Amos Goodman, chairman of the East Hampton Town Republican Committee, has challenged petitions David Lys submitted to the Suffolk County Board of Elections last month to create the East Hampton Unity Party.

Mr. Lys, a town councilman appointed to his post in January, offered himself as a candidate for the new independent political party in an effort to ensure he remains on the Nov. 6 ballot even if he loses today’s Democratic primary.

Mr. Lys had changed his party registration from Republican to Democratic last year before being appointed to his post. He faces David Gruber, who formed a splinter group called the East Hampton Reform Democrats, in today’s primary. 

Mr. Goodman, who successfully challenged the East Hampton Independence Party’s petitions for Mr. Gruber to appear on its line on the November ballot, said on Tuesday that his challenge would not be settled before today’s primary election, but “by my count they’re short of what’s the statutory requirement.” The petition requires 320 valid signatures; Mr. Goodman charged that only about 260 of approximately 383 submitted are valid. 

Unlike his challenge to the Independence Party’s nominating petitions, in which he accused that party’s officials of fraud, Mr. Goodman said he is simply trying to ascertain the validity of the signatures. He described the move as “strictly a technical challenge,” referring to requirements including that signatories be residents of the town and that they have not signed another nominating petition.

Deepwater Wind, the Rhode Island company seeking to construct the 15-turbine South Fork Wind Farm in an area leased from the federal government about 30 miles offshore from Montauk, plans to submit an application for the wind farm’s transmission cable to the New York State Public Service Commission in the next week. The company submitted a construction and operations plan for the installation to the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management in June, and an application to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is to be submitted in the coming weeks.

Clint Plummer, Deepwater Wind’s vice president of development, said last Thursday that the application to the P.S.C. will include Beach Lane in Wainscott as the transmission cable’s preferred route, where it is to make landing from the wind farm. It would then be buried along a route to a Long Island Power Authority substation near Cove Hollow Road in East Hampton. 

The P.S.C. oversees components of the project that lie within state waters, including portions of the transmission cable, and those buried under state roads or rights of way, as well as the interconnection facilities to be built at the LIPA substation. The agency will determine whether to issue a certificate of environmental compatibility and public need, as required under the review process known as Article VII, which covers applications to construct and operate a major electric transmission facility. 

Deepwater’s move follows the East Hampton Town Board’s 3-to-2 vote in July to support the granting of an access and utility easement allowing the company to land the cable at the ocean beach at the end of Beach Lane, and the town trustees’ Aug. 27 vote to retain Daniel Spitzer, an attorney who is to guide the trustees in negotiating a land-use agreement and through the Article VII process. 

In its July vote, the town board also voted to hire an attorney, John Wagner, to serve as outside counsel to the town attorney’s office for issues relating to the wind farm, including proceedings pursuant to Article VII and before the federal agency and other regulatory bodies.

“Because we have the votes that show an indication of interest by the town and trustees, we’re moving forward in good faith,” Mr. Plummer said. “But since we don’t have agreements finalized, we are including a viable alternative,” referring to a landing site on state-owned land at Hither Hills. “If we don’t get an agreement, we will land at Hither Hills and connect at the [East Hampton] substation,” bypassing land that may be under trustee jurisdiction.

The Beach Lane landing has drawn criticism, particularly from Wainscott residents who are concerned about the environmental impact on the beach. Deepwater Wind plans to drill horizontally, beginning several hundred yards offshore and continuing under the beach, to create a tunnel into which a conduit will be laid, the high-voltage transmission cable contained within it. 

A petition opposing the Wainscott landing began circulating late last month and is to be delivered to the town board. 

More broadly, many residents are opposed to the wind farm entirely. Commercial fishermen and their advocates say that the electromagnetic field emanating from the transmission cable might alter fish migration patterns, possibly repelling some species while attracting others. 

Deepwater Wind has offered an $8.45 million community-benefits package to the town, which would fund sustainability programs and infrastructure improvements, in exchange for the easement. Should the town and trustees deny Deepwater Wind an easement to land its cable, the offer will be withdrawn, the company’s officials say. 

Adjacent property owners along both routes will be notified on or about the day the application is submitted to the P.S.C., Mr. Plummer said, with instructions on how to access additional information. The commission is to review it for completeness. It will be posted to the P.S.C.’s website and at southforkwindfarm.com, and print copies will be available at locations in East Hampton Town and Village, including the Montauk Library. 

