With the collective conviction that the time to act is now, the East Hampton Town Board engaged on Tuesday in a long discussion about the creation of a wastewater treatment system for downtown Montauk, and a tax district to help fund it.

Meeting in the easternmost hamlet’s firehouse, the board listened as Joanne Pilgrim, executive assistant to Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc, reviewed its past discussions and engagement with Lombardo Associates, a consulting firm, to create a plan for a centralized wastewater treatment plant. The discussion, she said, has grown to include interrelated issues such as sand replenishment along downtown Montauk’s ocean shoreline and a longer-term strategic retreat from rising sea level.

“Particularly,” Ms. Pilgrim said, “some property owners” and managers of the oceanfront motels “want to know, if they’re going to become participants in wastewater treatment, if they will have a business plan for the foreseeable future for a healthy beach.” The discussion is in tandem with another, about creating a beach replenishment tax district, she said. 

Improving the downtown’s wastewater treatment is urgent in order to limit the release of pollutants that could impact ground and surface waters, including Fort Pond, which has suffered from harmful algal blooms. The hamlet’s citizens advisory committee has asked for a wastewater district, Mr. Van Scoyoc said. 

Many of the hamlet’s commercial properties have septic systems that are defined as nonfunctioning, a designation assigned a system that must be pumped out more than four times per year. But a large majority of downtown properties do not have room to replace a failing system with a state-of-the-art, low-nitrogen septic system, as their buildings occupy most of the lots.

The federal Environmental Protection Agency banned new large-capacity cesspools in 2000 because untreated sanitary waste from cesspools can enter groundwater and contaminate drinking-water sources. A ban on existing large-capacity cesspools went into effect in 2005. “Those regulations could potentially put downtown property owners in a tough spot,” Ms. Pilgrim said. “A community system would offer a solution and a way to resolve” environmental impacts on ground and surface waters related to septic waste.

The location of a treatment site has not been determined, though a property near the recycling center on Montauk Highway has been considered. Additional high-density areas could be tied into the system later, adding to its cost. 

Securing grant funding will be important to accomplishing the goal, the town having set a target of 75 percent of the approximately $32 million price tag. Should the town move forward with a wastewater district, it would hope to receive grant money from the state Environmental Facilities Corporation, Ms. Pilgrim said. That grant application has an expected submission deadline of the end of July. The community preservation fund, up to 20 percent of which voters decided in 2016 could be allocated to water quality improvement projects, could also be tapped. 

Should the town move forward, Lombardo Associates would have to prepare a mapping plan, Ms. Pilgrim said. 

A formal proposal could be put to a public vote, for which the district’s registered voters would be eligible, or the board could adopt the creation of a tax district, which would then be subject to a permissive referendum. In the latter course, a public vote would be forced should someone object and file the signatures of 5 percent of the total vote cast in the last gubernatorial election with the town clerk within 30 days. 

“We have a very densely populated business district,” Mr. Van Scoyoc said, with “businesses that regularly pump out” their septic systems, in some cases almost daily. “We’re a beachfront community, our water quality is important. . . . This is an issue that has to be dealt with, and now.”

It is important, Mr. Van Scoyoc said, that property owners understand why a wastewater district is important and that the board “take a hard look at costs” and how to reduce them through grant funding. “I believe this is the least expensive time to make this move,” he said. “We don’t have the luxury of waiting.” 

A public hearing on creation of a wastewater district will be necessary, he said, likening the process to the board’s recent move to create a water supply district in Wainscott so that the Suffolk County Water Authority can extend mains and connect properties that rely on well water, in the wake of the discovery that many wells there are contaminated with perfluorinated compounds. “Our efforts should be focused on creating a district as soon as we can,” he said. “There has to be public outreach, communication — that has to happen first. We need to put together very specific outreach to property owners, stakeholders within the district, to engage them and the community as to why this needs to be done, what it is we’re looking to do, and when.” 

With respect to a strategic retreat from the shore, “it’s really all about timing,” the supervisor said, adding that the likelihood of a major hurricane increases every year. “Trying to make this transition with the least amount of disruption, maintaining the greatest amount of viability . . . so it’s not disruptive and we’re not having this conversation in an emotionally heightened state post-major hurricane,” he said, is “a very difficult choreography to undertake.”

