The Southampton Town Board voted unanimously on July 10 to approve the purchase of 1.25 acres in Sag Harbor Village that will become the site of the proposed John Steinbeck Waterfront Park.

The parcels of land that the town is acquiring for $10.5 million with the use of community preservation fund money include 1, 3, and 5 Ferry Road, on the Sag Harbor side of the bridge that leads to North Haven. For more than a decade, they have been blighted with abandoned buildings.

In May, the town announced that it had struck a deal to buy the properties from Jay Bialsky, a real estate developer who had recently acquired them. Earlier this year, Mr. Bialsky purchased the lots, as well as 2 West Water Street, better known as the 1-800-Lawyer residence, from Greystone Property Development, a Manhattan real estate company that initially had planned to use the land to build a complex of condominiums.

Now that the town has purchased the land on the village's behalf, Sag Harbor can move forward with its plan to create a public park that will be linked by land and water to Windmill Park and Long Wharf and will feature a beach area, a fishing and small boat pier, and a pedestrian walkway.

"The creation of Steinbeck Park will honor the history of Sag Harbor and enhance access to the waterfront for all residents and visitors," Southampton Town Supervisor Jay Schneiderman said in a prepared statement.

According to the announcement released by the town, the agreement with Mr. Bialsky stipulates that he must remove the dilapidated buildings and that "the land must be vacant, cleared, and ready to turn into a park."

Sag Harbor Mayor Sandra Schroeder informed the town board last week that the village hoped to begin work on the park early next year. 

The East Hampton Town Board is expected to narrowly vote in favor of granting an easement allowing Deepwater Wind to bury a transmission cable from its proposed South Fork Wind Farm on a path from Wainscott to a Long Island Power Authority substation off Cove Hollow Road in East Hampton. 

An affirmative vote, which could come at the board’s meeting tonight, has been long awaited by Deepwater Wind, whose officials say they must have it before submitting applications to federal and state permitting agencies. But Councilman Jeffrey Bragman, in arguing against granting an easement at this time, told his colleagues that that assertion is unsupported by the facts, and that they should not feel pressured to grant the easement.  

One by one, the five members of the board laid out a rationale for or against an easement when they met on Tuesday. While they expressed unanimous support for the concept of offshore wind, Mr. Bragman and Councilman David Lys said that Deepwater Wind has not been forthcoming with respect to several components of the project, particularly protection of fisheries and the livelihood of those who make their living on the water. 

But for Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc, Councilwoman Sylvia Overby, and Councilwoman Kathee Burke-Gonzalez, the transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources to combat climate change is too urgent to delay. “Later,” Ms. Overby said, “is too late.” 

Local review of the proposed 15-turbine installation is “very, very limited,” Michael Sendlenski, the town’s lead attorney, told the board, but because Deepwater Wind wants to route the transmission cable under town-owned roadways, “only the town board, because of our property interest, our ownership of those roadways, has the ability to grant them an easement to go underneath those.” At issue before the board, he said, is “whether or not to grant that property interest right and easement under town roads, because we are pre-empted pursuant to the Article VII proceeding” — a review process under the state public service law covering applications to construct and operate a major electric transmission facility — “from taking on anything else.” 

Article VII requires a review of the need for, and environmental impact of, the siting, design, construction, and operation of such facilities. Mr. Sendlenski suggested that the town file for Article VII intervener status with the State Public Service Commission, something the town trustees, who may have jurisdiction over the ocean beach in Wainscott at which Deepwater Wind wants to land the transmission cable, have indicated they will do. 

Marguerite Wolffsohn, the town’s director of planning, detailed Deepwater Wind’s proposed community benefits package, an $8.45 million commitment to fund sustainability programs and infrastructure improvements in exchange for the easement, and summarized the 107 written comments received from the public following a May 17 joint hearing with the trustees, at which 49 people had spoken for or against the wind farm. 

Should the board deny Deepwater Wind’s easement request, the company’s officials have indicated that they will seek to bypass it by landing the transmission cable on state-owned land at Napeague. But should the town accept the community benefits package, Deepwater Wind would not object to the town’s intervening in an Article VII review, said Joanne Pilgrim, executive assistant to Mr. Van Scoyoc. 

“I still don’t feel this has been as complete an application as I’d like to see,” Mr. Lys said, while acknowledging that the effects of climate change — including sea level rise and the frequency and intensity of storms — are serious. He pointed to decisions he made while serving on the town’s zoning board of appeals to demonstrate his support for renewable energy, but said that mitigation plans should be in place to protect commercial fishermen, not only from loss of fishing gear but from diminished or eliminated catches due to unintended consequences of the wind farm. (Many opponents of the wind farm assert that the electromagnetic frequency emanating from the transmission cable may alter fish migration patterns, for example.)

Mr. Lys said that he has asked Deepwater Wind multiple times for such a plan, to be led by a third-party arbitrator. “This plan, in my opinion, would have multiple layers of continual research, not just for fisheries stocks, but information on landings.” Offshore wind “may be inevitable,” he said, and while he is in favor of the project, “not this application and community benefits package.” 