The construction and operations plan, which a developer is required to submit within five years of receiving an offshore renewable-energy lease from the federal government, will also be made public once the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management deems it complete. That is expected in mid-October, according to Deepwater Wind. Public hearings, including one in East Hampton, will follow.

Mr. Spitzer attended the trustees’ meeting on Monday, and was to have met with them and with stakeholders, including representatives of the commercial fishing industry, on Tuesday. 

Julia Prince, Deepwater Wind’s Montauk manager and fisheries liaison, “has been on the docks and has been letting folks know we are submitting the application,” Mr. Plummer said.

With the approaching one-year anniversary of the discovery of a southern pine beetle infestation in Northwest Woods in East Hampton, the town board is mulling its approach to managing the invasive species. 

The infestation resulted in the declaration of a state of emergency last October, which authorized the town’s Department of Land Acquisition and Management to cut down infested pine trees on both public and private property, the latter with landowners’ permission. Town staff was also authorized to enter private property to inspect trees and hire private contractors to augment town staff. Around 10,000 trees were felled to curb the infestation, Andy Drake, an environmental analyst, told the board on Tuesday.

This year, “We can be hopeful, or worry about what’s going to happen come October,” Mr. Drake said. He had been summoned to the meeting following last Thursday’s town board meeting, at which a resident of Swamp Road, near the epicenter of the outbreak, said that he had spent more than $24,000 in the felling or removal of pine trees on his 2.5-acre property and was now “way beyond my ability to pay” for the removal of still more infested trees. 

The town has adopted a “cut and leave” approach to suppressing southern pine beetle infestations, in which infested trees and a buffer are cut down and left on the ground. Beetles tunnel under the bark, blocking the flow of nutrients and killing the trees. To combat this, the bark is scored to expose the beetles to the elements. Private property owners are responsible for the cost of removing the trees, but the town accepts them at its recycling centers free of charge. 

Fortunately, Mr. Drake said, the situation is significantly different from last year. “We’ve made a really large effort in trying to minimize the spread since then,” he said. “This year, so far, we haven’t seen very much new emergence. . . . I think it shows that our efforts from last year have paid off.” 

The Land Acquisition and Management Department is “trying to stay on top of this and manage properties,” Mr. Drake said, pointing out that it offers inspections of private land. Since last September, around 480 properties were inspected, he said. Since June, eight private properties of 43 inspected have revealed southern pine beetle infestation. On town properties, 518 trees were felled since June. 

“Right now, we have 32 trees marked on town lands, which we intend to cut by the end of the week,” he said. “But so far, emergence has been relatively low.” Nonetheless, private property owners who are worried about the pines on their land have been advised to contact the town. 

The question for the town board, Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc said, is how to proceed. “Does it make sense to declare a state of emergency again to try to suppress the spread of the beetles, given we’ve made an investment and commitment to do that?” he asked. “I don’t know . . . if it makes sense to continue to try to suppress these little outbreaks. The resources that we might have to bring to bear might be much less and save us a lot of money, and residents a lot of money, over time, and prevent destruction of those large forest tracts.” 

Last year, two separate emergency declarations were made, spanning a total of 60 days. Mr. Drake suggested that, should the board again declare an emergency, “we should declare later on in the season so it can encapsulate the whole migration time period and reproduction time period.” The beetles go dormant once the temperature falls below 40 degrees Fahrenheit, he said. “Last year, there were still trees being infested after the period we were allowed to do cutting. We were making recommendations, but private property owners were stuck with a lot of their own management.” 

The invasive species is now well established, Mr. Drake said. “This is a problem that has been a management effort and should continue to be a management effort. But I don’t know if it has quite that emergency feel anymore, because it is so heavily established at this point.”

The town has $47,000 remaining from a State Department of Environmental Conservation grant to manage the invasive species, he said, and a standing relationship with the tree company that felled trees last year. “There’s a really high potential to reach outbreak status again,” he said, but “so far, based on our inspections, we’ve seen really low numbers.” 

