With a backdrop of earth-moving equipment digging a long trench into Windsor Lane in Wainscott, the East Hampton Town Board, officials from the Suffolk County Water Authority, County Legislator Bridget Fleming, and Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr., announced on Monday the commencement of work to install approximately 45,000 feet of water main in the hamlet, where perfluorinated chemicals have been detected in more than 150 private wells.

The project, encompassing much of the hamlet south of East Hampton Airport, includes more than 500 residential properties and is the largest water main project undertaken by the water authority in almost 20 years. It follows establishment by the town board of a water supply district, which itself followed a state of emergency declaration by the town board.

Detection of the perfluorinated chemicals, known as perfluorooctane sulfonate or PFOS, and perfluorooctanoic acid, or PFOA, was announced last October.

"This is a very important day for residents of Wainscott," Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc said at the site, at the intersection of Windsor Lane and Two Rod Highway, calling it "the fruition of many months' worth of work" to map the affected area, create a water supply district, and partner with the water authority to develop the project. He thanked Joanne Pilgrim, his executive assistant, who acted as liaison between his office and the water authority, and "pulled all the many threads together to make sure this happened."

James Gaughran, the water authority's chairman, called the project "an example of how government at all levels, when you cooperate and work together, can really make something happen."

Perfluorinated chemicals, Mr. Thiele said, are emerging chemicals about which little is known. "There aren't even federal water standards yet for these compounds. But we know they're dangerous, we know that people shouldn't be drinking themst of; there's a health advisory limit for these chemicals," he said. Wainscott residents "had a right to be scared."

Water mains between six and 16 inches in diameter will be installed in the impacted area. Copper and high-density polyethylene service lines will also be installed between water mains and impacted houses. Water meters and meter vaults are among the project's additional elements.

Properties in the affected area where water mains already exist will be the first connected. Streets where the perfluorinated chemicreals have been detected in wells and streets where willing project participants reside will then be prioritized. Existing private wells will be disconnected from houses' internal plumbing to prevent the possibility of cross-contamination with the public water system.

Ms. Fleming encouraged residents in the affected area to connect to public water. "This is the way to go at this point," she said. "These are emerging contaminants, we don't have standards, we're not 100-percent certain from a scientific standpoint as to the level at which you're going to have health impact. So hook up to the water mains if you can."

The water authority and the town have jointly applied for grant funding under the ?state's Clean Water Infrastructure Act of 2017, which could pay for up to $10 million of the project's estimated $24 million cost. A bond issue will initially fund the project, which is expected to take at least three months to complete.

The costs to residents of the district "will be offset to the largest degree possible" by grant money, Mr. Van Scoyoc said. "We'll continue to look for funding sources to offset those costs."

The Army Corps of Engineers has indicated that its Fire Island to Montauk Point Reformulation Plan, decades in the making, will provide significantly less sand to replenish Montauk’s downtown ocean beach than town officials had hoped.

Faced with that fact, in a step toward self-sufficiency, the recently formed Montauk Beach Preservation Committee presented a proposal to the East Hampton Town Board on Tuesday calling for a feasibility study and engineering analysis for a plan to combat erosion of the hamlet’s ocean beach. 

Laura Tooman, the committee’s chairwoman and the president of Concerned Citizens of Montauk, asked that the board allocate approximately $50,000 for a feasibility study that would draw potential boundaries of an erosion control district and explore funding mechanisms, and an additional $100,000 to $150,000 for an analysis including beach and inshore surveys, a study of the sediment quality of potential sand-source sites, beach replenishment options, and preliminary plans for a project that she estimated would cost $15 to $17 million. 

Implementation of the Army Corps’ plan remains several years into the future, and that combined with the reduced volume of sand “leaves us at a standstill,” Ms. Tooman said, “in terms of, we’re going to get a project but we know we need a bigger project, so maybe we, as a municipality, need to take it on our own and do something about it.” The committee will seek answers such as, “If we need to do more, what do we need to do, how much will it cost, and how are we going to pay for it?” she said. 

