month citing problems including what he called the developer’s “bait and switch” tactics, issued a statement on Monday commenting on an apology he had received from that developer, Orsted U.S. Offshore Wind. 

Mr. Thiele had complained that the original developer, Deepwater Wind, was now part of a foreign company: Orsted, Denmark’s largest energy company and the world’s largest offshore wind developer, acquired Deepwater Wind in November. That, and the company’s announcement that the wind farm would be capable of producing 130 megawatts of electricity, rather than the initial plan of 90 megawatts, represented “the classic ‘bait and switch,’ ” Mr. Thiele said. (The change in capacity resulted from advances in turbine technology subsequent to the wind farm’s initial blueprint.) He further cited a lack of communication on Orsted U.S. Offshore Wind’s part. 

In his statement on Monday, he reiterated his consistent support for renewable energy and his long leadership on environmental issues, citing a 100-percent score from Environmental Advocates of New York and the New York State League of Conservation Voters. But, he said, “the truth is Deepwater has not always been transparent or open about its project, either with the community at large or with elected officials. They have acknowledged that by the letter they have sent to me this past Friday.” 

“When I sought a meeting to discuss their failures to be open and transparent, my requests were ignored by Deepwater representatives, despite the fact that I had been a vocal advocate for their project moving forward so that we all could assess the merits,” Mr. Thiele said. “I have always responded to their requests to meet. They misled the media about all of this.” 

The letter from Orsted U.S. Offshore Wind, signed by its co-chief executive officers, Jeffrey Grybowski and Thomas Brostrom, said, in part, “We recognize that our communication with your office has not been up to the standards we expect from our team and for that we apologize.” They went on to pledge “our personal commitment to redoubling our efforts to ensure that you and your constituents are kept informed and up-to-date on our plans for the South Fork Wind Farm and our other initiatives related to the project going forward.” 

Clint Plummer, the company’s head of market strategies and new projects, said on Monday that “Assemblyman Thiele has been a great champion of renewable energy and offshore wind, and particularly our projects, over a relatively long period. We have historically enjoyed a great relationship with him. We recognize there may have been some missteps in the past. As we move forward holding ourselves to the highest standard, we look forward to rebuilding the relationship in a trust-based way.” 

Orsted, in a partnership with Eversource, New England’s largest energy company, is one of several participants in the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority’s offshore wind energy solicitation, through which the state plans to procure 800 megawatts of offshore wind. 

“We will be required to trust these companies with our ocean, our beaches, and our quality of life,” Mr. Thiele said of the developers responding to the authority’s solicitation, “which we have invested decades of effort and millions of dollars to protect. I think it is imperative that any successful proposer not only have the best energy project, but also be able to prove to the community that they possess the proven corporate ethics to ensure that they will be open, honest, and transparent about all aspects of their proposal with the public.”

Residents of Lazy Point in Amagansett, who own their houses but rent the underlying land from the East Hampton Town Trustees, may soon see a dramatic change to the tenant-landlord agreement. 

As they had suggested last spring, the trustees, at their meeting on Monday, discussed extending leases of the modest lots from the present one-year term to 35 years. 

Rent at Lazy Point is an anomaly on the South Fork, home to some of the most expensive real estate in the country. Even when the trustees raised the annual rent by 50 percent in 2013, the new figure was just $1,500, a trifle compared to anywhere else in the area. 

By 2015, though, the trustees were intent on at least a closer alignment of the rent for their small lots with what they considered market value. During negotiations that lasted nearly a year, tenants beat back a proposed fourfold increase, to $6,000, arguing that while their rent was modest in comparison to elsewhere on the South Fork, the fact that they did not own the land precluded their obtaining mortgages. Their pastoral neighborhood on Gardiner’s Bay also endures harsh winter weather and an uncertain future at an eroding shoreline, they said. 

The trustees abandoned the fourfold increase in favor of a 10-percent rise along with a 4-percent transfer fee when a house is sold. 

Negotiations over the last five years produced calls to modify lease terms in a way that would allow tenants to obtain mortgages, and last year the trustees, who derive approximately half their annual revenue from the leases and transfer fees on house sales, took up the call themselves. 

Jim Grimes, now a deputy clerk of the trustees, said in May that only those with cash to put down or another asset to leverage could buy a house at Lazy Point. “It completely locks out the local person, or even a family member here,” he said at the time, while renovations and upgrades were impossible unless one could pay out of pocket. 