The infestation, Mr. Van Scoyoc said, “was a predicted result from a warming climate. This creature did not live in this area, in this climate. Due to warming temperatures over all, it’s expanded its range. They’re probably going to have to rename it the Mid-Atlantic pine beetle.”

Days before today’s Democratic primary to determine the party’s candidate for a seat on the East Hampton Town Board, the East Hampton Reform Dem­ocrats and their town board candidate, David Gruber, accused David Lys, the East Hampton Democratic Committee’s nominee, of lying about his write-in vote for president in the 2016 election. Mr. Lys stood by his statement, and information from the Suffolk County Board of Elections backs him up. 

In an editor’s note on a letter in the Aug. 30 issue of The Star, Mr. Lys said he had cast a write-in vote for his father, Hakim Lys, in 2016, and had not voted for Donald Trump. An editorial in last week’s paper repeated that statement, calling Reform Democrats’ assertions to the contrary false. 

Reform Democrats cried foul, and on Monday morning sent out an email bearing the headline “David Lys Misleads East Hampton Star About His Presidential Vote in 2016.” It went on to state that “The official Suffolk County Board of Elections tally for the 2016 Presidential Election shows that NO ONE voted for Hakim Lys, David Lys’s father, in all Suffolk County.” The assertion was also disseminated on social media. 

A copy of the final results for the Nov. 8, 2016, general election was included. Below the Republican, Democratic, and third-party candidates’ names and the number of votes each received are the names and vote tallies for 12 write-in candidates. Hakim Lys is not among them.

According to the board of elections, however, the list presented by the Reform Democrats was not proof that no one wrote in Hakim Lys’s name. Rather, an official at the board of elections explained on Monday that those listed on the final-results document had probably notified the board of elections of their write-in candidacy. “If you notify us, you get your name printed,” said the official, who did not want to be named. As an example, she said that Mickey Mouse, a perennial write-in candidate, is not listed in the 2016 results. 

Votes for such candidates “would be considered a scattering,” said another official, who also asked not to be named. That official agreed to speak to the commissioner and endeavor to provide the names of those grouped under the “scattering” umbrella.

Under the Freedom of Information Act, Mr. Gruber had asked the board of elections for a printout of all people who received write-in votes in the 2016 presidential election. On Monday, he said that an official there first read the names of write-in candidates receiving votes to him over the telephone. “I said, ‘Okay, thank you, that gives me the information I need,’ because I did not hear Hakim in the list. Then I said, ‘Please, I need you to send me a document that says this, because nobody is going to take my word for it.’ They did.” 

The board of elections’ final-results list, which the Reform Democrats offered as proof that Ms. Lys was lying, lists 4,087 scattering votes countywide.

In an email on Tuesday morning, Cate Rogers, chairwoman of the East Hampton Democratic Committee, wrote that she, too, had called the board of elections and was informed that “the only names that you see on that report as write-ins are official write-in candidates. Official means that the board of elections received a letter from the state stating that the candidate is a recognized candidate for write-in. All other names: Mickey Mouse, Barack Obama, David Lys’s dad, Hakim Lys, and any other random name are reported in the ‘Scatterings’ column. In Suffolk County there were thousands of ‘Scatterings’ as you can see,” she said. A 2016 election report for East Hampton Town lists 85 votes under the “Scattering” column.

“My write-in would be part of that scattering on there,” Mr. Lys said Tuesday. He called the Reform Democrats’ information a “half-truth” and said he is “disappointed by their actions.”

“They are trying to call me a liar. I am not,” Mr. Lys said.

“This attempt to say that David Lys is a liar is so blatant and egregious and if the truth still matters in our world then this should be exposed,” Ms. Rogers said.

  Also on the ballot in today’s Democratic primary election are candidates for the party’s committee in each of the 19 election districts. Registered Democrats will also choose a candidate for governor, lieutenant governor, and attorney general. 

Polls, which are the same as for the general election, will be open from 6 a.m. to 9 p.m. A list of polling places can be found in last week’s Star and online at easthamptonstar.com.

The long-awaited effort to alleviate traffic by adding Long Island Rail Road service between Speonk and Montauk in the morning and afternoon has taken a step closer to reality. 

On Tuesday, JoAnne Pahwul, East Hampton Town’s assistant planning director, told the town board that Feb. 25 is the target date for the inaugural runs of two additional eastbound trains that will arrive in East Hampton in the morning, and one additional westbound train leaving East Hampton around 5:15 p.m. 