“There seems to be an ominous silence from three members of the board,” Mr. Bragman said when Mr. Lys had finished speaking. A litany of reasons for voting against the granting of rights to Deepwater Wind followed, as he complained of “sporadic” presentations “and recitations of how well they managed other projects.” 

“I’ve heard Deepwater Wind repeatedly claim . . . that they have to have us grant this right to begin their Article VII review,” Mr. Bragman said. “That is not an accurate statement. . . . They do not have to have us grant them this easement.” The company has been pressuring the board, he said. “I am uncomfortable that Deepwater Wind took that position and didn’t adequately explain it.” 

Turning to his colleagues, he asked why they would even consider executing an “essentially permanent” real estate right before participating in an Article VII review. “Why are we committing ourselves before we do the environmental review? Once you’ve committed, you’ve given up a lot of your leverage. How much attention are they going to pay you when they can say the municipality is on board for the route?” 

He is uneasy about accepting the community benefits package “before we begin, because it suggests it has something to do with the interest of getting this approved more quickly,” he said.  

Moreover, he said, the wind farm is likely to produce more electricity in the winter months, when demand for electricity on the South Fork is low. “Our demand curve and supply curve are working in opposite seasons,” he said, and would encourage the construction of new fossil fuel-fired plants given the intermittent nature of wind power. 

“I support wind power,” he said. “I also support a deliberative environmental review. My vote in this instance: Do not give this easement right. . . . Get active, hire experts to participate in Article VII. It does not come down to wind or fossil fuel.” 

But “every megawatt generated in a clean and renewable way is one we don’t have to get from fossil fuel,” Mr. Van Scoyoc said. True, the cost of wind power is predicted to fall precipitously in the coming years, he said, just as the cost of flat-screen televisions did. “Does that mean we should wait? If everybody should take that approach — wait until costs come down — costs would never come down.”

The town can attach conditions to the granting of an easement, the supervisor said, “that would protect the town’s interests and retain leverage over the process. I fully believe the town should be the intervener, that we should go through the process supporting our fisheries and fisher-people in the town who have economic interests.” He is confident that further review by credentialed scientists and third parties through the Public Service Commission and the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management will mitigate any concerns, he said. 

“Given present conditions here, with severe storms coming much more frequently, our coastlines being threatened, our quality of life at risk from outside impacts . . . we have to make a transition,” he said. “I think that the right approach would be to go forward with granting those easements with very strong language and retaining rights, and leaving them very much contingent” on thorough environmental review. 

“From my perspective,” Ms. Burke-Gonzalez said, “there are real consequences to doing nothing, among them hotter temperatures, stronger and more frequent storms, and rising seas.” Granting the easement, and filing for Article VII intervener status “is going to offer us a meaningful opportunity for additional comment and mitigation,” she said. 

Ms. Overby, the board’s liaison to the town’s energy sustainability advisory committee, said that solar power alone could not meet the town’s energy needs, as some of the wind farm’s opponents have suggested. “Reducing energy consumption, producing energy from renewable sources is needed now. Now is the time for leadership. It cannot be put off until later.”

However, she said, “Addressing and preserving the fishing industry must go hand in hand with our offshore wind power.” At least 25 percent of the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere goes into the ocean, causing its acidification, she said. “Because of the ocean acidification, food and jobs are profoundly affected.” 

“Fishing is our sustainable industry here in East Hampton,” and the community benefits package would aid that sustainability, Ms. Overby said. “It’s necessary to do it now,” she said of the wind farm.

It appears that there will be at least one primary election for a seat on the East Hampton Town Board on Sept. 13. 

The East Hampton Reform Demo­crats, which its candidate for town board described as a caucus within the town’s Democratic Party, announced on Monday that it has filed sufficient designating petitions with the Suffolk County Board of Elections to put David Gruber on the Democratic primary ballot.

Barring any successful challenge to a petition, Mr. Gruber will face off against David Lys, who was appointed to the town board in January to fill the seat vacated when Peter Van Scoyoc became supervisor. 

Republicans, meanwhile, have nominated Manny Vilar, who ran for town supervisor last year on the Republican and Conservative tickets, to run for a seat on the town board. And the East Hampton Independence Party announced on Saturday that it had filed sufficient designating petitions to put Mr. Gruber on its ballot.

The East Hampton Town Democratic Committee chose Mr. Lys as its candidate last month over the objection of a sizable minority of its members. 

Not long after, Mr. Gruber, a former chairman of the committee and its 2001 candidate for supervisor, launched the East Hampton Reform Democrats and declared his candidacy for a seat on the town board. He serves on the town’s airport management advisory committee, was a founder of the Hayground School in Bridgehampton, and was a co-founder, with the actor Alec Baldwin, of the East Hampton Conservators.

Mr. Lys has changed his party registration from Republican to Democratic, but a statement issued by the Reform Democrats says that as he is not yet technically an enrolled Democrat, “he required special permission from the Suffolk County Democratic Committee,” known as a Wilson-Pakula certificate, in order to appear on the Democratic Party ballot. 