By extending leases to 35 years, Mr. Grimes said on Monday, homeowners would be afforded an opportunity to finance improvements and satisfy some owners’ intentions to keep properties in their families, while assuring the trustees a revenue stream for years to come. 

The trustees wondered aloud about unintended consequences, such as a building boom. “If they start getting mortgages, are banks going to require them to come into FEMA compliance?” Francis Bock, the clerk of the trustees, asked, referring to the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s floodplain management regulations, which can require houses to be elevated. “If so, we have to realize houses are going to start getting raised on pilings.” 

But Mr. Grimes emphasized the potential to spur a large-scale replacement of aging septic systems with low-nitrogen systems, which a substantial renovation or demolition and reconstruction would also trigger. “We want to give the property owner the incentive and ability to do it,” he said. “This 35-year lease, I thought, would allow it.” 

The trustees “have to consider the possibility there could be a lot of development,” said John Aldred. But the lots are so small, said Susan Vorpahl, and Mr. Aldred agreed that, given the constraints imposed by modest lots, demolitions and reconstructions were unlikely to change a house’s footprint. 

A “crude draft” of a new lease has been drawn, said Christopher Carillo, the trustees’ attorney. “It’s a work in progress.” Once finalized, the trustees will issue a public notice so all residents of the town can comment.

The East Hampton Town Board, which has already agreed to require residents to obtain new permit stickers for parking and driving on beaches, discussed the plan’s details at its meeting on Tuesday. 

Current town resident stickers issued for parking and driving on beaches never expire. Members of the town board, mindful that more than 30,000 such permits have been issued — a number that exceeds the population of the town — have voiced the concern that many vehicles bearing current permits were subsequently sold to nonresidents, who would not be authorized to use them. 

The town trustees, who manage common lands, including beaches, on behalf of the public, support the board’s plan to implement a new permit scheme. 

New, color-coded resident permits, which will be free, will be valid for five years. The fee for nonresidents, whose permits will expire at the end of every year, will be $375. 

Permits will become available sometime this year, become mandatory in 2020, and expire in 2025, Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc said in December. Permits for 2025 to 2030 would become available in 2024, he said. 

On Tuesday, Jameson McWilliams, an assistant town attorney, discussed several subcategories of permits, including a commercial lodging facility parking permit, issued to the owner or manager of a hotel, motel, or other lodging and to be used by temporary paying guests. No more than one permit per room, each inscribed with the facility’s name, would be issued. 

A cooperative ownership parking permit would be issued to co-op shareholders, Ms. McWilliams said, upon approval of an application and payment of a fee. Owners of condominium units would be treated as owners of single-family houses, she said, eligible for free resident permits. 

Some details are apparently still to be determined. “It’s straightforward until we get into a discussion about condos and co-ops,” Mr. Van Scoyoc said. 

While owners of condominiums, said Michael Sendlenski, the town attorney, can obtain resident beach driving permits, “residents of cooperatives don’t have that ability because they don’t own the underlying property, and are taxed at a different rate as well.” The Montauk Manor, he said, has a number of condominium units that are rented on the owners’ behalf, “almost like a motel or hotel.” 

“It gets difficult trying to track all this,” said Carole Brennan, the town clerk. 

Updated changes are to be presented to the board at its meeting on Tuesday. A March 7 public hearing will precede a vote to change the town code. 

In other news, Councilwoman Kathee Burke-Gonzalez told her colleagues that the town now officially owns the former Child Development Center of the Hamptons property on Stephen Hand’s Path in East Hampton, for which the board had authorized a bond resolution for its purchase in December. The plan for the building is to house community groups, with suggestions including a day care center and space for meetings, lectures, and performances.

Ms. Burke-Gonzalez said that she and other town officials recently toured the facility, which closed in 2016, compiling a list of components needing inspection or upgrading. She has also led tours of the building for nonprofit organizations and will schedule more. 

Also at the meeting, Katy Casey of the East Hampton Housing Authority told the board that the plan to break ground on an affordable housing complex at 531 Montauk Highway in Amagansett in April remains on schedule. “The plans have been delivered to the Building Department for review,” she said. 

Gansett Meadows, as the development will be known, is expected to comprise 38 housing units.