A key component of the plan is the “last-mile shuttle,” through which commuters would get from train stations to their workplaces and back, and for which the Towns of East Hampton and Southampton will issue a joint request for proposals. 

Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr. and State Senator Kenneth P. LaValle helped to secure $500,000 to fund shuttle ser­vices. 

Southampton, Ms. Pahwul told the board, is prepared to move forward with a request for proposals. “We need to review it,” she said. The towns will issue the request jointly, but will enter contracts with winning bidders individually so that East Hampton “will have complete control over the service” it seeks. 

She asked the board to review and comment on the request for proposals in order to adopt a resolution at its meeting next Thursday to move forward with Southampton. By adhering to that schedule, the request can be advertised in media on Oct. 4, a bidders’ meeting can be scheduled for Oct. 15, and bids would be due on Oct. 30. “We are leaving enough time so we have an opportunity to rebid if necessary,” she said. 

Soliciting a service provider to shuttle people to and from train stations is “relatively new territory” that requires the town to determine how many passengers must be accommodated and what areas would be served by the shuttle service, Ms. Pahwul said. A 2007 survey conducted when the L.I.R.R. provided a similar service during construction on County Road 39 yielded considerable data, including that 77 percent of the 149 respondents took the train every day and that 23 percent, or 34 people, took the train to East Hampton. The town is conducting a new survey to determine how many of its employees live west of the Shinnecock Canal, she said. 

Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc said that the L.I.R.R. has asked the towns where additional stations might be sited. A station closer to the Town Hall campus, and to the nearby site where the Southampton Hospital Association plans to construct a freestanding emergency medical facility, makes sense, for example. 

“We don’t really know what ridership will be at a particular stop,” Mr. Van Scoyoc said, and adjustments will be likely as that becomes clear. “As the system becomes more in the public eye, more and more people are likely to take advantage.” 

Traffic to and from the South Fork, where the so-called trade parade clogs the primary route throughout the year, makes it difficult for employers, including the town, to find qualified employees, he said.

It wasn’t long after the earthmoving equipment began digging a trench into Windsor Lane in Wainscott, commencing a months-long effort to install approximately 45,000 feet of water main in the hamlet, that reports of sticker shock began circulating. 

One homeowner, who asked not to be named, told The Star that the Suffolk County Water Authority informed him that connecting the house on his flag lot to public water would cost $93,775. Another property owner complained to East Hampton Town Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc via email that authorizing the water authority’s contractor, Asplundh Construction, to connect his house would cost $14,800, while a local contractor quoted just $2,338. 

"The residents of Wainscott are paying attention," He wrote, "and virtually everyone I speak with is ready to vote the lot of you out of office." 

The Aug. 20 commencement of the water main extension followed the discovery of perfluorinated chemicals in more than 150 private wells in the hamlet to date, the declaration of a state of emergency, the establishment by the town board of a water supply district, and the board’s partnering with the water authority to develop the project. In the interim, the town provided free bottled water to affected residents and offered a rebate of up to $3,000 for those opting to install a point-of-entry water treatment system. 

The cost of extending the water mains throughout the hamlet will be covered through a bond issue, to be repaid in taxes assessed to all the town’s residents outside the villages. Property owners, however, are responsible for the expense of connecting the main to their residence, should they choose to do so. Should property owners use the water authority’s contractor, the town would pay the cost up front, and residents would repay it through a special assessment on their property tax bill, amortized over at least 20 years. 

That structure is behind the sticker shock: Publicly bid labor contracts are typically three to four times higher, or more, than private contracts because of public procurement rules including Wicks Law, a state law mandating the use of independent prime contractors — large companies that handle sizable and complex government undertakings — for most projects. 

The town board issued a statement on Monday encouraging Wainscott residents who plan to connect to public water to solicit estimates from both the water authority’s contractor and a private plumber. “The water authority must adhere to state law and bidding procedures,” according to the statement, “including selecting the lowest responsible bidder; winning bidders are required to meet certain Department of Labor and insurance requirements, which drives up costs.”