For its part, the East Hampton Town Democratic Committee issued a statement on Saturday criticizing Mr. Gruber’s actions and accusing him of filing petitions for a slate of candidates for the committee “apparently in retaliation against those who did not vote for him” for the party’s nomination for councilman. The statement described Mr. Gruber as “a hedge fund manager and previously unsuccessful candidate for supervisor” who “recently returned to East Hampton having lived in Paris and New York for the past 14 years.” The statement quotes Mr. Van Scoyoc, former Supervisor Larry Cantwell, and former Supervisor Judith Hope as supporting Cate Rogers, who was elected chairwoman of the Democratic Committee last month, and opposing Mr. Gruber’s candidacy. 

As for the Independence Party, Elaine Jones, its chairwoman, said in a statement on Saturday that her party “came away convinced” that Mr. Gruber “is far better equipped” than Mr. Lys “to achieve what our members want — clean healthy water, job opportunities for young people, affordable housing for seniors, working families, and especially young adults who grew up here and don’t want to be forced to leave.” She also cited protection of the commercial fishing industry against perceived threats posed by the proposed South Fork Wind Farm, and of the laws governing the community preservation fund, in supporting Mr. Gruber.

Amos Goodman, chairman of the East Hampton Town Republican Committee, was quick to criticize Mr. Gruber on Tuesday, calling him “a strident and stubborn throwback to yesterday” who “will deliver nothing but more partisanship and less competence. Our town government can little afford that type of backwards vision for the future,” he said in a statement. 

Lisa Mulhern Larsen, who ran unsuccessfully for a seat on the town board in 2015, had considered a run on the Independence Party line but decided against it last weekend, according to the Republicans’ release. She could not be reached for comment.

According to the release, Ms. Larsen has endorsed Mr. Vilar, the founding president of the Police Benevolent Association of New York State and a first sergeant with the New York State Parks Police. 

While the Democratic factions’ feud plays out publicly, Mr. Vilar took a conciliatory approach to the campaign. “I commend everybody that ever runs for office,” he said. “It’s a good thing they’re invested in their community, throwing their hat in the ring. Everybody involved has the best intentions at heart. They’re all good people. I look forward to moving the ball forward. I look at every campaign as an opportunity to bring issues to light and give our community a voice.” 

He criticized the proposed South Fork Wind Farm as “an industrialization of our oceans for profit” that would put commercial fishing at risk, and said that the town board has fallen short on work-force housing, remediation of the aging and failing septic systems that are compromising the health of the town’s waterways, and stabilization of the ocean beach in downtown Montauk. “The airport,” he said, “is still a mess. Nothing has been worked out. Everybody keeps pointing the finger at someone else, I don’t see anybody rolling up their sleeves. . . . The airport is a vital part of our economy and necessary in case of natural disaster, but we’ve got to try and reach a happy ground.” 

Mr. Vilar spoke of a “long and well-established track record” of bipartisanship. “I’m looking forward to getting on the town board, making friends and allies, and working with everybody to push the ball forward. I’m not under any pressure by any party, anywhere. I truly am Switzerland.”

The winner of the election will serve only the final year of Mr. Van Scoyoc’s term, and will have to stand for election in 2019, should he or she seek to hold the seat.

A long-awaited effort to alleviate traffic by adding Long Island Rail Road service between Speonk and Montauk in the morning and afternoon is to begin late in the winter of 2019, officials confirmed on Tuesday. 

Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr. was on hand at the East Hampton Town Board’s meeting on Tuesday when Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc announced that the railroad has agreed to increase commuter service to the South Fork by adding two eastbound trains in the morning and three westbound in the afternoon. 

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. Mr. Thiele and State Senator Kenneth P. LaValle helped to secure $500,000 to fund shuttle services. 

A pilot program of additional trains was conducted in 2007, Mr. Van Scoyoc said, when County Road 39 in Southampton was being widened. “Capacity was eaten up pretty quickly” on the road, he said, but the “limited experiment was pretty successful.” Expanded rail service “is not going to replace the automobile,” he said, but is intended to “mitigate some issues we suffer from traffic.” 

Expansion of rail service is limited by the single-track system on the South Fork, he said, but whatever can be done will help to reduce carbon-dioxide emissions by shrinking the “trade parade” of workers contributing to heavy traffic year round. 

“Having train service is great,” Mr. Thiele said, but “you have to get people the last mile . . . from the train station to their place of work.” The Towns of East Hampton and Southampton will be expected to jointly match the $500,000 in funding for the shuttle service, he said. 

“This is where we turn it over to Southampton and East Hampton Towns to come up with a solution of how they want to provide last mile service,” Mr. Thiele said, adding that the towns must work together to administer that component. The next step, he said, is to devise and submit a request for proposals for shuttle service, as well as a marketing plan to alert the public.

Much of the housing stock on the South Fork is second homes, JoAnne Pawhul, a town planner, told the board, and real estate costs have skyrocketed, driving many former residents westward and resulting in heavy truck volume. Being stuck in traffic impacts quality of life, she said, and town businesses are facing staffing shortages. The same is true in Southampton, she said. 