An initial commitment of around 750,000 cubic yards of sand to bolster Montauk’s beaches is now closer to 450,000, Ms. Tooman said yesterday, though the latter figure remains subject to change. “If the Army Corps comes in at 400,000-plus cubic yards, we and the town have already decided that’s not enough,” she said. “Plus, we may want to have a farther east point and west point” of sand replenishment than the Army Corps’ eventual plan. “We may want a wider beach profile, we may want a longer project.” The committee’s charge is to develop a plan that could be implemented in tandem with the Army Corps’ eventual effort. “If we could piggyback onto that project, it would make the most financial, planning, and programmatic sense,” she said. 

The Army Corps, Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc said yesterday, has reduced its estimated volume of sand for Montauk’s beaches due to its conclusion that a 50-foot-wide beach is not sustainable. “My argument was, don’t cut back the total number of cubic yards,” he said. “This is well supported in coastal geology: If you widen and lengthen it, it lasts much longer. They should place the same quantity they verbally agreed to in 2016. Instead of projecting out, go with the 40-foot-wide beach they’re producing, put sand at either end, and expand the lineal dimensions of the project.” The Army Corps is taking that request into consideration, he said.  

“We don’t know if we need a district, or if that’s the best way to pay for this project,” Ms. Tooman told the board on Tuesday. “We do need assistance assessing that.” The committee is consulting with the Town of Southampton’s attorneys, planning staff, and environmental staff, she said, citing that town’s experience in establishing multiple erosion control districts. 

A feasibility study would be tasked with drawing conclusions as to an erosion control district’s boundaries, who would pay into it and how much, and whether there would be a willingness to do so. “If they aren’t, it doesn’t make sense to move forward with all this engineering analysis which also needs to be done,” she said. 

The committee will investigate imposition of a “bed tax,” a levy on hotel stays within an erosion control district’s jurisdiction, to help fund a replenishment project, Ms. Tooman said. 

Unfortunately, she said, grant money tends to be awarded to projects of a larger scale than the committee proposes. “I don’t know how competitive we would be in attaining it, to be frank,” she told the board. 

“We’re going to look to tap any potential funding sources that we can to offset costs to the town,” Mr. Van Scoyoc replied. 

The town at present has no erosion control districts, the supervisor noted. “This is something that we will have to take a very close look at. In my opinion, it’s critical that we get moving on creating funding districts for erosion control, and be self-sufficient in doing that, and use that to have additional benefit to any other federal project or state funding that comes through.” The town cannot wholly rely on the federal government, he said, given its shifting timelines and financial commitments. “So we need to have a self-sufficient approach, and use that district as a betterment to any project that might come.” 

“This is our new reality,” he said. “We have erosion that’s going to continue, and it’s going to get worse with more and more storms.”

A Sagaponack resident’s application to install eight-foot-tall deer fencing along the perimeter of a nearly 34-acre agricultural reserve elicited vehement opposition from the reserve’s neighbors at a village board meeting on Monday. The village’s code pertaining to deer fencing, which is currently under review, permits it on farms, but not residential properties, which has led to a lively debate about who qualifies as a farmer. 

Kimberly Lippmann, the applicant, said her efforts to operate a working farm at 129 Parsonage Lane have been so thwarted by deer that she is forced to install a mile’s length of fencing at an estimated cost of $58,000. “I have four kids between the ages of 13 and 3. I think it’s important for my family and our extended family to participate in farming the land,” she said.

In addition to cultivating fruit trees and raising goats on the property, she has leased some of the land to Peter Dankowski, a local farmer who is growing corn, potatoes, and oats, and who confirmed that fencing was a necessity. The deer, he said, “wreak a lot of havoc.” 

To encompass the reserve, the fencing would abut the properties of 10 neighbors, several of whom voiced concerns about the impact it would have on their views and the market value of their houses. “Who’s going to mitigate the real estate devaluation of people who live next door?” asked Paul Brennan, who lives across the street from Ms. Lippmann’s property. “There are residual effects that this is going to have.” 