Rona Klopman, a candidate for chairwoman of the East Hampton Democratic Committee, has filed a legal action against the committee to determine its “true current membership,” which she has charged has been manipulated by Jeanne Frankl, its present chairwoman. 

The Article 78 action also demands that the election for the committee’s next leader, previously scheduled for next month but unlikely to occur until the matter has been resolved, be conducted on the basis of that true membership. 

Ms. Klopman, who has been a member of the committee for a decade and chairs its community outreach committee, charges that Ms. Frankl has improperly revised the list of current committee members, established in 2016. She also alleges that Ms. Frankl has moved committee members from one election district to another without their consent, the implication being an effort to manipulate the election by giving greater weight to some committee members and less to others, based on the number of Demo­crats in each district who voted in the last gubernatorial election. Ms. Klopman also claims Ms. Frankl illegally terminated members from the committee. 

In an affidavit accompanying the Article 78 challenge, Ms. Klopman states that two committee members, Jeanne Hutson and Arline Gideon, were moved from the election district they lawfully represented, having filed the requisite petition signatures to become elected members representing their respective districts. Further, she charged that Barbara Layton was improperly removed from the committee and presently has no district placement. Two other members, Walker Bragman and Tyler Armstrong, were permanently removed from the committee, the affidavit charges. 

The Article 78 action also asserts that Ms. Frankl’s reshuffling of the committee “has resulted in confusion and ambiguity as to the true membership of the committee.” 

Ms. Frankl’s attorney has until May 7 to answer the charges. She has repeatedly expressed her intention to resign from the leadership position, but rescinded a resignation in February. She told The Star earlier this month that she favors Cate Rogers, another candidate for chairwoman, over Ms. Klopman. 

Ms. Klopman wrote a letter to The Star that is in this week’s issue. In it, she stated that she and other committee members “made many attempts to enter into a dialogue” with Ms. Frankl, “but were disregarded.” A letter from her attorney, Jonathan Wallace, was also ignored, she wrote. 

Ms. Frankl said yesterday that the lawsuit was “a big surprise” and one that she has not had time to review. “We don’t think it has any merit,” she said. “It’s been referred to counsel.”

Jeffrey Locker’s dream house is almost finished. It is on what the Town of East Hampton describes as pristine dunes on Cranberry Hole Road in Amagansett, abutting Napeague State Park on one side, with Gardiner’s Bay a stone’s throw away. Now, his brother and sister-in-law, Keith and Stacy Locker, want to follow suit. 

Jeffrey Locker obtained approval for his house in a split East Hampton Town Zoning Board of Appeals decision less than three years ago, in June 2015. At the hearing that preceded the decision, the East Hampton Town Planning Department had expressed its opposition, and it did so again at an April 17 Z.B.A. hearing on the new Locker application.

The application is for a 4,038-square-foot house with a covered porch, a 579-square-foot detached garage, 471 square feet of decking, and a small swimming pool. Like Jeffrey Locker’s property, the 1.7-acre parcel is severely constrained by scenic easements, creating a somewhat unusual building envelope. Almost all of the square footage is on the first floor, which is 3,549 square feet, and the house is to be accessed by a common driveway serving both brothers.

“This parcel contains protected natural features and needs to be assessed accordingly,” Brian Frank, the town’s chief environmentalist, wrote in a memo to the board regarding the new proposal. “The house is positioned close to the minimum distance allowed for structures near scenic easements. The proposed clearing line is right up against the scenic easement lines and the Planning Department feels that this line is unrealistic,” he wrote. “It is the Planning Department’s opinion that this project is sprawling. It is not consolidated in a way which minimizes the diminishment of the natural features. An alternate design of a two-story residence with an attached garage could result in a much smaller footprint and less impact on the protected dunes and beach vegetation.”

There is only one member left from the board that approved Jeffrey Locker’s application. However, John Whelan, the chairman of the Z.B.A., had been one of the members who voted against approval in the 3-to-2 decision. Mr. Whelan clearly was skeptical of the new proposal, with other board members questioning the design as well. Mr. Frank told the board on April 17 that the members of the board should not feel obligated by precedent.