When the new shuttle schedule is implemented, there will not be westbound service on Friday afternoons during the summer, Ms. Pawhul said, due to the eastbound “Cannonball” train from Manhattan. To make up for that, the request for proposals will include a Montauk-to-Speonk bus. 

The added trains’ schedules are in draft form and subject to change, but the L.I.R.R. has committed to the pilot program, which is to be assessed after a year. 

A single fare for the train and shuttle is tentatively set at $4.25 each way, based on the $3.25 fare within the zone encompassing Westhampton and Montauk — Speonk will be brought into the zone, Ms. Pawhul said — plus $1 for the shuttle. 

“We expect we will be using a variety of service types” for shuttle service, she said. In Montauk, that could include taxi services that feature vans among their fleets. “There may be different types of vehicles and options that fit different needs of different stations,” she said. 

Southampton is to issue the request for proposals, and the town has set a goal of approving the language of the request by the middle of next month, she said. The towns would request that bids be returned by mid-October, and would award contracts by December. 

Employers will be encouraged to be flexible with work schedules to accommodate employees’ use of public transportation, Ms. Pawhul said. 

“This isn’t going to solve the traffic issue,” Mr. Thiele said, “but success here will lead to even greater improvements in public transportation that can yield a system that people will be able to commute to work here by ways other than County Road 39.”

The East Hampton Town Board voted narrowly last Thursday to support the granting of an access and utility easement to Deepwater Wind that would allow the Rhode Island company to route a transmission cable from its proposed South Fork Wind Farm from the ocean beach in Wainscott to a Long Island Power Authority substation near Cove Hollow Road in East Hampton.

The decision came at the conclusion of a contentious, nearly three-hour discussion in which members of the public argued passionately for immediate action or a delay to review the matter.

In the resolution, passed by a 3-to-2 vote, the board also voted to hire John Wagner of the Long Island law firm Certilman Balin Adler & Hyman L.L.P., to serve as outside counsel to the town attorney’s office for all issues relating to the project. Mr. Wagner will be charged with drafting and negotiating the grant of access and utility easement and the $8.45 million community benefits package that Deepwater Wind has offered the town to fund sustainability programs and infrastructure improvements in exchange for the easement. He will also oversee proceedings pursuant to Article VII — a review process under the state public service law covering applications to construct and operate a major electric transmission facility — and proceedings before the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management and other regulatory and environmental review agencies.

Despite its support of the easement, the board fell short of actually granting it. According to the resolution, “once the grant of access and utility easement, lease, and community benefits package agreements are drafted and in final form, they will be made publicly available and the Town Board will review the same and give them due consideration.” The board needs “legal language to actually execute those agreements,” Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc explained. “We believe hiring outside counsel to develop that document for us . . . to preserve our interests . . . is necessary before we actually take a vote to sign the agreement.”

A statement by Jeff Grybowski, Deepwater Wind’s chief executive officer, was issued early on Friday. “The East Hampton Town Board’s support for the South Fork Wind Farm proves yet again that they are true champions of the environment and clean energy,” he said, and that it is moving toward its goal, announced in 2014, to achieve 100 percent of the town’s energy needs via renewable sources. “We’re ready to fulfill our promise to bring more than $8 million in community benefits to East Hampton from New York’s first offshore wind farm, and to deliver a project that reflects extensive input from local stakeholders.”

The board’s 3-2 vote was expected, based on the discussion at its July 17 meeting. Mr. Van Scoyoc and Councilwomen Sylvia Overby and Kathee Burke-Gonzalez voted in favor; Councilmen Jeff Bragman and David Lys were opposed.

The vote supporting the easement survived a last-minute effort by Mr. Lys to amend the resolution, eliminating the language about granting of an easement and retaining solely outside counsel.

As he had at the board’s July 17 meeting, Mr. Bragman protested the timing of the resolution. The company has long stated that it had to secure an easement before submitting applications to federal and state permitting agencies to construct the 15-turbine installation approximately 30 miles off Montauk. In fact, Mr. Bragman told his colleagues at the July 17 meeting, the public service commission’s general counsel had confirmed to him that it is “very rare” that an applicant has deeded property rights at the time of a submission. “I am uncomfortable that Deepwater Wind took that position,” he said on July 17, “and didn’t adequately explain it.” Later, he said, “They kind of softened their position.”

A majority of the board, he said last Thursday, argues that granting the easement is the best way to maintain a level of control over the project, “which I really think means that’s the best way to get the money for these projects that seem to be so attractive,” referring to the community benefits package. “But it also means that the town recognizes there are serious and substantial issues with the project that must be addressed and mitigated through the Article VII review.” He could not support the resolution, he said, “because it essentially requires the town to give the easement first and do the environmental review second.”

