Editorials

Members of the Springs Fire Department were upset that a town planning board hearing on a controversial radio and cellular telephone monopole behind the firehouse was scheduled for last night — that is, Sept. 11, the same evening that the somber annual memorial ceremony is held at Hook Mill.

It seems only right to offer a tip of the cap to the professionals and volunteers who answer the call at any time of day or night even as the population of residents and day-trippers doubles and then doubles again then returns to normal after Labor Day.

A recent little-noticed report about East Hampton Town’s wastewater system upgrade program deserves wider attention. Produced by the town’s water quality advisory committee, the report offered five ways to increase the rate at which property owners are signing on.

And just like that, the tropical Atlantic came alive. After an August with minimal swell and no hurricanes, two named storms popped up, one as we went to press Wednesday threatening to make a first landfall in already battered Puerto Rico and projected to arrive as Hurricane Dorian in northern Florida on Monday. At the same time, but less of a threat to shore, another storm developed off the Carolina coast but was to move away into the open ocean by the end of the week.

A proposal to force New York private schools to report more than their local boards of education now require is circulating in Albany and has some educators and parents worried.

Term limits are great talking points during political campaigns, but after getting elected, most officials lose interest in them. National Democratic strategists looking to push Representative Lee Zeldin out of office have seized on his 2014 victory over the incumbent, Tim Bishop, as evidence of just such a flip-flop.

The Village of Sag Harbor gets it. In a ceremony marking its new Steinbeck Park, Southampton Town and Sag Harbor elected officials celebrated the creation of a public waterfront asset. Officials in other towns and villages should be watching this closely. This park might never have been a reality had the village, over many years, failed to resist pressure from developers.

The big field on Montauk Highway east of the Amagansett I.G.A. is quiet again following two large benefit events — the Soldier Ride fund-raiser and the East Hampton Library Authors Night book fair.

Recently and almost in passing, an East Hampton Town Board member observed that it might be necessary to seek outside help for the Ordinance Enforcement Department. At the moment, the town lists eight field employees and one clerk in the department directory, but three work only part time. This small group is supposed to provide seven-day-a-week coverage, taking on everything and anything not otherwise in the purview of town police.

All agreed new helping hands are harder than ever to recruit. This has led to a graying of the volunteer work force, in which a 50-year-old can feel that he or she is the springyist chicken in the coop.

It seems somehow crazy that Donald Trump is to arrive on the East End tomorrow for a fund-raiser, after two mass shootings within hours of each other, as if nothing were wrong.

Two sides are circling each other in regard to a new, consolidated town shellfish hatchery off Gann Road at Three Mile Harbor. Untangling this will help guide what has been an excessively contentious debate toward an amicable resolution.

Town and county officials are going to have a difficult time convincing anyone that the cause of a rash of earaches and other infections among people who surf and swim at Ditch Plain has been caused by anything other than wastewater effluent from the adjacent mobile home park.

The Montauk Lighthouse will undergo repair beginning this summer and major restoration of its protective seawall is to begin in the fall. These are costly endeavors — more than $1 million for the tower and $24 million for the stonework — but in the minds of many, well worth it.

The Trump re-election campaign recently began selling 10-pack plastic drinking straws after the president seized on the paper versions as a sign of liberal overreach. This followed media outrage from the right earlier this year after plastic ones were banned for takeout drinks in Washington, D.C.

What is it, really, about wind that pushes otherwise reasonable people over the edge? Certainly, there is no equivalent outcry when gas lines or water mains are installed or replaced. And if those vigorous in their opposition to the Orsted Deepwater South Fork Wind Farm far out in the ocean truly wanted to do something about the cost of electricity, they could advocate for the various “demand-reduction” programs that have had some success and have room to grow. No, for all the position papers and public statements, the intense opposition cannot truly be explained.

The lack of an efficient customer service response to the Optimum internet outage Monday night was remarkable in itself and for what it said about the overtaxed infrastructure on the East End in general.

From our vantage point overlooking Main Street, electric bicycles seem to have arrived, along with an increase in the number of traditional, pedal-powered bikes. We’ve seen a couple of electric scooters, too, which look like fun, but we are not sure that any of these belong on the sidewalk.

The humpback whale that became temporarily stuck in a commercial fishing net on Monday moved away before officials could determine if it may have remained tangled in a portion of the mesh and be at possible risk of greater harm, even death.

While the court cases develop, let’s not forget about the emergency personnel who responded to both scenes. The effects of tragedies like these ripple beyond the victims and their families.

Vote suppression and voting roll purges have been a hallmark of the Trump era. The census fight needs to be understood in that context.  

In the midst of a growing struggle to free themselves from the most powerful nation on earth, the American colonial rebels recognized something about tyranny that reverberates in our time. It was not that there would be leaders who sought to concentrate power in themselves, but that there would always be people who sought the heavy hand of authoritarianism.

East Hampton Town police dispatchers were kept busy by a prodigious pace of calls last week; of these, a substantial portion were about noise as people kicked out the jams, celebrating summer and the beginning of Fourth of July week. The party really didn’t get going until last Thursday after about 8 p.m. From there it was thumping bass from Old House Landing Road to Montauk Downs.

Before you grab that beef burger or toss some packages of hot dogs and buns into your shopping cart, think about going local this Fourth of July. East End baymen and baywomen provide heavenly and healthy seafood year round. Rounding out your holiday eating with fresh seafood from nearby waters seems to us a fine way to celebrate.

A day after an East Hampton Democratic primary, voters could be forgiven for wondering what all the fuss was about. Candidates from what might be considered the old-line part of the party won with ease. In what appeared to be a very strong turnout for a down-ballot primary, the East Hampton Reform Democrats’ trustee challengers were defeated. The strength of an activated Democratic base could also be seen in Andrew Strong’s win over East Hampton Town Justice Lisa R. Rana, a Republican who had sought cross-endorsement.

Town officials edged close last week to fully allowing Stephen Hand’s Path in East Hampton to be turned into a major transit route. The modest two-lane road already serves as a bypass for drivers eager to skirt East Hampton Village, and for many, it is a faster or more direct route to and from their homes or workplaces in Northwest or Springs. This has led to backups at Cedar Street and hot tempers from residents who have to cope with speeding drivers and long waits to get safely out of their driveways.

Tuesday’s East Hampton Democratic primary comes at an important time for the town trustees, who have moved away from being mostly reactive, as they were in the past, to looking ahead and leaning in on a new role as environmental advocates. While the town board may have to cope with all kinds of problems, the trustees’ mandate as stewards of critical waterways and ancient lands gives them moral authority that goes well beyond the harbors, bays, and woodland roads. 

‘Star shines for all?” an old friend roared last Thursday when stopping by in the rain to pick up his Star. “Doesn’t look like it out there!”

Tuesday’s Democratic primary for East Hampton Town justice is a strange one, and a Republican incumbent might walk away the winner. 

The town lawyer at the center of a controversy over a lawsuit brought by the new owner of Duryea’s in Montauk has departed for parts unknown, but this is hardly the end of the troubling matter. Many questions remain about who knew what when in an improper — and possibly illegal — settlement arrangement he signed.