At the hearing, Carl Irace, the attorney representing both brothers, disagreed with Mr. Frank’s idea that square footage should be added to the second floor. That would leave the house looming over the dunes, he said, as opposed to being nestled within them. A larger second story also would decrease the sunlight for the vegetation the town is trying to protect, he said, while the design submitted “embraces the protected features.” 

Mr. Frank responded by saying he had never seen a second floor destroy vegetation. 

Keith Locker also addressed the board. “I spent my first 35 years living in the dunes in Westhampton, the next 35 living in the dunes in Southampton.” He and his wife want to spend the next 35 years living in and protecting the dunes in Amagansett, he said. Mr. Frank responded by saying that if the natural features of the dunes were disturbed, what makes them unique would be destroyed. 

Mr. Irace said Tuesday that the proposal is locked in stone. “We appreciate the opportunity to come to the board directly for its feedback on our proposal. We look forward to using the board’s feedback to move forward toward an approval,” he said.

Waterways under the jurisdiction of the East Hampton Town Trustees are mostly healthy, and some that are seasonally or permanently closed to shellfishing might be safely opened, according to Christopher Gobler of Stony Brook University’s School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences. 

Dr. Gobler delivered his 2017 findings to the East Hampton Town Trustees, who have engaged him to monitor trustee-managed water bodies for the last five years, at their meeting on Monday. A group of property owners surrounding Georgica Pond has also hired Dr. Gobler to study and make recommendations to combat the toxic blue-green algae blooms that have afflicted it during the past several summers. 

Salinity across the sites he monitors for the trustees was “fairly high” in 2017, Dr. Gobler reported. “These water bodies are being well flushed with ocean-like water,” maintaining that salinity, he said, which is “a very good sign” for healthy waterways. All sites also showed “very good” levels of dissolved oxygen, though those levels fluctuate from day to night, when they typically fall. 

In another positive sign, all monitored sites showed low levels of chlorophyll last year, Dr. Gobler said. Excessive nutrients in a water body, often caused by runoff of sewage, animal waste, or fertilizers from the land, can promote the algal blooms that deplete oxygen and cause fish kills. 

Only at the head of Three Mile Harbor, Dr. Gobler said, was fecal coliform bacteria measured above a concerning threshold. Measurements of fecal coliform bacteria by the culvert in Accabonac Harbor, which the trustees recently opened to promote tidal flushing, were low, he said, suggesting that that action has been effective. 

In general, the State Department of Environmental Conservation “has it right for most locations” where it has closed a waterway to shellfishing on a seasonal basis, he said. Some of these could potentially be reopened, though he did caution that the D.E.C.’s sampling is more rigorous than his own. As an example, when he took his first samples in 2013, all of Northwest Creek was uncertified, or permanently closed. “Our first-year data suggested that could be eased,” he said. The following year, the northern half of the creek was opened seasonally. An area of Hand’s Creek that is closed to shellfishing “seems to be pretty clean,” he said, as does the southern portion of Hog Creek.

Harmful algal blooms were sparse in 2017, Dr. Gobler said, with just one low-level sample of alexandrium, which can produce a toxin leading to paralytic shellfish poisoning, at the head of Three Mile Harbor. Dinophysis, which is harmful to shellfish, was not detected last year, he reported. 

The news was not as positive for cochlodinium, or rust tide, with “some very high detects” at the head of Three Mile Harbor and one high level mea­sured in Accabonac Harbor. Last year, though, was milder than 2016, he said. Cochlodinium can be lethal to finfish and bivalves. 

Three Mile Harbor experiences the highest rate of nitrogen loading among East Hampton’s water bodies, and the relationship between excessive nutrients and algal blooms is clear, Dr. Gobler said. On a positive note, however, groundwater travel times around the harbor are relatively fast compared to other parts of Long Island. That means that “rapid action would lead to rapid results.” Addressing nitrogen from wastewater “could have a rapid effect on that region,” suggesting that allocating a portion of the community preservation fund to water quality initiatives, which voters approved in a 2016 referendum, is advisable. State-of-the-art nitrogen-reducing septic systems, which Suffolk County recently approved, would also help, he said. 