Mr. Van Scoyoc disagreed. The language of the easement, he said, “would be conditioned upon thorough review of the public service commission and a finding of environmental appropriateness.” He said that Mr. Bragman had agreed at Tuesday’s meeting that “that was the best place to vet this project for its environmental impacts, and the town was not capable or well suited to make those determinations on the project, and that fell to the public service commission” and other agencies, including the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management and the State Department of Environmental Conservation, to fully review any environmental impacts of the wind farm.

“I think your explanation sounds more compromising than the actual language of the resolution,” Mr. Bragman said, “because you’re going to engage lawyers on both sides and hammer out an agreement, and then tack a condition on at the end.”

Again, Mr. Van Scoyoc disagreed. “I’m confident that the best way to proceed is represented well in the first resolution,” he said. Mr. Bragman repeated his assertion that the supervisor was motivated by the community benefits package.

That discussion followed members of the public issuing urgent calls to action or pleas to allow study of potential adverse impacts. Cate Rogers referred to the Nobel Prize-winning scientist Henry Pollack, who co-authored a report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and authored “A World Without Ice.” Postponing action, she said, “is an implicit endorsement of the status quo” and “often an excuse for maintaining it. . . . Waiting for uncertainties to disappear is not a feasible option.”

Gordian Raacke, executive director of Renewable Energy Long Island and a former member of the town’s energy sustainability advisory committee, said that he had coauthored a 1999 Pace University study that had recommended a study of offshore wind. If the South Fork Wind Farm becomes operational in 2022 as planned, it will be 23 years after that study. “Nature has set us a deadline,” he said. “Ignoring nature’s deadline is not an option when it comes to these things. I encourage you to move forward swiftly for the sake of this community and future generations.”

Don Matheson said that Antarctica is melting three times faster than it was in 2007. If all of its ice were to melt, sea level would rise by 200 feet — and that would be the least of civilization’s problems, he said, pointing to mass migration from places that will become uninhabitable due to heat. As a place visited by “decision makers from all over the world,” East Hampton should serve as an example, he said, by embracing offshore wind and abandoning fossil fuel-derived energy.

But Bonnie Brady, executive director of the Long Island Commercial Fishing Association, and Julie Evans, who serves as liaison to Deepwater Wind for the town’s fisheries advisory committee, said that the developer has not been an honest partner in its outreach to the town, and repeated a call for a $30,000 budget to devise a framework for compensation should the wind farm interrupt commercial fishing activity, or worse.

Simon Kinsella, who has addressed the board repeatedly to oppose the South Fork Wind Farm, asked that the board seek outside counsel in an effort to compel Deepwater Wind to reveal details about the cost of its electricity to LIPA ratepayers, about which it has been reticent. “No contract should be entered into without first knowing the price,” he said.

David Gruber, who plans a primary challenge to Mr. Lys for his seat on the town board in September, said that the board is “deciding to do a real estate deal for money cloaked with the virtue of sustainable energy.” Deepwater Wind does not need the easement in order to proceed with its permit applications, he said, and the board is acting without an understanding of the implications. Board members, he charged, know nothing about fisheries or statistical analysis “because you deliberately choose not to know.”

“It’s remarkable that you know what we do and do not know,” Mr. Van Scoyoc replied. “It’s a pretty broad statement. It takes a lot of gusto to make that comment, but go for it.”

John Mullen, a part-time resident of Springs who was born in New Orleans, made the evening’s most dramatic pronouncement about climate change. In the 23 years he has resided here, he has measured nearly three inches of sea level rise, he said. “Ice is melting, air is warming, seas are rising,” he said. The hurricanes experienced in the Northeast are “nothing” compared to Katrina, which killed at least 1,245 people in 2005, and Camille, which flattened nearly everything along the Mississippi coast in 1969.

“Temperature back then in the Gulf is similar to what you’re starting to get here,” Mr. Mullen said. “It’s coming, folks, it’s coming.”

This article has been updated with the version that appeared in the July 26 print edition.  

Suffolk County

Oyster Farm Decision

At the Suffolk County Legislature’s July 17 meeting, Legislator Bridget Fleming secured authorization to include 52 underwater parcels in Gardiner’s Bay in certified agricultural districts for lease to oyster farmers under the county’s aquaculture program. The inclusion of the parcels is a compromise arrived at after the Legislature’s environment, planning, and agriculture committee heard from recreational boaters and oyster farmers. 

The 52 parcels were among 390 originally proposed for leases, totaling approximately 26,000 acres, that are already in existing and certified Agricultural Districts 1, 5, and 7. 

Inclusion within a certified agricultural district allows the property to receive benefits and protections under the state’s Agriculture and Markets Law. The measure will not affect a 10-year review of the county’s aquaculture program, which is about to commence.

“After many weeks of meetings and conversations with different groups, I am glad to have been able to find a common-sense compromise to this challenging issue,” Ms. Fleming said in a statement. “With the battle against nitrogen pollution and brown tide a top priority, it’s critically important that we encourage oyster cultivation, as oysters are filter feeders and reduce nitrogen in our bays, creeks, and harbors. In addition, the restoration of our once-booming shellfish industry is an important economic goal. At the same time, millions of recreational boaters enjoy our stunning waterways, helping to drive the economy and to make the East End the special place it is. Their concerns regarding safe navigation must be considered.”