Hiring a private plumber, which residents are free to do, is likely to cost significantly less, the release said, but that cost would be the property owner’s responsibility. “Every property owner,” Mr. Van Scoyoc said at the town board’s meeting on Tuesday, “has to make that decision on their own.” 

The town has instructed the water authority to “make residents fully aware of their options before they are asked to make a choice,” according to Monday’s statement. At the board’s direction, the water authority has suspended Asplundh’s direct contact with potential customers. Residents who agreed to use Asplundh without the contractor’s having informed them as to the cost are to be reimbursed the difference between the public and private contractor costs, Mr. Van Scoyoc said. 

While residents are not required to connect to public water, the town board is strongly recommending it. The financing option, using the water authority’s contractor, will expire in July 2020. Under an emergency declaration in May, the town instituted a rebate program for the installation of point-of-entry treatment systems. That program expires once public water installation is completed.

The irate property owner who complained to Mr. Van Scoyoc softened his position following the supervisor’s reply, in which he explained the circumstances behind the cost of connecting to public water. “While I appreciate that government bids are higher because of the regulatory overhead, I’m still hard pressed to believe that they should be 4-plus times higher,” he wrote. And though the out-of-pocket cost of hiring a private plumber may be easily absorbed by most of the hamlet’s residents, for some it could be difficult or impossible. Those residents, he wrote, must choose among few options, none of them good.

To date, around 8,700 of the 45,000 feet of water main have been installed, Mr. Van Scoyoc said on Tuesday.

Summer may be unofficially over, but the harmful algal blooms associated with the hottest months are proliferating across the South Fork and elsewhere on Long Island. 

Last Thursday, Concerned Citizens of Montauk announced that its sampling conducted on Sept. 5 confirmed a bloom of cyanobacteria, or blue-green algae, in the southern portion of Fort Pond in that hamlet. The northern end of Fort Pond showed elevated risk of a bloom, C.C.O.M. reported, so the entire pond should be avoided. Fort Pond also saw cyanobacteria blooms in 2015 and 2017. 

The East Hampton Town Trustees announced on Monday that cyanobacteria contamination in Georgica Pond in East Hampton, which has experienced blooms of the harmful algae in each of the last seven summers, exceeds the federal Environmental Protection Agency’s standards. The pond is closed to all recreational uses until further notice. 

In an email to Francis Bock, the trustees’ clerk, and Sara Davison, executive director of the Friends of Georgica Pond Foundation, Christopher Gobler of Stony Brook University’s School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences, wrote that levels of blue-green algae jumped after a sensor in the pond was replaced on Friday, more than doubling over the weekend and continuing to intensify.

“Even more troubling is that the levels of the blue-green algal toxin, microcystin, jumped by an order of magnitude during the past week to 5 micrograms per liter,” above the E.P.A.’s limit for recreation, Dr. Gobler wrote. Microcystins can cause serious damage to the liver if ingested, and may promote liver and colorectal cancers. 

Dr. Gobler monitors waterways under trustee jurisdiction and for the Friends of Georgica Pond Foundation, a group of pondfront property owners who banded together to develop mitigation strategies after a dog died after ingesting the pond’s water in 2012. In May, he and C.C.O.M. announced a partnership to monitor Fort Pond. 

On Friday, the State Department of Environmental Conservation confirmed new blooms of cyanobacteria in Poxabogue Pond in Sagaponack and Old Town Pond in Southampton. On the South Fork, blue-green algae persist in Wainscott Pond, Sagg Pond in Sagaponack, Mill Pond in Water Mill, and Lake Agawam, Cooper’s Neck Pond, Wickapogue Pond, and Little Fresh Pond in Southampton.

Blue-green algae is naturally present in lakes and streams in low numbers, but can become abundant at times, forming blooms in shades of green, blue-green, yellow, brown, or red. They may produce floating scums on the surface of the water or cause the water to look like paint. 

Health officials urge residents not to use, swim, or wade in waters afflicted by cyanobacteria blooms and to keep pets and children away from the area. Contact with waters that appear scummy or discolored should be avoided. If contact does occur, one should rinse with clean water immediately, and seek medical attention if nausea, vomiting or diarrhea; skin, eye or throat irritation, or allergic reactions or breathing difficulties occur after contact.