Cyanobacteria, or blue-green algae, were measured below the D.E.C. standard for safety, Dr. Gobler said, with the lone exception of a brief period, in June, in Georgica Pond. The Friends of Georgica Pond Foundation, the group of pondfront property owners, leased and operated an aquatic weed harvester to remove macroalgae from the pond in 2016 and again last year. 

As macroalgae decay, they provide nutrients to harmful algae such as cyanobacteria. “The hypothesis is that’s pulsing massive amounts of nutrients into the water,” and cyanobacteria “love recycled and regenerated nutrients.” The removal in 2016 of more than 55,000 pounds of macroalgae from Georgica Pond may have contributed to the substantial reduction in cyanobacteria last year, when a harvester removed an additional 32,700 pounds. “So far, it looks like it’s beneficial” in discouraging cyanobacteria, he said. 

Dr. Gobler also referred to the recent report of the microbial source-tracking he has conducted at several sites in Georgica Pond, aimed at identifying specific sources of coliform bacteria. While human-based bacteria are getting into the pond, he said, waste from birds, deer, and canines represent a far greater share. That research will expand and continue this year, he said.

“I fight, I’m stubborn,” Kate Browning told those attending a congressional candidates forum at St. Michael’s Lutheran Church in Amagansett last month. “I never give up, I never back down. That’s why I can beat Lee Zeldin.” 

Ms. Browning, who represented the Third District in the Suffolk County Legislature for 12 years, is one of five candidates seeking the Democratic Party’s nomination to challenge Mr. Zeldin to represent New York’s First Congressional District. Mr. Zeldin, a Republican, is seeking a third term. 

A native of Belfast, Northern Ireland, Ms. Browning said that her consistent electoral success in the Republican-leaning Third District bodes well for her congressional bid. “My focus was always to make sure I deliver for my district and do what’s right by my constituency,” she said this week. “I won in a very Republican district with no less than 57 percent. That shows the people in the district appreciated and supported what I’ve been doing over the past 12 years.”

Mr. Zeldin “has been absent, has not really represented the district,” she said. 

As a legislator, she secured funding to install the ShotSpotter gun detection system, a technology that relies on sound equipment to pinpoint the origin of gunfire, in several communities. ShotSpotter, she said, “helps reduce the amount of gunfire in a community but also helps law enforcement be able to go directly to where an incident occurs. It helps response time. It can help save a life.”

“I have a good record on doing what’s needed when it comes to gun safety,” Ms. Browning said. “Lee Zeldin certainly has not. When you get an ‘A’ rating from the National Rifle Association, you’re not being responsive to issues of your constituency.”

“This is not an attack on the Second Amendment,” Ms. Browning, whose husband is a detective in the New York Police Department, said. “It’s about gun safety.”

Like most of her competitors for the Democratic nomination, she noted Mr. Zeldin’s co-sponsorship of the Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act, which would allow a person with a concealed carry permit from one state to carry a firearm in any other state and on any federal land. “This was a bill that law enforcement across the nation said they’re adamantly opposed to. He chose to support the N.R.A.’s position on this. . . . In my opinion, by supporting something like this, he puts people like my husband and his colleagues in danger. Concealed carry puts our residents in danger, but also puts law enforcement in a lot of danger.” 

Ms. Browning cited her work in the Legislature to preserve more than 1,000 acres of open space, and to secure $189 million in federal and state money for a   new sewer district in Mastic and Shirley, as proof of her commitment to environmental conservation and clean water. “Lee Zeldin has been nowhere on this issue,” she charged. “This is a very important issue for all of us here on Long Island.” 

In Congress, “I want to represent the working families, not the wealthy special interests,” Ms. Browning said. “We need to fight and repeal the Republican tax plan.” Health care is another focus, she said. “There’s certainly people in Suffolk County who are struggling to keep and maintain health care. When I meet many senior citizens who tell me they’re cutting their pills, they can’t afford their prescriptions, or to pay for bills and the roof over their head, there’s something seriously wrong. We need to have a good health care but one that everybody can afford. Health care is a right, not a privilege.” 

She also said that protecting a woman’s right to choose is very important. “So many single moms are so dependent on Planned Parenthood in many places across the country,” she said. “We can’t take that away from them.” She is also concerned about protecting the L.G.B.T. community, she said. “The Supreme Court could take away marriage equality. It’s time to secure that for the L.G.B.T. community on the federal level.” 

