Editorials

   Locals say it every summer: They have never, ever seen it so crowded. Only this year, the summer of 2013, we think they really mean it.

   Doesn’t anyone in East Hampton Town Hall do his or her homework? That is a fair question given the disregard for protected farmland that has become apparent recently.

   On a busy summer’s day, our local ambulance squads respond to an ever-increasing number of calls. Some of the emergencies they rush to are just that — matters of life and death. Other calls are less urgent, but the responders treat everyone with the utmost care. These volunteers are exemplary citizens, each having undergone dozens, if not hundreds, of hours’ training and refresher courses, as well as having devoted long periods of time to taking care of gear and answering calls.

   Many New Yorkers, whose state was among those in recent years that turned a long-overdue gender-blind eye on marriage, rightly celebrated the Supreme Court’s decision last week on the Defense of Marriage Act. Locally, we were pleased to learn that the plaintiff in this landmark case was a part-time Southampton resident, Edith Windsor.

    On a smaller scale, but also of major significance, at least for the South Fork, is the opening this month in Sag Harbor of the area’s first support and social center for gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender young people.

   By a strict party-line vote, the East Hampton Town Board approved a giant party called Shark Attack Sounds for the Fourth of July weekend in Montauk despite obvious concerns that the event had grown too large to be held either at its original location on East Lake Drive or at the Montauk Yacht Club.     

   There are perhaps hundreds of people engaged in the South Fork’s underground housing economy, at least if the online listings on Craigslist, Airbnb, and others are to be believed. An interesting account appeared in this newspaper last week about the now-ubiquitous short-term rental, in which landlords charge hundreds of dollars a night for temporary stays, turning ordinary houses on streets much like yours, no doubt, into hotels or motels, for all intents and purposes. What is baffling is why it is all so out in the open, despite local regulations barring the practice.

   New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has the right idea about sea-level rise, global warming, and the threat of catastrophic storms. East Hampton Town, and to a similar degree other local governments, have so far pretended these problems do not exist, although they may simply be paralyzed by their enormity. The discrepancy, however, is startling.

   The juxtaposition could not be more stark: East Hampton Town does not take adequate care of the public bathing beaches it already has and yet town officials appear to be thinking seriously about adding more. We say, not so fast. A little housekeeping and assumption-checking needs to occur first.

   Sag Harbor voters will choose a mayor and two board members on Tuesday at a pivotal time for the village. 

   Four candidates are vying for mayor: the two-term incumbent, Brian Gilbride, Pierce Hance, who held the post in the 1990s, Sandra Schroeder, who was the village clerk for many years, and Bruce Tait, the chairman of the village’s harbor committee. For us, the choice comes down to Mr. Hance or Mr. Tait; Mr. Gilbride has been too divisive a figure to stay on.

   Now in its second season, the Montauk Beach House, a hotel, bar, and music venue, remains in the news for good reason: How the modest former Ronjo Motel turned into a far larger business complex with only the barest of planning review is a key question for East Hampton Town officials — and the electorate.

   Like a missing tooth in a boxer’s smile, a gap in the notably verdant farmland along the Sag Harbor Road in East Hampton is a telling sight. This year’s potato crop is leafing out around the one-acre plot off Route 114 near Stephen Hand’s Path, but only a few weeds have sprouted in what is an abandoned and forlorn pit. Just how this hole came to be is no mystery: It was caused by a thoughtless road-drainage project. What is unacceptable and murky, however, is that nothing has been done to restore the site or to make amends for it.

   A photograph sent by a friend said it all. Visitors to Indian Wells Beach in Amagansett about an hour before sunset Saturday would have been treated to a mountain of garbage overflowing the metal bins and left haphazardly at the head of the parking lot. Looking closely at the photo, the preponderance of beer cans and empty cartons is apparent — most are Coors or Bud Light, which for some reason is the beverage of choice for the Indian Wells groups. A couple sits on a bench, taking in the evening air, just a few feet from the groaning bins.

   Earth-moving began this month on a long-delayed project to do something about persistent water pollution at Havens Beach, the Village of Sag Harbor’s sole bathing beach. This is good news — sort of. Unfortunately, it appears that after more than 25 years of unfulfilled promises and false starts, the work is not likely to be completed in time for the beginning of the swimming season.

   One thing should be clear to anyone in the audience (or watching on LTV). After yet another East Hampton Town Board meeting turned debacle it is more than time for Supervisor Bill Wilkinson and Councilwoman Theresa Quigley to call it quits. For all intents and purposes, they already have.

   One of the quirks of this admittedly quirky newspaper is that we leave the S off Ditch Plain in what we write. Almost everyone else calls that stretch of Montauk beach and the surrounding area Ditch Plains; we do not. To sharp-eyed readers this may seem to be a mistake, and, in fact, in conversation around the office the staff has been known to succumb. However, it was deemed long ago that the plain upon which the ditch or ditches were, was one, not many. Hence, it is Ditch Plain, not Plains. Or maybe it should even be Ditches Plain, really.

   Just in time for the beginning of the bathing and sunbathing season, Ditch Plain, one of East Hampton Town’s most popular beaches, will be, at least technically, off-limits to swimming.