Members of the Devon Yacht Club in Amagansett and residents who live along Gardiner’s Bay had complained that the seascape would be changed by the appearance of 10-acre oyster farms offshore. Early this year, an attorney for the club filed a lawsuit in State Supreme Court seeking to bar leaseholders of underwater parcels near the club from undertaking or continuing any action related to oyster farming or engaging in any other activity that would interfere with sailing. 

Septic Awareness

The Suffolk County Legislature’s septic nitrogen awareness outreach campaign is planning to initiate a program to educate property owners about septic discharge and how it affects surface waters and aquifers. 

Concerned Citizens of Montauk, Citizens Campaign for the Environment, and Group for the East End will work collaboratively with the Legislature. C.C.O.M. has agreed to match the county’s $112,000 for the project, which will begin within the next year and is to be completed within three years. In a statement, Laura Tooman, C.C.O.M.’s president, said: “C.C.O.M. looks forward to working with Suffolk County.” In the same statement, Legislator Bridget Fleming said, “Partnering with local not-for-profits on common goals like we are here is just another example of good government in action.”

Tick Contest 

The winners of Suffolk County’s 2018 tick safety poster contest were honored on July 17 at a meeting of the Legislature. The grand prizewinner, Annika Pasquale, received a joint proclamation from Legislators Bridget Fleming and Al Krupski, and the third division winner, Berlin Pasquale, received a certificate from Ms. Fleming. In addition, April Nil-Boitano, from Tick-Wise Education, who helped organize the contest, accepted a certificate for East End Tick and Mosquito Control, one of the contest’s sponsors. 

“Prevention is key in avoiding tick-borne illnesses,” Ms. Fleming said in a statement. “That’s what makes prevention, and education about prevention techniques, so important.” 

New York State

To Improve Roads and Crosswalks

Several East End crosswalks will receive improvements as part of a $62 million state program to enhance pedestrian safety, according to a recent announcement from State Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr. The initiative involves engineering work as well as education and law enforcement campaigns.

A $7.5 million project is underway to improve safety at 236 locations on Long Island, including 23 uncontrolled crosswalks in the Towns of East Hampton and Southampton and 7 in Sag Harbor Village and North Haven Village. The Sag Harbor Village locations include three intersections with Division Street, at Love Lane, Burke Street, and Bay Street. On North Haven a section of Ferry Road in front of Village Hall will also be improved. The work is expected to be completed next summer. 

Several segments of Montauk Highway in East Hampton, Bridgehampton, and Water Mill are slated for safety enhancements as well. 

Earlier this month, Mr. Thiele announced that the state has allocated $2.6 million to repair more than 54 miles of state roads on the East End, including sections of Montauk Highway extending from County Road 39 in Southampton to Stephen Hand’s Path in East Hampton, and from Buell Lane in East Hampton Village to South Etna Avenue in Montauk. The project is scheduled for completion in the fall of 2019.

Federal

Gershon Opens Southampton Office

Perry Gershon, the Democratic Party’s nominee to challenge Representative Lee Zeldin in New York’s First Congressional District, will open a campaign field office in Southampton on Sunday.

The campaign has invited the public to the opening of the office, at 71 Hill Street, at 10 a.m. that day. Mr. Gershon will attend the opening, as will local elected officials and community leaders, according to the campaign. “Help us send the message that we have a grassroots team ready to defeat Lee Zeldin in November and flip the 1st Congressional District,” the campaign said in an email on Tuesday. 

Five political parties have announced their endorsement of Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele in his bid for re-election. Mr. Thiele, who has represented the First District in the State Assembly since 1995, will be the candidate of the Independence Party, of which he is a member, as well as the Democratic, Working Families, Women’s Equality, and Reform Parties. 

All five parties filed petitions with the requisite number of signatures to designate him as their candidate.

“I am honored to be endorsed in my re-election to the State Assembly by such a broad cross-section of voters in my district,” Mr. Thiele said in a statement issued on Monday. “The support of these five parties demonstrates that my work on behalf of eastern Long Island has been broadly recognized in the community. Throughout my tenure in Albany, I have put my district first and have rejected the partisanship that has paralyzed so much of our government. I thank the voters across the district who took the time to sign or carry petitions supporting my candidacy.”

The general election will be held on Nov. 6.

Legislation granting state recognition to the Montaukett Indian Tribe has passed the New York State Senate and Assembly, Senator Kenneth LaValle and Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr. announced Tuesday. It was the tribe’s third attempt at state recognition; similar bills had been vetoed twice. 

The Montauketts were declared extinct in a state court decision in 1910 and members have been trying to gain recognition ever since. The Assembly approved the legislation in a 137-1 vote; the Senate approved the measure 61-0 on June 5. 

The Montauketts lost state recognition in a legal case known as Pharaoh v. Benson. In declaring them extinct, a judge cited dilution of the tribe’s bloodlines through intermarriage.