Mr. Brennan, a real estate broker, subsequently wrote a letter to Sagaponack Mayor Donald Louchheim requesting a six-month moratorium on the installation of deer fencing. “Please give us all an opportunity to find solutions that are viable for all residents,” he wrote.

One alternative to eight-foot deer fencing was presented at the meeting by Charlie Marder, the owner of the Marders nursery and landscaping business in Bridgehampton, which developed a curved fence four feet in height and extending outward by four feet. “We call it, affectionately and modestly, the Marders cantilever fence,” said Mr. Marder. “We’ve used it to make residential code deer fencing. It’s been very effective. It intimidates the deer to the point where they really don’t want to fool with it.”

Ruth Raisman, who lives next to Ms. Lippmann’s land, was enthusiastic about the Marders invention. “This is a fencing system that has been discussed among the neighbors and it is something that we would like to try,” she said. “We are really interested in preserving the vistas that Sagaponack was built upon.”

Ms. Lippmann was more skeptical about the curved fence, pointing out that vegetation under its overhang would grow into a four-foot hedge barrier that would require ongoing maintenance. “I’ve applied for an eight-foot fence because I think it’s necessary to exclude the deer. Am I willing to be flexible? Yes, but I don’t want to put up a massively expensive fence and then wind up fighting people again when I come back here next year saying it’s not working, the field is full of deer.”

Mayor Louchheim echoed some of her concerns, calling the cantilever fence “just as much if not more of a sight barrier than an eight-foot mesh fence.” Speaking of the proposed new law pertaining to deer fencing, he said that one of its key components would require that the applicant be a “bona fide farmer.”

Ms. Lippmann’s neighbors questioned whether she fit that description. “Farmers who farm for subsistence and that’s their livelihood, you can’t take that livelihood away,” said Mr. Brennan. “I don’t think that this is the case here. These are not people who are farming to live by their farm, that is not how they make their money.”

Ms. Lippmann’s husband, Greg, is a hedge fund manager who was featured in “The Big Short,” Michael Lewis’s book about the financial crisis triggered by subprime mortgages. He was played by Ryan Gosling in the book’s film adaptation. Mr. Lippmann has become such a prominent Wall Street figure that a reporter from The New York Post traveled to Sagaponack on Monday to cover the meeting. A story headed “Hedgie Couple Has Hamptons Neighbors Fuming Over Proposed Fence” appeared on the paper’s website later that day. 

In response to Mr. Brennan’s assertion that farming was not her main occupation, Ms. Lippmann said, “This will be a livelihood for people who farm this property, so I don’t think it’s right to look at what I have and conclude that just because I own the property, that it’s not a livelihood for someone.”

“I think she wants to do the right thing for the land, and she’s very ser­ious about farming,” said Richard Schoninger, a neighbor who is supportive of Ms. Lippmann’s proposal. “Her chickens and the guinea hens come on my property all the time, I love it. That’s why you live in Sagaponack and you don’t live in East Hampton. It’s about farming.”

When asked whether he considered her a bona fide farmer, Mr. Dankowski said, “No, but she’s trying.” 

The board adjourned the application without resolution.

Insisting that the Town of East Hampton, not to mention civilization itself, faces imminent climate chaos, four residents urged the town trustees on Monday night to look positively on the proposed South Fork Wind Farm as a means of curtailing the use of fossil fuels, but also to “consider the bigger picture and the larger cost to all of us” of climate change.

Cate Rogers, a representative of the Climate Reality Project, told the trustees that the daily emission of 110 million tons of heat-trapping fossil-fuel gases, which she likened to treating the atmosphere “like an open sewer,” was the primary cause of rising global temperatures. The trustees, who have jurisdiction over many of the town’s beaches, bottomlands, and waterways, may have a say in whether or not Deepwater Wind can run its proposed wind farm’s transmission cable beneath an ocean beach in Wainscott.

Sea level rise is an inevitable result of melting glaciers, but another consequence, warmer ocean temperatures, will cause both stronger and more frequent storms, along with dramatic changes to marine habitat. “That impacts our fishing industry,” said Ms. Rogers, who is also the chairwoman of the East Hampton Town Democratic Committee. 