East Hampton Town

Republicans Extend Screening

The East Hampton Town Republican Committee, which screened candidates for supervisor, town board, and other elected positions last weekend, will hold additional screenings on Saturday and Sunday from 2 to 4 p.m. at the American Legion Hall in Amagansett. 

The committee will also interview potential candidates for town justice, tax assessor, and town trustee. Those interested in screening have been asked to contact Manny Vilar, the committee’s chairman, at 631-324-0528 or [email protected], or Kyle Ballou, the committee’s secretary, at 631-708-7777 or [email protected]. 

The committee has also rescheduled its nominating convention from tomorrow to Feb. 23 at 2 p.m., also at the American Legion Hall.

“Due to the astounding turnout, positive show of support from our community, and those who were not able to attend this past weekend, the East Hampton Town Republican Committee has decided to extend our screening process into next weekend to provide all those interested the opportunity to screen,” according to a statement the committee issued on Sunday. 

Election Day is Nov. 5.

A matter before the East Hampton Town Zoning Board of Appeals is an assault on the town code, which allows residents to run some businesses out of their homes, according to Carl Irace, an East Hampton attorney. In addition to the code, however, the matter is of widespread interest because it concerns dogs.

Mr. Irace’s clients, Lori Marsden and her husband, Anthony Tyson, are appealing a July 2018 decision by the town building inspector, Ann M. Glennon, that Ms. Marsden is illegally offering doggy day care at the couple’s house at 10 Saddle Lane, which is in a residential zone in East Hampton. 

Ms. Marsden, who owns two dogs, has been operating the small-scale company  for 12 of the 23 years the couple have lived there. She offers daytime and overnight pet care, also making house calls and  walking dogs.

In July 2017, a town code enforcement inspector visited the property and charged her with operating the business. Ordinance violations are prosecuted by the county district attorney’s office in accordance with criminal procedure law. Five dogs were reportedly on her property at the time of the visit, though she said there were only four and that two were her own. The case is pending in East Hampton Town Justice Court.

Later in 2017, the county brought a related civil enforcement case against her, reportedly over dog grooming, which, while legal, requires a permit. The case was dismissed before Ms. Marsden appeared in court, after she told the zoning board she had decided against grooming. 

“The criminal case is still pending, and we sought a determination from the building inspector that Lori’s business was a lawful home occupation, as defined in town code,” Mr. Irace told the Z.B.A. “We thought that this would change the circumstances of the criminal case, and, to be honest, were quite surprised when we received a determination that claimed that doggy day care in fact violated the home occupation law.” The decision will put her out of business, he said. 

Although the building inspector said pet sitting did not qualify as a home occupation, dog walking could qualify if the dogs were not being dropped off and picked up at her house, but picked up and dropped off elsewhere. 

The home occupation law allows for home occupations as lawful accessory uses of single-family residences. External evidence of any business, like noise, however, is prohibited, as are changes to  the residential character of the house. 

The basis for the building inspector’s decision, that there was external evidence of a pet-sitting business, such as dogs playing or walking, was a mistake, Mr. Irace said, because it ordinarily occurs at people’s houses. “If that’s external evidence that makes a dog-sitting operation unlawful, you’d have to go to site plan review to be a pet sitter or get an office in a commercial district in a town that notoriously doesn’t have enough commercial space,” Mr. Irace said. “And it also undermines the goals of the comprehensive plan that wants us to have low intensity uses.”

By his own count, Mr. Irace found 57 pet sitters on Petsitter.com in East Hampton alone. “The ramifications of this are huge,” he said. “To interpret the statute this way creates an absurd and objectionable result,” which would destroy every home occupation, Mr. Irace said. “Think of the repercussion of upholding this decision,” he said. “Upholding it will prohibit occupations that for time immemorial have operated from their homes,” he said. 

“The list is endless,” he said, rattling off a few examples. “Contractor vans with lettering you can see from the street. If this is external evidence, so is that. Clients parking cars, open and shutting car doors for different professionals, whether it’s psychologists or whoever else . . . attorneys. Plenty of attorneys in town have home offices. If an attorney has surveys dropped off and you can see them from the street is that external evidence? By this analysis, yes it is.”