Ms. Browning and her husband settled in Shirley, where Mr. Zeldin lives, in 1989. “I’m certainly going to be able to pull voters from Lee Zeldin,” she said. “I’ve never lost an election, and the First Congressional District is not unlike the Third Legislative District. I think I will be able to appeal to the blue-collar voters that are in the district. I’m running on my record, my vision for the future. Government needs to work for the people, not wealthy special interests. I believe that’s something I can certainly do.”

This is the last in a series of profiles of Democrats competing to challenge Lee Zeldin in the lead-up to the June 26 Democratic primary.

With pledges of impartiality and appeals to the better angels of our nature, the East Hampton Clericus announced an interfaith initiative dedicated to voter registration, engagement, and turnout last Thursday at Calvary Baptist Church in East Hampton. 

In a meeting at the church, the Rev. Walter Silva Thompson Jr., senior pastor of the Calvary church and a member of the Clericus, introduced VoteHamptonNY, which he described as a nonpartisan, clergy-based plan to encourage voters to fulfill their civic duty. 

VoteHamptonNY, Mr. Thompson said, is “a moral campaign” to ensure that residents understand the value of civic engagement through voter registration and the exercise of their right. “The sociopolitical and economic climate in our country calls for our communities to communicate with one another,” he said, “to work together and build accountable plans to educate, engage, organize, and mobilize its citizens along with working to keep its elected officials morally and politically accountable.” 

Along with voter registration and mobilization, the initiative calls for a monthly series in which speakers from both major parties at the state and national level will address the community. “This initiative seeks to hold them accountable to what they say and what they do,” Mr. Thompson said. “It is incumbent upon us to do research” so participants “can ask the right questions.” Congregations will also designate a member or members to educate people on registration and the importance of participation in the electoral process, he said. 

A primary goal is to inform the community about the primary elections scheduled for June 26 and Sept. 13 as well as the midterm election on Nov. 6. 

Reading a statement from the Clericus, Mr. Thompson said that, “As religious leaders in the community, we must underscore the ethical and moral impetus for peaceful discussions and consideration of the needs of all of us who live together according to a serene process.” As leaders of differing beliefs, “we can personally attest to the ease and existential utility of gathering together, discussing all concerns, and always keeping an eye on the future as we work to live peacefully and successfully in this community.” 

For all its affluence, many East Hampton residents face poverty and hunger, said Gregorio Mayers, a founding participant of VoteHamptonNY and a former senior policy adviser with New York City’s Office of the Mayor. He is now a professor at the City University of New York and a part-time resident of East Hampton. “It is our moral responsibility as a community and member of the clergy to galvanize, educate, and get a centered, nonpartisan approach to help people throughout the process when you’re feeling these types of pains and concerns,” he said. 

“I want to be able to have friendships that are acknowledged with people who might see the world differently from me,” said Diana Walker, who advocates for immigrants’ rights, “but I want an opportunity to be able to meet and have a discussion and debate.” Ms. Walker said Tuesday that she is “an extremely enthusiastic supporter of bipartisan dialog, which has been all too sadly missing.” 

Along with Mr. Mayers and Ms. Walker, founding participants of VoteHamptonNY include Mr. Mayers’s wife, Onida Coward Mayers, the New York City Campaign Finance Board’s director of voter assistance; Louis Myrick, the founder of Current Citizens Group Inc., which seeks to address issues including affordable housing and police guidelines, and Zachary Cohen, chairman of the town’s nature preserve committee and a former candidate for supervisor. 

Ms. Walker and Mr. Thompson referred to the philosopher Reinhold Niebuhr and his book, “Moral Man and Immoral Society: A Study in Ethics and Politics,” concluding that religious leaders are obliged to be involved in the political realm in order to ensure justice. Silence becomes betrayal, Mr. Thompson said. “There is the need for a transcendent voice in light of the confusion and the conflict and the bickering and the infighting that’s taking place in both the Democratic Party and the Republican Party,” he said. “I believe there is a need for a collaboration of voices within the community to really come together and try to make some sense of the confusion that most people are inundated with over the news. . . . They feel the political process has lost its moral guidance and significance for helping understand what the issues are within our community. I think this is the time for the transcendent voice to be lifted so we can raise the consciousness of people.” 