 In 1994, the State Supreme Court, in the matter of Breakers Motel v. Sunbeach Montauk Two, subsequently described the Pharaoh case as of “questionable propriety,” according to a joint statement from Senator LaValle and Assemblyman Thiele, but it had no immediate effect.

“The designation was improperly removed from them in 1910, and it’s time the Montaukett Tribe receives the appropriate recognition,” Mr. LaValle said. “I am pleased that we were able to obtain the approval of the measure from both the Senate and the Assembly.”  

The legislation will now go to Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, and, if signed into law, would take effect immediately. The governor vetoed similar legislation in 2017 and 2013, but the lawmakers said the Montauketts had since met with the governor’s counsel and provided additional information.

“I’m delighted that the Senate came through in the 11th hour to vote in favor of this important measure, following the Assembly’s approval,” Assemblyman Thiele said. “The Montaukett Indian Nation is alive and thriving, and I’m proud the State is finally correcting a grave injustice.”

Energized by a 75-percent increase in turnout over the 2016 primary election, more than 200 East Hampton Democrats held what they called a “unity” rally for Perry Gershon, the party’s nominee to challenge Representative Lee Zeldin in New York’s First Congressional District, at the Springs residence of John and Alice Tepper Marlin on Sunday. All of Mr. Gershon’s four opponents in the June 26 primary attended and pledged their support, as did Congresswoman Nita Lowey and Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney, both of New York; Assemblywoman Christine Pellegrino, who won an upset victory in New York’s Ninth District last year, Tim Bishop, who represented the district for 12 years, and members of the East Hampton Town Board.

“This has been a great week for me,” said Mr. Gershon, who won 35.5 percent of the vote in the five-way Democratic primary election. “But the work has barely started. We’ve got to win in November, or there’s no point.” 

Citing the increase in turnout over 2016, when Anna Throne-Holst, the former Southampton Town supervisor, defeated David Calone for the Democratic nomination before losing to Mr. Zeldin in the election, Mr. Gershon, who lives in East Hampton, predicted a “very winnable” race. “It’s hard to tell people to go vote on a Tuesday in late June when there’s nothing else on the ballot, and to get the turnout up that much is an accomplishment,” he said. “It’s an accomplishment for all the candidates, and it shows again that Zeldin is in trouble. And he knows it: The first thing Zeldin did when the winner of the primary was announced is come personal on me. That’s not what a confident guy does.” In a press release issued moments after Mr. Gershon’s primary win was apparent, Mr. Zeldin repeatedly referred to Mr. Gershon as “Park Avenue Perry,” accusing his opponent of buying his party’s nomination.

Mr. Zeldin will try to take him “down to the swamp,” Mr. Gershon said. “And I’m not going there. This has been and will remain a campaign about issues that people care about.” Democrats will turn out in the Nov. 6 election, he predicted, “when we talk about health care, how we’re not going to let the Republicans take away our health care coverage and take away coverage for pre-existing conditions.”

He and Ms. Lowey pointed out Mr. Zeldin’s 9-percent rating from the League of Conservation Voters and hammered the Republican incumbent on his co-sponsorship of the Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act, which would require all states to recognize concealed carry permits granted by other states and allow permit holders to carry a concealed weapon in school zones in any state. “It’s time we said enough,” he said, “and Lee Zeldin is on the wrong side.” Of the Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act, he asked, “Who wants that in this state?” The National Rifle Association does, he answered, “and that’s Lee Zeldin’s lobby.”

A win in the First District is key to a Democratic majority in the House of Representatives, Ms. Maloney told the crowd. “I am here with great pride to endorse Perry Gershon and to work with him” toward that majority, she said. “We all have to get out and help him get elected.”

Democrats have to pick up at least two seats in New York in order to retake the majority in the House of Representatives, Ms. Lowey said. Citing her own election to Congress in 1988 and last year’s election of George Latimer as Westchester County executive, in which he unseated the incumbent Republican in an election that was seen as a referendum on the president, Ms. Lowey, who represents the northern suburbs of New York City, said that Democrats have reason to be optimistic. “There were more groups out there than I ever could have imagined,” she said of activist groups that formed in the wake of President Trump’s election. “They would ring doorbells. They would call. They were everywhere.”

East Hampton Town Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc introduced the four candidates who fell short of the nomination. “We had a very large field of candidates, and I think that’s representative of just how badly we want and need a change in Suffolk County representing us in Washington,” he said. “To have all the candidates here together to support the choice of the people, Perry Gershon, is outstanding, and it demonstrates that we all have to come together to make a change in Washington. We start here, and we do it now.” 

Mr. Gershon repeatedly pledged to deliver a positive message. “We’re going to stay out of the swamp, because that’s how you win,” he said. “It’s how you win in Brookhaven, it’s how you win in the Hamptons, that’s how you win on the North Fork, that’s how you win in Riverhead, and, believe it or not, we’re going to do well in Smithtown too.”

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee will be involved in the campaign, he said. “We are going to get national attention, because you take back the House through New York 1,” he said, leading the assembled in a chant of “Flip the House!”