 Mr. Irace asked the zoning board to think about how upholding the determination would affect people who are running small businesses from home. “Please, when you consider my client’s appeal here, consider the effects that this will have on our neighbors’ livelihoods and how this would change our town as we know it.” 

Zoning board members inquired about noise from the dogs. “It seems to me that if there was a trigger to this it was likely that neighbors were disturbed by the amount of activity, specifically the amount of noise,” Tim Brenneman said. 

John Collier, who lives at 11 Saddle Lane, said he and his husband had complained about the noise. He spoke about his concern that a business is being run in a residential neighborhood and the negative impact it has on the neighborhood. 

Noise from dogs seven days a week all year limits how his family can enjoy their property, he said, adding that he was going to submit audio of dogs barking. Sometimes, he said, it sounds like there are a dozen or more dogs there. 

He also said multiple cars come and go both morning and night and that he is worried that a dog may get loose and attack his children. 

Randy Parsons of Springs, a planning board member, spoke in support of Ms. Marsden. “This is an interesting case you guys have,” he said, calling the decision a balancing act. He appreciated some of the questions raised, he said, including whether additional legislation was necessary on home occupations. 

“Doggy day care has become a business here,” he said. “I think there’s a great need for our year-round residents to make a living as much as they can in their own homes without bothering their own neighbors.” 

“I hope you can find a balance here that allows her to continue to make money doing what she does so well and also try to accommodate the reasonable concerns of the neighbors,” he said. “I have to say, I don’t find a concern that a dog is going to escape and attack children reasonable because that would apply to everybody’s dog,” he said, referring to Mr. Collier’s comment. “I think the noise objection and perhaps traffic, I think those are legitimate concerns, but I think they can be managed so we can have a live-and-let-live situation.”

The record was to remain open until Feb. 12 for Mr. Irace to respond to written comments received from other neighbors.

While overall activity at East Hampton Airport decreased slightly last summer from the same period in 2017, operations — and particularly helicopter activity — were up sharply from 2016, when laws imposing curfews were in effect, according to a report delivered to the East Hampton Town Board on Tuesday. 

“The headline here is the more than 50-percent increase in helicopter traffic in two years,” Bill O’Connor of the law firm Cooley L.L.P. told the board. With Mary Ellen Eagan of HMMH, an environmental and transportation planning consultancy, he told the board that that helicopter activity at the airport increased by 52 percent, almost 2,000 operations, from 2016 to 2018. (An operation is defined as a takeoff or a landing.) Overall activity was up by 13 percent over the same period, despite a 1 percent drop from 2017 to 2018. 

Helicopters were also the category spurring the most complaints to the two systems used to record noise grievances, responsible for 54 percent of all aircraft complaints. Helicopters, Mr. O’Connor said, are “the main source of the noise complaints, and source of the noise problem, in East Hampton.”

Helicopter activity increased by 152 operations, or 3 percent, between June 28 and Sept. 30 last year over the same period in 2017, Ms. Eagan said. Airplane activity fell by 305 operations, or 3 percent, but seaplane activity was up by 105 operations, or 5 percent. 

Airplanes remained the largest category of aircraft operating at the airport last summer, the 9,299 operations representing 52 percent of all activity. Helicopters, 32 percent of operations, or 5,729 takeoffs or landings, were next. But, Mr. O’Connor noted, “two years ago, helicopters were about one quarter of users. Now that’s shifted to one third.” Seaplanes were the next largest category, 12 percent of operations. The report lists “undefined aircraft” as the remaining 3 percent. 

In “trying to solve this issue,” one that has “been around for decades,” Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc said on Tuesday, the town board adopted laws establishing overnight curfews in April 2015. A coalition of aviation interests calling itself Friends of the East Hampton Airport challenged the laws, postponing their implementation until just prior to the July 4 weekend. The restrictions were enjoined by a federal appellate court in November 2016, however, which ruled that the town cannot independently enact airport use restrictions but must follow the federal Airport Noise and Capacity Act and seek federal approval. 

The town has turned to a Part 161 study, an analysis it must complete in order to propose and enact noise or operational restrictions on aircraft. On Tuesday, the consultants updated the board as to that effort’s progress, and reviewed as-yet-unsuccessful efforts at federal legislation to add nighttime curfews and require the Federal Aviation Administration to implement an air traffic management plan for East Hampton. 