The commercial fishing industry opposes the wind farm, and Ms. Rogers noted that some critics have called it an industrialization of the oceans. “I think that ship has sailed,” she said. “The offshore oil industry is thriving — another industrialized use of the ocean.” 

But, she said, the costs of solar, wind, and other renewable sources are falling and clean energy is becoming more accessible, providing the means to “create a safe, sustainable and prosperous future.” She supports the South Fork Wind Farm, “but my goal tonight is to bring climate change to the forefront,” Ms. Rogers said. “I’m asking you to please consider the bigger picture and the larger cost to all of us.”

Gordian Raacke, the executive director of Renewable Energy Long Island, spoke in starker terms. “We’ve heard about the impacts of climate change on sea level rise and the extreme weather events that we’re starting to witness,” he said, “and we hear about the impacts on oceans, whether it’s warming or acidification.” Now, he said, scientists have observed a slowing of the Gulf Stream. “If that is in fact happening, we are in pretty deep trouble.”

A 2017 study published in the journal Nature stated that the Gulf Stream is flowing at its slowest rate in at least 1,600 years, probably due to climate change. A shutdown in its circulation, the study’s authors wrote, would bring rapid sea level rise along the East Coast, among other impacts.

The year 2020 is crucial, according to another 2017 study published in Nature, this one co-authored by Christiana Figueres, the former executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, which helped shape the 2015 Paris Agreement in which 195 countries set the goal of holding an increase in global average temperatures to 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit. Should emissions continue to rise or even remain stable beyond that year, the goal would be almost unattainable, the authors wrote. 

“We have very little time left and we face a humongous, giant threat,” Mr. Raacke said, “and our solutions to this problem have to be commensurate in scale to the threat we’re facing. There is now a real sense of urgency, because we have waited far too long to act. We could have started this when scientists first told us that we need to begin to ramp down our carbon emissions, but we have done nothing, nothing that was able to bring that curve of annual emissions down.”

“We now have about a decade, some say just a few years left, to begin to bend this emissions curve down so that by mid-century we’ll . . . essentially decarbonize our entire economy,” he said.

Mr. Raacke suggested solar panels should be deployed “on every house that’s suitable for it, parking lots, everywhere else,” as well as improve energy efficiency in houses and lower peak energy demand. “But we also will need offshore wind,” he said. “If we fail to take dramatic action, tipping points and feedback loops will accelerate the melting of glaciers and ice sheets to a point of no return, to a point where all hope would be lost.” 

The trustees, he said, “bear an even greater burden on your shoulders, because we elected you to act on our behalf.” 

Christopher Carillo, the trustees’ attorney, asked that the speakers return in a few weeks to explain to the trustees how the South Fork Wind Farm can reverse the adverse impacts of climate change. Linda James, chairwoman of the town’s energy sustainability advisory committee, distributed a depiction of the committee’s recommended energy portfolio, which includes the aforementioned renewables as well as battery storage, green building practices, and community choice aggregation, and promised Mr. Carillo “a complete presentation of what this portfolio . . . can mean to our community, and how we, the trustees, and the town-appointed committees can work collaboratively to accomplish this.” 

Another speaker, Joan McGivern, took issue with assertions made by a member of the town board and a candidate for the board with respect to Deepwater Wind’s insistence that the town and trustees grant easements allowing it to land the wind farm’s transmission cable and route it to the Long Island Power Authority substation in East Hampton, before it submits its applications to federal and state agencies. 

Councilman Jeff Bragman has said that Deepwater Wind need not secure an easement before submitting applications, that in fact it would be unusual, according to the State Public Service Commission’s general counsel. In a letter in last week’s Star, David Gruber, a candidate for town board, agreed. 

“It is true that it’s rare to receive easement rights when you’re a public utility or a publicly regulated entity and you already have a right to use a public utility right of way,” Ms. McGivern, who is an attorney, said. “It is not rare when talking about a private applicant, like a non-utility applicant or a non-municipal applicant” [such as Deepwater Wind], “that doesn’t have access to public utility rights of way.”

