Editorials

From early in the pandemic, it was clear that resort communities were different. Ski areas, which attract visitors and seasonal workers from across the United States and other countries, became hot spots for virus outbreaks. In Colorado, while the rest of the country was just becoming aware of the danger in March, numbers were already beginning to appear in places like Vail and Aspen.

For a long time, this newspaper has called for bike lanes on county, town, and village roads in a general sense. Instead of just keeping to that, we now suggest that several specific roads should be considered for widening to accommodate bicycles.

As summer began, Covid-19 prevention on the East End looked dangerously inadequate.

With mounting evidence about a Russian plot to pay bounties to fighters in Afghanistan to target United States and coalition troops, one might have thought an Army veteran like Lee Zeldin would sympathize with the American military personnel who may have come under attack, but that would be wrong.

There is a sense on South Fork streets and on the beaches that we may somehow have defeated the virus. There is no evidence this is true.

The question is if — not when — schools will welcome back students. And the question also is how teachers and administrators are preparing.

For a nation that venerates the throwing off of tyranny the way the United States does at the Fourth of July, the end of a far greater repression of human life and dignity goes largely uncelebrated.

What Obama designates Trump takes away, and in the case of a recent decision to open the almost 5,000-square-mile Northeast Canyons and Seamounts National Monument, what may be taken away if the move is allowed to stand cannot be replaced.

Reactions have been negative to a $60,000, six-month contract between the Town of East Hampton and a New York City-based communications firm hired to help get the word out about Covid-19 issues and to redesign the town website.

New Yorkers have already been voting in 2020 primaries for a range of local and statewide races. Early in-person polling places, which opened on Saturday, will remain open until Sunday afternoon and then reopen on Tuesday, the actual day of the primary.

No sooner were New York restaurants granted a reprieve from the Covid-19 lockdown did patrons come back in swarms for outdoor dining. But for many on the East End who had become used to hunkering down and ordering takeout, if at all, the return of crowds was an unsettling shock.

There are times when voters are faced with a critical choice. This is one of those times.