The race remains in the “Likely Republican” column of the Cook Political Report, an independent, nonpartisan newsletter that analyzes elections, campaigns, and political trends.

The ongoing issue of litter on beaches was revisited on Monday when Dell Cullum, an East Hampton Town trustee, delivered a slide presentation to his colleagues that depicted overflowing receptacles on East Hampton Village beaches. 

Three years ago, the trustees sought to have the garbage bins moved from the village’s five ocean beaches to the road ends or parking lots. That push met with a cool reception, with village officials expressing pride in the cleanliness of their beaches and their efforts to maintain them. 

At the trustees’ prior meeting, on June 25, Mr. Cullum, who has organized beach cleanups and regularly collects litter of his own accord, issued lengthy remarks denouncing litterers and insisting that having garbage receptacles right on the beach only encourages them. The bins are overturned, he said, and seagulls and other wildlife tear into trash bags that are left nearby — some of which, he said, is household garbage — spreading refuse far and wide, including into the ocean. 

“I’m not giving up on this,” Mr. Cullum said at the June 25 meeting, at times pounding the table for emphasis. “I don’t care how loud I have to scream about it. It has nothing to do with how well the village keeps the beach clean. Trash does not belong on the beach. Receptacles belong in the parking lots.” 

On Monday, before Mr. Cullum could begin his slide show, Jim Grimes, a trustee, criticized his colleague’s June 25 actions. “Quite frankly, the behavior was embarrassing to most of the board members here,” he said, calling it “damaging to our relationship with the village.” 

The litter “looks horrible,” Mr. Cullum answered, adding that he has been “dealing with this for eight years.” His suggestions — moving receptacles off the beach, and perhaps removing them altogether to encourage a carry-in, carry-out approach — are being ignored, he said, adding to his frustration. “I wasn’t trying to offend any person,” he said, just inveighing against the on-the-sand receptacles. The problem is overnight, between the last collection of the day and the first of the following day, he said. “I apologize for my behavior if it offended you and the rest of the board,” he told Mr. Grimes. 

“I agreed with the concept of what you’re trying to accomplish,” Mr. Grimes said, “but your behavior at the last meeting. . . .” Noting that it is nearly mid-July, expecting the village to change its protocol now is unrealistic, he said. Mr. Cullum said he hoped that the village would change its trash-management practices by next year. 

On Friday, Francis Bock, the trustees’ clerk, and his colleagues Brian Byrnes and Mr. Grimes met with Mayor Paul F. Rickenbach Jr., Newt Mott, who manages the village’s beaches, Rick Lawler of the village board, Rebecca Molinaro Hansen, the village administrator, and Scott Fithian, the superintendent of public works. “The village respects the position of the trustees, or any individual member,” Ms. Hansen said yesterday. “However, at this point in time the village does not feel there is a problem that needs to be addressed. If at some point in the future that changes and we want to change the way garbage is collected on the beaches . . . we’re certainly not opposed to it, but at this particular point in time we don’t see an issue with the way trash is being collected.” 

On Monday, other trustees were empathetic but disagreed with Mr. Cullum’s assertions. “The village doesn’t create any of this litter,” said Bill Taylor. If it puts the cans on the beach, Mr. Cullum replied, it does.

Mr. Bock said he had visited Main Beach at around 6:45 on a recent evening, and saw a garbage bag on the sand next to a receptacle. Four hours later, it was still there. He said he lifted the receptacle’s lid, and it was empty. “That’s not going to stop people from leaving it” on the sand, he said. 

Undeterred, Mr. Cullum asked that the trustees send a letter to the village asking that the bins be moved to the parking lots. “You can add as many as you want to the parking lot,” he said. “I just want them off the beach.” 

Mr. Grimes said he was not in favor of the proposal, suggesting instead that the trustees meet with village officials in the off-season and explore alternatives. “I would be in favor of letting things cool down for a while,” Mr. Bock said, before revisiting the issue with the village. “If that’s not enough, I can’t support it either. But I’m more than happy to work on a program for next year.” 

Rick Drew said that a carry-in, carry-out protocol should be explored, and that “reducing the amount of trash we create is really important” and a goal the trustees must embrace. “I just don’t know if we can do it in the middle of summer.” 

Susan Vorpahl, however, said Mr. Cullum had her full support. “I’m encouraged by your passion,” she told him. “More people should follow that passion.” While it may be understandable that village officials took offense at his approach, “I still don’t think that’s reason to say we can’t do anything about it now.” Summer, she said, is precisely the time for action. 

In other news from the meeting, Susan McGraw Keber told her colleagues that the pilot program in which Accabonac Harbor is sampled for mosquito larvae and data forwarded to the Suffolk County Department of Public Works’ division of vector control is having the desired result of reducing the use of methoprene, a larvicide. The county announced on Monday that it would not apply methoprene via helicopter this week. This is the third week in which larval samples have demonstrated no need to apply the larvicide, which critics say is harmful to non-target species including lobster and crabs. “We’re moving forward, little by little,” Ms. Keber said.