Another algal bloom, of cochlodinium polykrikoides, or rust tide, appeared late last month in the southern portion of Three Mile Harbor in East Hampton. Rick Drew, a trustee, wrote to Dr. Gobler last Thursday that some residents described it as “the worst one ever seen.” Though not a threat to human health, rust tide is lethal to shellfish and finfish. 

Dr. Gobler’s lab at the university’s School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences, according to an Aug. 29 press release, has monitored what has grown from an isolated rust tide event in eastern Shinnecock Bay to span Great South Bay, parts of Long Island Sound, and the Peconic Estuary. Last month, tens of thousands of caged oysters and fish in Old Fort Pond in Southampton were killed by rust tide, Dr. Gobler said. Late in August, bloom patches were also detected across Conscience Bay in Setauket and Port Jefferson Harbor. “Beyond large kills in Southampton this year, prior rust tides have brought kills of both natural and aquacultured populations of fish and shellfish on eastern Long Island,” Dr. Gobler said in the release. 

Dr. Gobler pointed to climate change “and specifically warm summer temperatures as a trigger for these large, widespread rust tides” in the Aug. 29 statement. Compared to the 20th century, summer water temperatures “are significantly warmer and it’s been a warmer than usual summer. When we have extended heat as we have seen this summer, intense rust tides often follow.” 

Excessive nitrogen is an equally important factor for rust tides, he said, and can make them more intense and toxic. “As nitrogen loading has increased in Suffolk County waters, these events have intensified,” he said in the Aug. 29 statement. 

Pointing to excessive nitrogen loading from aging septic systems and stormwater runoff, the Friends of Georgica Pond Foundation and C.C.O.M. have encouraged replacement of septic systems with state-of-the-art systems that reduce nitrogen. This week, C.C.O.M., Group for the East End, and Citizens Campaign for the Environment announced a partnership to help raise public awareness about the need for such systems and available funding opportunities for system upgrades as part of the Suffolk County Septic and Nitrogen Awareness Outreach Campaign. The county’s Water Quality Protection and Restoration Program, which is administered by the Department of Economic Development and Planning, has awarded the partners $112,000 to implement the campaign.

Affordable Houses

A lottery for 15 affordable houses at Southampton Pointe will be held next month. 

Southampton Pointe is a condominium townhouse complex on Village Green Drive off County Road 39. The affordable units feature two bedrooms and one-and-a-half baths. The development also has market price condominiums, which cost between $845,000 and $975,000, and a clubhouse. 

Those eligible for affordable housing must meet median 2018-19 household income levels established by the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development. The sale price of a house for people earning 80 percent of the median income is $233,375 and for those earning 20 percent more than the median it is $350,125. 

Eighty percent of the median income is $93,350 for a family of four and $74,700 for a family of two, while 20 percent above the median income is $140,050 for a family of four or $112,050 for a family of two.

Applicants for affordable houses are to submit lottery intake applications to the Long Island Housing Partnership by Oct. 12 at 5 p.m., along with a $50 nonrefundable fee. Applications are available at lihp.org. 

The lottery will be held at Southampton Town Hall on Oct. 25 at 3 p.m. Applicants do not have to be there to be placed on a ranking list. After the list is complete, a formal application process for eligibility to purchase a house will begin.

The arrival of Labor Day heralds the launch of campaign season, and with a contested nomination for a seat on the East Hampton Town Board, Democrats are wasting no time. Councilman David Lys, appointed to the town board in January to fill the seat vacated by Peter Van Scoyoc upon his election as supervisor, and David Gruber, a former candidate for supervisor who recently formed the East Hampton Reform Democrats, will debate on Tuesday, nine days ahead of the Sept. 13 primary election that will decide the Democratic Party’s nominee. 

The East Hampton Group for Good Government is hosting the debate at 7 p.m. at the Emergency Services Building in East Hampton. Arthur Malman, its chairman, will moderate the 90-minute discussion. It will begin with each candidate delivering a two-minute opening statement. “The two candidates will talk to one another about several questions that the G.G.G. will share with them and the audience in advance,” Mr. Malman said in an email on Monday. “They are encouraged to politely interrupt each other to clarify or disagree.” Ten to 15 minutes will typically be allocated for each of the questions. The debate will conclude with two-minute closing statements. LTV will record the event for rebroadcast on channel 20 and on its website. 