Quoting from a legal analysis, “Siting Transmission Lines for New York Offshore Wind Projects,” from “Environmental Law in New York,” published one year ago, she said that “a private applicant must secure those rights from the pertinent municipality if it will require crossing or occupying municipal property.” It would be pointless, she said, for Deepwater Wind to undergo a years-long review process only to learn that it could not secure the rights to the transmission cable’s preferred route.

As long as it is determined not to have adverse environmental impacts, “Resolve to negotiate a deal so we can get on with getting the South Fork Wind Farm built,” she told the trustees. 

Also at the meeting, Rod Richardson, who was arrested last month for trespassing on Cartwright Shoal, a sand spit off Gardiner’s Island, urged the trustees to investigate the Goelet family trust’s claim of ownership, which he doubts. The purported owners’ security forces, he charged, wrongly intimidate and threaten anyone anchoring on the foreshore, and even harass paddleboarders on the water. Colonial-era documents, he said, prove that the spit, which is often submerged, is public property, and “marine patrol enforcement on this spit of land is a waste of public resources.” A letter from Mr. Richardson is in this issue of The Star. 

Several others in attendance at the meeting spoke in defense of Mr. Richardson.

The East Hampton Town Board collectively denounced the increase in takeoffs and landings at East Hampton Airport in a press release issued last Thursday, calling a 29-percent increase in helicopter flights between 2016 and last year a direct consequence of a federal Court of Appeals’ November 2016 ruling that the town could not independently enact the curfews and limits it had set the previous year. 

A mandatory curfew from 11 p.m. to 7 a.m., and one from 8 p.m. to 9 a.m. directed at aircraft, including helicopters, deemed noisy, were in effect from July 2015 until the court’s ruling. Complaints by East Hampton and Southampton Town residents living under flight paths to and from the airport have soared since then. 

According to statistics in an Aug. 8 report on last year’s airport operations by Councilwoman Sylvia Overby and Councilman Jeff Bragman, the board’s co-liaisons to the airport, the volume of takeoffs and landings was relatively stable from 2014 through 2016. But 2017 saw a 7-percent increase in operations over the previous year, or 27,546 operations versus 25,836. Operations are calculated by doubling the number of reported landings. 

In enacting its curfews, according to last Thursday’s release, the board had relied on written statements from the Federal Aviation Administration to then-Representative Tim Bishop stating that once federal grant assurances expired in 2014 the town, as the airport’s proprietor, was authorized to adopt noise restrictions. But due to the appeals court’s decision, East Hampton Town  must complete an analysis known as a Part 161 study in order to propose and enact noise or operational restrictions on aircraft. That process is ongoing. 

The board’s statement followed a communication from the Eastern Region Helicopter Council to its members stating that the southern route to the

airport was unavailable due to overcrowding of different aircraft types. That statement, which was inaccurate, nonetheless upset what had been a balance between southern and northern flight paths. But those paths are voluntary, Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc said last week, because the town has no authority to mandate them. 

At the board’s meeting at the Montauk Firehouse on Tuesday, Ms. Overby told her colleagues that “We’re looking for noise abatement maps to continue to be used so our constituents here, and those on the North Fork, get some relief during summer,” when airport operations are at a peak. 

Mr. Bragman suggested that the board summon Jeff Smith, chairman of the Eastern Region Helicopter Council, to speak to residents at a meeting of the board so that they are informed as to the council’s directives to its members with respect to the airport.

Responding to concerns from parents of children who swim at a small beach inside the mouth of Three Mile Harbor at Maidstone Park in Springs, the East Hampton Town Trustees erected sections of split-rail fencing last month to discourage trucks from backing down to the water’s edge. 

“Several moms were concerned about all the trucks backing up on the south side of ‘Baby Beach’ where the little ones wade in the shallow water,” said Brian Byrnes, a trustee. “Since we’ve done that, people are really pleased.” 