Reg Cornelia, who until recently was chairman of the East Hampton Town Republican Committee, noted the moral underpinning of the initiative. The Revolutionary War and the antislavery element leading up to the Civil War “were preached from the pulpit,” he said. Likening the present, hyper-partisan climate to the schism between North and South that led to the Civil War, the VoteHamptonNY initiative is timely, he said. 

The meeting ended with Mr. Cornelia quoting from Abraham Lincoln’s first inaugural address. “We must not be enemies,” Lincoln said. “Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.”

An Earth Day beach cleanup on Hicks Island, at Lazy Point in Amagansett, on Saturday has led to charges that the State Department of Environmental Conservation and Office of Parks, Recreation, and Historic Preservation are unlawfully prohibiting the public’s right to access the beach there. 

Rod Richardson told the East Hampton Town Trustees at its meeting on Monday that he decided to clean up Hicks Island on Saturday, and that he believes that no one had removed litter from the beach there because of signs proclaiming it a bird sanctuary and therefore closed to the public. Signs prohibiting “dogs, camping, picnicing [sic],” or boat landing bear no reference to their origin or jurisdictional authority, he said. 

“Those signs that prevent public access also prevent citizens of East Hampton from getting their eyes on what’s going on, on Hicks Island,” Mr. Richardson, a member of Citizens for Access Rights, told the trustees. “There was a tremendous amount of trash there,” including plastic mesh, fishing nets, and Styrofoam. 

The beach on Hicks Island is entirely foreshore, Mr. Richardson said. The wrack line, the line of organic and inorganic debris left on the beach by high tide, “is right up at the grass, and in some cases goes well into the grass,” indicating, he said, that it is under jurisdiction of the trustees, who own and manage most of the town’s beaches, waterways, and bottomlands on behalf of the public as granted by the Dongan Patent of 1686. 

“This is on the beach,” Mr. Richardson told the trustees. “That beach is owned by the trustees.” The signs, he said, are “denying public access, trespassing on your property, denying your mission.” 

The D.E.C. lists the Office of Parks, Recreation, and Historic Preservation as the owner and managing agency of its Napeague Conservation Area. A D.E.C. spokesman referred questions to George Gorman, a deputy regional director of that office. Mr. Gorman said yesterday that he agreed that he agreeed his agency owns Hicks Island but had to confer with colleagues before providing additional information. Thomas Dess, the park manager at Montauk Point State Park, had not returned two calls seeking information as of yesterday.

According to the State Department of State’s coastal policies document, “Access to the publicly owned foreshore and to lands immediately adjacent to the foreshore or the water’s edge that are publicly owned shall be provided and it shall be provided in a manner compatible with adjoining uses.” Also, the document states, “Water-dependent and water-enhanced recreation will be encouraged and facilitated, and will be given priority over non-water-related uses along the coast.” 

The D.E.C., which lists the piping plover and several species of tern as endangered, erects fencing and signs to protect the shorebirds during their nesting season, from early spring into summer. 

But, Mr. Richardson said, there are no endangered shorebirds on Hicks Island. He cited a 2006 D.E.C. report stating that the east channel between Hicks Island, part of Napeague State Park, and Goff Point, part of Hither Hills State Park, had closed as a result of sand deposition, creating a land bridge. “The Hicks Island tern colony was eliminated by one to two foxes and perhaps other terrestrial predators,” according to the document. 

“The very purpose of the D.E.C. having control of that to keep it a sanctuary failed,” Mr. Richardson said. The signs misinform and confuse the public, Mr. Richardson said. “You have every authority to take down those signs that breach the public trust and deny public access,” he said. 

In an essay written after Saturday’s cleanup, Mr. Richardson wrote that the state “should voluntarily step down and turn over the stewardship of the land” to the trustees. Failing that, the trustees should take legal action against the agency for breach of trust and violation of state policy, he said. In the short term, the trustees should remove the signs prohibiting public access, which he said infringe on their authority. 

At the meeting, the trustees agreed that the signs were improper and pledged to take action. But on Tuesday, Francis Bock, the governing body’s clerk, said that the trustees “have to do a little research and confirm whether or not” Hicks Island is state-owned and if the trustees have jurisdiction over the beach. “I can’t respond until we look at it,” he said.