But while the Part 161 action could afford the town the ability to impose curfews at the airport, and customized federal legislation to address airport-related noise should still be pursued, the board was told, preparations should also be made for the airport’s closure, which the town would legally be permitted to do upon the expiration of federal grant assurances in 2021.

While the restrictions enacted in 2015 banned takeoffs and landings between 11 p.m. and 7 a.m., with an extended ban from 8 p.m. to 9 a.m. for aircraft deemed noisy, “total operations continue to shift into the prior nighttime curfew hours,” according to the 2017-18 comparison. “ ‘Noisy’ aircraft operations continued to shift out of daytime hours into prior restricted nighttime curfew and extended curfew hours.” In short, “2018 operations continued to follow patterns from 2017 and deviate from the intent of the 2015 restrictions,” the report stated.

Noise complaints fell last summer relative to the summer of 2017, with overall complaints down by 10,586, or 23 percent. Complaints had roughly doubled, to more than 46,000, between 2016 and 2017, however, the appellate court ruling having lifted the curfews between those summer seasons. 

The Bell 407 helicopter prompted the most complaints last year, the board was told. The Sikorsky S-76, a helicopter that performed the most operations among all aircraft, drew the second highest number. A seaplane, the Cessna 208 Caravan, performed the second highest number 

of operations and brought the third 

most complaints. Not surprisingly, charter companies commonly use these aircraft to ferry people from Manhattan to East Hampton in the summer. 

Curfews, such as a blanket overnight curfew, Mr. O’Connor told the board, are an achievable outcome of the Part 161 action. But “frequency restrictions,” such as the board hoped to implement on aircraft deemed noisy in 2015, “may be more challenging.” The F.A.A. “likes to see a static restriction: Here’s the hours it’s open, here’s the hours it’s closed,” he said. “Any effort to try to impose caps could present a lot of litigation risk going forward.”

The F.A.A.’s metric of an airport’s annual day-night average decibel level doesn’t fit East Hampton’s condition as “a uniquely quiet and rural area,” Mr. O’Connor said, one that experiences a huge summer influx of tourists and second-home owners. The town is “starting from a real disadvantage in terms of math,” he said. “All the days you’re not hearing helicopters, that gets averaged, too.” 

Worse, “the F.A.A. has always been very skeptical of noise complaint data,” Mr. O’Connor said. Such data is just one component presented in a Part 161 study. “I don’t think it’s dispositive,” he said. But “in terms of defining a problem statement for our Part 161, we don’t need to rely on complaint data. It is, in a way, self-evident, there has been a lot of activity, not just here but throughout Long Island. . . . A correlation between routes and complaints makes complete sense.” For East Hampton “supplemental metrics we would present are quite critical,” he said, and F.A.A. officials he has spoken with have indicated an openness to considering such data on a discretional basis.

Concurrent to the Part 161 action, 

Mr. O’Connor suggested a “visioning process” to evaluate alternative uses for the 600-acre airport property, such as “to restore and preserve the quiet of our environment.” All stakeholders’ views would be considered, he said. “Have those discussions now to try to align with the town’s objectives and [with] residents’ best interests in mind.” 

Alternatives should be pursued in parallel with the Part 161 action and legislative efforts, he said, because “You can close this airport and use it for something else after grant assurances expire in 2021.”

The riddle of how to address rising health care costs and gaps in coverage is an urgent topic that state and federal government officials struggle with as much as the families they serve. 

The New York Health Act, a state health care bill advancing the idea of a single-payer system — sometimes called Medicare for all — has gained a lot of traction and generated a lot of debate. Would such a universal health care bill deliver all the benefits that advocates say it could? Or are critics right to argue that the cons and unknowns are being downplayed too much?

Those are some of issues likely to be examined on Saturday at a 90-minute panel discussion called “What Is the New York Health Act?” at Chancellors Hall on the campus of Stony Brook Southampton. The doors open at 1 p.m., and the forum begins at 1:30. Audience members will be invited to speak as well. A reception will follow the discussion.

The scheduled panelists include Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr., Martha Livingston, a professor at the State University at Old Westbury and chairwoman of the school’s public health department, Michael Hynes, superintendent of Patchogue-Medford School District, and Jackie Romero, a nurses union representative. The event is being sponsored by Progressive East End Reformers, or PEER, and a host of local organizations, churches, and social agencies.