Mr. Byrnes acknowledged some opposition to the move from those considering it an encroachment on the public’s right to drive on the beach. “We were more concerned about the moms,” he said. 

Sections of fence are spaced apart, so vehicle access to the water’s edge remains. “It’s a small thing,” Mr. Byrnes said, “but it gets a little crazy there on nice weekends.”

The East Hampton Town Board announced yesterday that the town has maintained its top-tier AAA credit rating, as affirmed by Moody’s Investors Service. 

In preparation for yesterday’s sale of $16.5 million in general obligation bonds for the town, Moody’s affirmed that the town’s financial status continues to warrant the AAA rating it was awarded last year. 

The rating reflects confidence not only in the town’s present financial condition but also in its practices, according to a statement issued by the town. Moody’s cited East Hampton’s “conservative budgeting and proactive financial management practices” as well as its “modest debt burden” and “sizable tax base” as factors in the triple-A rating and positive outlook. The town has built reserves while lowering overall indebtedness, according to Moody’s. 

Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc said in yesterday’s statement that “it is very satisfying to have Moody’s acknowledge through our AAA rating the town’s strong financial position as well as the work we have been doing to maintain that strength. Our substantial financial reserves and surplus were particularly noted by Moody’s as factors that have allowed us to maintain the highest rating possible.” The town will strive to maintain those reserves at levels expected for a triple-A credit, he said. 

The bonds being sold are to finance projects including a townwide upgrade to its emergency communications system, a new records management system, a new fuel facility at East Hampton Airport, and structural improvements to the Y.M.C.A. East Hampton RECenter.

Health Care Workers for Gershon

In New York’s First Congressional District, 1199SEIU United Healthcare Workers East has announced its endorsement of Perry Gershon.

“Our union is dedicated to the ideals that make it possible for every working person to create the life they envision for themselves and their family,” Gabby Seay, 1199SEIU’s political director, said in a statement issued last week. “We believe Perry will fight to protect family-sustaining jobs, expand access to quality health care, and serve as a true advocate for working people.”

“We must reaffirm the importance of unions to our communities by taking action on behalf of workers,” Mr. Gershon said in the same statement. “Income inequality, the lack of well-paying jobs, the lack of affordable health care, are all symptoms of a much greater problem in our country: People have forgotten that the fundamental right to assembly is the source of greatness in our country. When the American people unite, organize, and act as one collective, there is nothing that can hold us back from continuing to be the greatest nation in the world.”

—

C.S.E.A. Backs Thiele

The Civil Service Employees Association has endorsed State Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr. in his 2018 re-election bid. Mr. Thiele is a member of the Independence Party. 

Mr. Thiele expressed appreciation for the endorsement in a statement last Thursday and praised unions as “the backbone of this country. They established a foundation for job security and economic stability for all working people. I support, and will continue to fight for, the right of every person to have access to good jobs, good benefits, and fair wages, as they are fundamental to achieving a sustainable standard of living.”

Mr. Thiele will not face a primary challenger. Election Day is Nov. 6.

Mr. Thiele also picked up an endorsement from the New York State United Teachers, a federation of more than 1,200 local unions representing people who work in, or are retired from, New York’s schools, colleges, and health care facilities. It is affiliated with the American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association, as well as the AFL-CIO and Education International, with more than 20 million members worldwide.

Candidates who earned NYSUT’s endorsement “showed through their advocacy, their accessibility, and their strong pro-education, pro-labor voting records that they are true friends of public education, organized labor, and working people,” Andy Pallota, NYSUT’s president, said in a statement. “They have demonstrated a willingness to stand shoulder to shoulder with educators to fight for better public schools, colleges and hospitals. We are proud to support them.”

A mosquito collected in East Hampton has tested positive for West Nile virus, according to James Tomarken, the commissioner of the Suffolk County Department of Health Services, who made the announcement on Friday. 

The East Hampton mosquito was the first found to be infected here this year and one of 12 taken from July 23 through 29 to test positive. So far this year 35 infected mosquitoes have been collected across the county. To date, no human cases have been reported.