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Correction: In an earlier version of this article, the connection between cleanup on Hicks Island and Citizens for Access Rights was misstated. Mr. Richardson is a member of the group, but neither the cleanup, nor his subsequent presentation to the East Hampton Town Trustees, were done on behalf of the group.

As the East Hampton Town Board continues to work with consultants to craft a vision for future development in the town’s five hamlets, it took a hard look this week at opposite ends of the town, discussing a transfer of development rights program in downtown Montauk as a means of strategically retreating from the shoreline and a new approach for Wainscott’s commercial district.

Three months after presenting updated hamlet-study plans to the board, Peter Flinker of Dodson and Flinker, a Massachusetts consulting firm, and Lisa Liquori of Fine Arts and Sciences, a former town planning director, took the latest iteration of reports on the five hamlets, and a sixth study focusing on business, to the board’s meeting on Tuesday.

Public comment on a June 2017 presentation of draft reports was submitted through the end of last year. It is now up to the board to decide whether the draft reports are sufficient in their current form to be presented in a public hearing. Alternatively, said Ms. Liquori, the town could continue to solicit comment, make adjustments, and set priorities before scheduling a public hearing. The board could also combine those options in some fashion, she said. 

The studies are to provide an understanding of the demographic trends and the dynamics that drive each unique hamlet’s economy, and present a master plan to implement a shared vision of more attractive, walkable, and economically viable villages, she said. 

In Montauk, the consultants discussed a transfer of development rights program that would allow the downtown to remain where it is and at its present density, while also adapting to rising sea level by moving some businesses away from the shoreline. 

This would require identification of a “receiving zone” that would absorb the businesses, such as the motels on South Emerson Avenue, the consultants said. 

“We are really trying to save that whole area that would be prone to climate change,” said Councilwoman Sylvia Overby. “We can hardly keep sand on the beach now.” A transfer of development rights program is an opportunity she hoped businesses in Montauk would embrace “in order to keep Montauk as vital and alive as it is now.”

Such an approach “seems to make sense for Montauk,” Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc said. The program would neither increase nor decrease density, important because tourism is the foundation of the hamlet’s economy, he said. “Having a strategy for adapting to sea level rise and erosion,” he said, “is something we should be working on but may not be accomplished in a 5 or 10-year timeline. . . . We need to plan ahead to ensure the future vitality of the business district. We need to have discussion now, to drill down to see how we can make this work over a long period of time so we don’t find ourselves trying to make decisions in the present tense.” 

The process is yet to be determined, Mr. Van Scoyoc said, and will require further engagement with the public and discussion by the board and, perhaps, future consultants. 

Implementing that project may require a new position in the town government, Councilman David Lys suggested. Ms. Liquori agreed. “It would be great if you adopted these as a vision and decided to go forward,” she said. “There is no one set way to go forward, but we put forward a lot of recommendations.”

Separately, in discussing the merits of applying overlay districts to regulate development specific to a hamlet, the board, Ms. Liquori, and Mr. Flinker held a long discussion about form-based code. 

That, Mr. Flinker said, is “another name for a high-powered, design standard-driven code” that “focuses more on public space and the way buildings relate to that space.” It incorporates type of architecture, building facades, how buildings relate to the street, parking, and even standards for streets. “One of the innovations with the form-based code model is it’s based on a master plan” incorporating public streets, sidewalks, and buildings as one continuous design, he said. Put another way, it is a mechanism by which implementation of a plan is consistent even when happening incrementally, he said.

Such regulations use “physical form, rather than separation of uses, as the organizing principle for the code,” as defined by the Form-Based Codes Institute. 

As an example, Mr. Flinker pointed to Wainscott’s commercial district, which is inconsistent and not always aesthetically pleasing, with parking in front of some structures and behind others. Form-based code would be a regulation and not merely a guideline, Mr. Flinker said, allowing certainty in development, “less time at the planning board arguing about the facade of this building and more on what you want as a town.” This would, of course, require consensus as to the overall character of future development. 