   In an intriguing outcome to yesterday’s East Hampton School Board vote, residents opted for three newcomers, saying no thank you to one incumbent who has  strong ties to the community. This may well signal a level of anger with the district over its poorly handled, surprise demotion of Gina Kraus, the popular John M. Marshall Elementary School principal, as well as a long period this year when the East Hampton Middle School principal was absent for what was described as a medical problem.

   Much has been made about the Town of East Hampton seeking money from the Federal Aviation Administration to help pay for projects at the airport. According to both those who favor taking aid from Washington and those who do not, the funding comes with strings attached: The airport must be operated in the way the agency likes — and with only a minimal degree of local control. However, there seems to be what might be called a moral and ethical dimension to the question of what it really means to accept financial help from outside.

   Having watched the workings of school boards here for as long as we have, one thing has become obvious: The chummy closeness between elected board members and district administrators is not necessarily a good thing. With this in mind, the over-arching yardstick, if you will, with which we think voters should measure candidates for the boards in Tuesday’s votes is independence. The question should not be who is easiest to get along with. Rather, it should be who is most likely to maintain sufficient distance.

   Of the twin scandals that broke for the Obama administration this week, the one that at this early point seems more troubling is that of the secret gathering of Associated Press phone records. That is not to say that the targeting of Tea Party and related groups by the Internal Revenue Service is defensible. Neither should have happened, but one appears to have been the result of a very bad decision at some so-far unknown level of bureaucracy.

   As the East Hampton Town Democrats move rapidly toward a Wednesday nominating convention for town offices, we find ourselves wondering again where the Republicans have gone, and why.

   Reading the tea leaves, it appears that East Hampton Town may be advertising for a town manager some time soon. Such was the unmistakable impression at a meeting Saturday at which the advantages of such a position were extolled. Hosted by the Group for Good Government, the League of Women Voters, and the East Hampton Business Alliance, a compelling, if mostly one-sided, take on the issue was heard.

   As spring on the South Fork really gets under way, a jarring discrepancy between how we think about this area and how run down it looks in many places is becoming apparent. For a resort and second-home community of such renown, East Hampton Town is looking a little down in the dumps these days. Litter is everywhere. An increasing welter of utility lines mar the overhead view. Roadsides, at least those outside the incorporated villages, are left without mowing or maintenance. Trees downed by Hurricane Sandy, now more than six months on, are still in evidence.

   Before food became such a phenomena that there were magazines devoted to it, before cooking shows, way back before locavore was even a word, the potato was king in these parts. We get a glimpse of those days around this time each spring when farmers begin seeding new crops. And it is right around now when passers-by cannot help but reflect on how wonderful it is that any land is left to plow. Thanks to the devotion of a small number of local farming families, there are still people living on the East End who know how it is done.

   It was an otherwise quiet spring day, and a resident dog owner and lover, morning cup of java from Mary’s Marvelous in hand, was standing near the water’s edge at the ocean at Georgica enjoying the quiet and taking in the view. Then, out of nowhere, a small purebred dragging a leash appeared at his side, barking angrily as if the dark shadow itself were at hand. After what seemed like and an inordinate length of time, a woman called the dog over, and without so much as a wave of apology, they walked away. So much for serenity.

   The united call from a number of South Fork environmental groups that the Town of East Hampton proceed no further on coastal policy until at least one top expert has signed on as an adviser is welcome. Post-Hurricane Sandy, East Hampton has been among many shoreline communities rushing to rebuild and reinforce damaged property, in many cases without taking the time to be sure the work will not do more harm than good over the long term. East Hampton Town has fast-tracked scores of permits, and more are headed to the zoning board of appeals for review.

   After an unnecessarily messy period in which the East Hampton School District denied tenure to a well-regarded elementary school principal, stumbled into a likely lawsuit by bus personnel, and repeatedly defied state law on sharing documents under discussion at open meetings, it is little surprise that as many as five newcomers will seek places on the school board next month. Such moments come and go with school boards, and East Hampton is joined by Wainscott in illegally withholding documents and by Montauk in generating parents’ ire, in the latter case over class sizes.

   A proposal unveiled last week for an 89-unit housing complex in Amagansett for the well-off 55-and-older set is — there’s no other word for it — audacious. And, once you get past the shock factor, it has to rank among the just plain most-unwelcome and ill-conceived notions to come down the pike in a long time.

   During a meeting of the East Hampton Village Board last week, two members of the public spoke of the dangers that the continuing increase in automobile and truck traffic poses to pedestrians and bicyclists. Among other things, they suggested that bike lanes were needed. Mayor Paul F. Rickenbach Jr. told them to take their ideas to Village Police Chief Gerard Larsen. This is something that should be explored, but it will take more than a knowledgeable law enforcement officer to figure out how to solve Main Street’s problems.

   An article in these pages this week about local enforcement of regulations governing access to businesses and public accommodations for people with disabilities points to a looming problem: East Hampton Town departments have been left unable to provide needed services as a result of three years of budget-cutting. Seeking compliance with disabilities laws, both local and federal, would take a considerable investment of time and staff, something the departments involved lack.