West Nile virus, first detected in birds and mosquitoes in Suffolk County in 1999 and each year thereafter, is transmitted to humans by the bite of an infected mosquito. 

“The confirmation of West Nile virus in mosquito samples or birds indicates the presence of West Nile virus in the area,” Dr. Tomarken said in a statement on Friday. “While there is no cause for alarm, we advise residents to cooperate with us in our efforts to reduce the exposure to the virus, which can be debilitating to humans.” 

To keep mosquitoes from laying eggs inside and outside of residences and thereby reduce the possibility of mosquito bites, residents have been advised that at least once a week they should empty and scrub, turn over, cover, or throw out containers that hold water, such as vases, pets’ water bowls, flower pot saucers, discarded tires, buckets, pool covers, birdbaths, trash cans, and rain barrels.

To avoid the possibility of mosquito bites, residents have been advised to minimize outdoor activities between dusk and dawn; wear shoes and socks, long pants, and long-sleeve shirts when mosquitoes are active; use mosquito repellent, following label directions carefully, and make sure all windows and doors have screens in good repair. Individuals most at risk, particularly those who are 50 or older or have compromised immune systems, have been urged to take extra precautions.

Most people infected with West Nile will experience mild or no symptoms, but some can develop severe symptoms, including high fever, headache, neck stiffness, stupor, disorientation, coma, tremors, convulsions, muscle weakness, vision loss, numbness, and paralysis. The symptoms may last several weeks and have neurological effects that may be permanent. 

The county announcement warned that dead birds might indicate the presence of West Nile virus. To report dead birds, the public has been asked to call the county’s public health information line at 631-852-5999 between 9 a.m. and 4 p.m., Monday through Friday. Residents also have been encouraged to take a photograph of any dead bird.

The county applies methoprene, a mosquito larvicide, and Bti, a biological agent, over marsh areas on Napeague and Beach Hampton, in Amagansett, as well as at Accabonac Harbor. Methoprene’s use is controversial, however; while county officials have long insisted it is not harmful to nontarget species, others disagree. 

In an effort to reduce methoprene’s use, the East Hampton Town Trustees and the Nature Conservancy launched a pilot program to quantify mosquito larvae at Accabonac Harbor this year. The county decides whether or not to apply methoprene based on those results. 

The program should continue despite the appearance of a West Nile-infected mosquito in East Hampton, said Nicole Maher, a senior coastal scientist with the Nature Conservancy. “It doesn’t change our program, it just makes it more important that we collect this real-time and spatially important data on mosquito breeding,” Dr. Maher said. “The collaboration between the Nature Conservancy, vector control, and the trustees has been a really positive experience so far, reducing the number of times that vector control needed to spray, reducing the number of areas they needed to spray, and increasing trust and transparency among the various stakeholders.”

Susan McGraw Keber, a trustee who participates in the weekly sampling, agreed. “My goal as a trustee and resident . . . is to eradicate all spraying of methoprene,” she said yesterday. “That’s why I got involved in this. Accabonac and water is very precious. I feel a sense of duty to stop chemicals in our waters.”

To report mosquito problems or stagnant pools of water that residents cannot remediate themselves, they have been asked to call the Department of Public Works Vector Control Division at 631-852-4270. A county informational brochure, “Get the Buzz on Mosquito Protection,” is available in English and Spanish at suffolkcountyny.gov.

Increased traffic to and from East Hampton Airport, coupled with a communication to helicopter pilots stating that the southern route to the airport was unavailable, has brought frustrated East Hampton and Southampton Town residents to a boiling point, and on Tuesday several of the latter pleaded with the East Hampton Town Board to do something about it. 

The town board issued a release on Friday quoting a statement from the previous day by Robinson Aviation, which controls air traffic by contract with the town. “There have been no official cancellations of any routes,” according to Keren Williams McLendon, Robinson’s chief executive officer, “including the Sierra route,” the southern approach to the airport. “The Sierra route continues to be utilized upon request if there is not a traffic conflict.”