Water quality, sea level rise, affordable housing, the East Hampton Airport, energy self-sufficiency, a living wage, and recreational facilities are among the topics to be addressed, according to a brochure issued by the G.G.G. yesterday. 

The winner of the Sept. 13 Democratic primary will face Manny Vilar, the Republican Party’s candidate, in the general election on Nov. 6. But Mr. Lys, who changed his party affiliation from Republican to Democratic last year, has moved to ensure a place on the ballot regardless of the primary election’s outcome: Last week, he submitted petitions to the Suffolk County Board of Elections offering himself as the candidate of a newly created independent political party, the East Hampton Unity Party. Provided his petitions are validated, he would face Mr. Gruber and Mr. Vilar in a three-way race should he lose the primary election. 

The East Hampton Independence Party nominated Mr. Gruber, who co-founded the East Hampton Conservators and was a founder of the Hayground School, as its candidate. That line on the ballot will be blank, however, following a ruling in State Supreme Court on Friday that invalidated nominating petitions gathered for him. That decision is covered elsewhere in this issue. 

The Reform Democrats, which Mr. Gruber describes as a caucus within the Democratic Party, sponsored a Springs Community Food Festival featuring food trucks and live music at Ashawagh Hall last Thursday. Rallies for Mr. Lys’s campaign are scheduled for Wednesday at the Montauket in Montauk and Friday, Sept. 7, at the Neighborhood House in East Hampton. 

Former supervisor Larry Cantwell issued an endorsement for Mr. Lys’s candidacy on Aug. 17, citing his roots in the community, his five years on the town’s zoning board of appeals, and his leadership roles in the Amagansett Life-Saving and Coast Guard Station Society and Citizens for Access Rights. “David Lys shares my values, Democratic values, and most importantly the values of the people who live and work in our community,” Mr. Cantwell said. 

Mr. Lys’s appointment to the town board, and an internecine dispute over selection of a new leader of the Democratic Committee to replace its retiring chairwoman, Jeanne Frankl, have caused acrimony and a schism within the party. Mr. Gruber formed the Reform Democrats in June, after the Democratic Committee passed over his candidacy for councilman in favor of Mr. Lys. Its members are also seeking election to the Democratic Committee, a vote that also takes place on primary day.

“My basic message is that this town board majority needs help in getting its job done,” Mr. Gruber said on Monday. “On the important issues that face the town, they are not getting the job done.”

The Democratic Party primary election next Thursday will determine not only the party’s nominee for the fifth seat on the East Hampton Town Board, but also the membership of the town’s Democratic Committee, which, atypically, is hotly contested this year. In every one of the town’s election districts, each of which has two seats on the committee, there are primary challenges.

A fight to determine the successor to Jeanne Frankl, the committee’s chairwoman until her retirement earlier this year, opened a chasm between establishment party officials and a group that has come together under the name “East Hampton Reform Democrats,” the latter group charging that Ms. Frankl had underhandedly maneuvered to ensure the outcome of her successor’s selection. That, the group charges, is emblematic of a broader culture of “bossism and cronyism.” 

David Gruber, who sought but did not win the Democratic Committee’s endorsement as its candidate for the town board, is the Reform Democrats’ candidate. He will face Councilman David Lys, who was appointed to the board in January, in the primary election. 

The Democratic Committee as currently constituted has seized on an Aug. 24 State Supreme Court ruling that nominating petitions for Mr. Gruber’s appearance on the Independence Party ballot were invalid due to fraudulent signatures, including that of a deceased person, to discredit his candidacy. 

“This level of deceit is astounding and unprecedented in our town and David Gruber has to take responsibility for it,” Cate Rogers, who was elected to succeed Ms. Frankl, said in a statement issued last weekend. “His campaign’s use of the ‘moral compass’ symbolism for his hostile takeover attempt of the East Hampton Democratic Party is clearly a farce.” 

In their own messaging on social media and in mailings, the Reform Demo­crats hit back, telling voters that they “are committed to breaking the monopoly of a small group of Democratic Party insiders on party nominations” with open screening of prospective candidates and party conventions. “That way, elected officials will no longer be beholden to party insiders who now exercise unhealthy influence over appointments and decisions by boards, such as planning and zoning, that are supposed to be fair and independent, serving the public.