Cheryl Cashin, a health economist and PEER member, will moderate the discussion. Ms. Cashin is an expert at designing and implementing health system financing. She is also managing director at the Results for Development Institute, a nonprofit that works to advance universal health care initiatives around the world, with an emphasis on making such programs self-sustaining.

The question of who can, should, and would pay if the New York Health Act is passed is among the biggest issues driving the debate. 

Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo has indicated that he is inclined to see what the federal government does regarding the Affordable Care Act, which he supports keeping, before moving ahead in New York.

Mr. Thiele disagrees. He co-sponsored and voted for the New York Health Act last summer when it came before the State Assembly, and he said via email on Monday that he continues to back the measure.

“We cannot allow New Yorkers to face the life-or-death consequences of skyrocketing premiums and insufficient health coverage,” Mr. Thiele said in a statement explaining his vote. “If we truly believe that access to health care is a human right, then a single-payer system is the best way forward.”

“Even for New Yorkers with insurance coverage, an illness or hospitalization can lead to nearly insurmountable personal debt and, in some cases, bankruptcy. New York Health will ensure New Yorkers no longer have to fear being turned down because of a pre-existing condition or forgo critical medical care because of an inability to pay.”

The Health Act’s advocates want a bill that provides cradle-to-grave coverage regardless of age, wealth, income, or pre-existing conditions. A state agency called New York Health would administer the program, and there would be no co-pays, deductibles, or other charges to patients. The insurance would cover primary and preventive care, all medically necessary inpatient and outpatient care, prescriptions, vision, hearing, dental, and hospital stay costs. 

Participants would also be able to choose whichever doctor or provider they want, rather than the ones their insurance companies dictate now. Coverage would remain intact even if the insured person loses or switches jobs or needs care while out of state.

Some critics of the Health Act are skeptical that it would deliver the array of services and projected savings the bill’s proponents claim. Some argue that the program would be needlessly disruptive or a nightmare to administer. Opponents also argue that universal coverage would create added, perhaps crippling costs for business owners who currently don’t offer health care coverage for employees. They also question whether some businesses or certain professionals would thus avoid New York State.

One thing all sides do agree on is public education opportunities like Saturday’s forum are needed. And the health care system needs work.

In addition to PEER, the many co-sponsors of Saturday’s event include the East End Action Network, Calvary Baptist Church of East Hampton, Christ Episcopal Church of Sag Harbor, Organizacion Latino-Americana of Eastern Long Island, Southampton Democrats, and the Southampton Progressive Caucus.

State Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr. last week introduced legislation to allow the five East End towns to establish community housing opportunity funds using money from a .5-percent increase in real estate transfer taxes. 

Under the proposal, the money could be used to provide financial assistance to first-time homebuyers for up to 50 percent of the purchase price of a house, the “production” of housing to sell or rent, “rehabilitation of existing buildings for community housing,” housing counseling, and “education impact payments to local school districts.” 

In addition to a .5-percent addition to the 2-percent real estate transfer tax that finances the community preservation fund, the housing fund legislation would increase the exemption for transfer tax payments. For improved properties, the exemption would increase from $250,000 to $350,000 in East Hampton, Southampton, and Shelter Island Towns, meaning the first $350,000 of a home purchase would not be subject to the tax. The exemption would go from $150,000 to $250,000 in Southold and Riverhead Towns. In all cases, the exemptions would apply only to transfers of $2 million or less. 

Should the legislation pass, it would allow the individual towns to put the funds before their voters in mandatory referendums. Before the funds could be established, the towns would have to adopt community housing plans that would include a “regional housing strategy agreed upon by all five East End towns.” At least 20 percent of the money collected would have to be used to implement this strategy. Towns would also have to establish their own community housing advisory boards to advise the town boards. 

Based on 2017 community preservation fund revenues, Mr. Thiele’s office said, the fund could generate $22.7 million for housing across the East End, with $4.5 million of that available for regional housing initiatives. 

The income cap for a one or two-person household would be $140,040, and the purchase price for a single-family home would be capped at $938,649. 

“This legislation will provide towns with a meaningful tool that can make a difference by providing housing opportunities . . . at a much greater rate than they can with existing resources and programs,” Mr. Thiele said in a Jan. 30 release.

His proposal will next go before the Assembly’s local government committee, which Mr. Thiele chairs.