The westernmost hamlet, said Mr. Van Scoyoc, is characteristic of “development done haphazardly and organically over time,” resulting in traffic problems. A service road behind the businesses would allow a more walkable downtown, like that of Amagansett, he said. “We can shape development and redevelopment to meet those needs, and have a result that is embraced by the community.” 

If there is consensus, form-based code is a wise approach, Mr. Flinker said. The public design and planning sessions, or charettes, held early in the hamlet-study process, indicated a desire to create a more consistent look in downtown Wainscott, he said. 

Parking could also be rethought as a single lot shared by businesses rather than the distinct lots separated by unused, empty strips, Mr. Flinker said. This would allow motorists to remain within the lot while driving to a different store, avoiding the need to re-enter Montauk Highway, he said, as well as better use of land and a reduction in the number of parking spaces needed.

While they were warm to the idea of form-based code, Mr. Van Scoyoc and Councilman Jeffrey Bragman worried that something akin to Disneyworld or, in the latter’s description, “faux-country strip mall,” could result.

The creation of 37 apartments in six buildings on what is now a 4.6-acre field on Montauk Highway in Amagansett has been scheduled for a public hearing at 7 p.m. on May 2 before the East Hampton Town Planning Board. The plans can be inspected at the planning board office at 300 Pantigo Place.

The development, which has been referred to as affordable housing, is more accurately described as work force housing, according to Catherine Casey, executive director of the East Hampton Housing Authority, which is working with David M. Gallo of Georgica Green Ventures on construction and will manage the property. One-quarter of the apartments are to be subsidized as low-income housing.

The plan calls for 12 one-bedroom, 12 two-bedroom, and 12 three-bedroom apartments, as well as a single four-bedroom unit. All except the latter will be in the six two-story buildings, while the four-bedroom apartment will be on the second floor of a common building, which is planned as a community center. There also will be a sewage treatment plant on the site, along with a 493-square-foot building to house equipment. There will be an open meadow at the center of the development, with the buildings clustered around it.

Originally, the plan called for 11 residential buildings, as well as a commercial building. The planning board had objected to the density and the current plan evolved through several site plan reviews. Also changed from the initial proposal is the setback from Montauk Highway, which was doubled from 50 to 100 feet. There are 77 parking spaces planned with a circular roadway around the development accessed from the highway on the western corner. 

When the planning board scheduled the May 2 public hearing, there was some discussion about the lighting. Ms. Casey assured the board that it would be “dark-sky” compliant. 

The property is just west of a Shell gasoline station and runs back to the Long Island Rail Road right of way. An eastern red cedar tree on the west border will be retained, as will two clusters of trees to the east. A fence facing the highway is to be removed, while another, on the northern border facing the railroad tracks, is to remain, as is a fence on the western border. A four-foot-high stockade fence is to be built on the eastern border.

East Hampton Town

A Boost for Energy Savings

The Town of East Hampton has announced the upcoming launch of its Energize East Hampton solar and energy savings program. The initiative will launch with an informational booth at the East Hampton Village street fair, happening on May 12 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Newtown Lane.

In a release issued by the town on Tuesday, the program is described as one-stop shopping for free or discounted energy efficiency and solar energy projects available to residents and businesses. The program is a joint initiative with Long Island Green Homes, South Fork Peak Savers, Renewable Energy Long Island, and others. 

The program has three components. One, called Solarize East Hampton, is a program that will make investing in solar power easier and more affordable for homeowners and businesses through bulk purchasing. Another, through Long Island Green Homes, provides free home energy assessments and assistance with efficiency upgrades. The South Fork Peak Savers program offers free smart thermostats, pool pump rebates, and free commercial lighting efficiency upgrades.

The programs are available to residents and businesses of both the town and village. Residents and business owners who sign up for solar installations through Solarize East Hampton by October will be able to take advantage of group rates below market prices by using a designated solar installer that has undergone a prequalification process. The more customers sign up, the lower the price will be. 

In the statement issued on Tuesday, Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc said that, “Thanks to state assistance, we will now be able to offer solar installations below market prices to East Hampton home and business owners, along with other energy savings programs. The Energize East Hampton initiative will help our community to save energy and money and is another important step in reaching our 100-percent renewable energy goals.” 

More information about Energize East Hampton is at energizeeh.org.