But that message conflicted with one previously issued by the Eastern Region Helicopter Council to its members “stating that Sierra would no longer be available, which is an unfortunate communication,” Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc said on Tuesday. “My office didn’t find out about that until after the fact. I think some of the fact that there’s still reduced traffic” on the Sierra route “is the result of those members of Eastern Region Helicopter maybe not knowing that it is available to them.”

The Eastern Region Helicopter Council’s communication to pilots was that “there was a lot of overcrowding of different aircraft types — fixed-wing, helicopter, jets — and the tower chief was concerned they needed not to be intermingled” on the southern route, Deputy Supervisor Sylvia Overby, the board’s co-liaison to the airport, said yesterday. 

That statement upset what had been, until the weekend of July 21 and 22, a balance between use of the Sierra and “November,” or northern, pathways to the airport, which the Eastern Region Helicopter Council had previously encouraged through its Fly Neighborly program. 

The town’s contract with Robinson Aviation includes an understanding that noise abatement routes are followed, Ms. Overby said. “Robinson put out a statement saying they will be followed,” she said. But a pilot must request the Sierra route in order to use it, according to the statement from Robinson Aviation. 

The flight paths are voluntary, Mr. Van Scoyoc said, “because the town has no authority to mandate them. That can only be done by the F.A.A.,” the Federal Aviation Administration. “The town has not changed any of the official noise abatement routes. . . . Our goal has always been to spread Robinson Aviation traffic within those routes equitably and evenly. If you looked at the airport noise abatement routes for both of the weekends around the Fourth of July . . . you will see that there was a fair and equitable distribution.” 

That statement was made in response to a “tale of woe” told by Patricia Curry of Noyac, who told the board that her community “has been abused by East Hampton Airport operations for over two decades.” Redirecting of airport traffic over communities north and west of the airport, she said, was a decision likely “made behind closed doors at Town Hall.” East Hampton’s oceanfront and estate areas, she charged, were being shielded from aircraft noise at those communities’ expense, and North Sea, Sag Harbor, North Haven, Shelter Island, Bridgehampton, Wainscott, Northwest Woods, and the North Fork were also negatively impacted. “There’s very little traffic on the South Shore, and there’s not much traffic over Southampton that is not going inland,” she said. 

“For years now, homeowners in our area have suffered the deterioration of our quality of life resulting from the dramatic increase, year by year, in fixed-wing aircraft and helicopters flying in and out of” East Hampton Airport, William Reilly, also of Noyac, told the board. The Sierra route had provided some relief to communities “because it has lessened the impact to some degree on any one area,” he said. “At the same time, though, the number of seaplanes and small planes flying low over Noyac has increased dramatically.” 

Directing all helicopter traffic to northerly flight paths presented a dangerous condition, Mr. Reilly said. “The risk of helicopters, seaplanes, jets, and small fixed-wing aircraft already jockeying for space over our community is absurd.” He implored the board to “make consistent, sincere efforts to bring an end to this insanity.” 

Gene Polito, also of Noyac, echoed his neighbors. “There is no upside to aviation except quickness,” he said. “From every other point of view it’s a damaging technology. For the environment, for human beings, for animals, it impacts everything negatively. . . . You own the airport,” he said. “Get creative. Be forceful. Do something. These are dangerous conditions. You should have some kind of grounds upon which to base some kind of action to get some kind of result. You’re the proprietors.”

The town board successfully enacted curfews that were in effect for the better part of two summers, Mr. Van Scoyoc said. In 2016, however, a federal appeals court ruled that the town could not independently enact use restrictions. Instead, it must follow the federal Airport Noise and Capacity Act and seek federal approval. 

That decision prompted the town to launch an analysis known as a Part 161 study, which airport owners must perform when proposing local noise or operational restrictions on aircraft. The process is ongoing, Ms. Overby said yesterday. “It’s unfortunate that the court sent us back to do this,” she said. “I continue to be frustrated by how it all transpired.” 

“I know Patricia is frustrated,” she said of Ms. Curry. “I can understand it. I’m frustrated as well . . . that we have not had help necessary on the federal level to control our own airport.”