East Hampton Town experienced a total governmental funds loss of $27.3 million in 2024, primarily due to losses in the general fund and the community preservation fund, the latter impacted by last year’s $56 million purchase of a 30-acre lot at 66 Main Street in Wainscott, the largest C.P.F. purchase in the town’s history.
But the town did receive “a clean management letter, where we had no recommendations,” according to Craig Hauser of the auditing firm Nawrocki Smith, who presented his firm’s finding as to the town’s comprehensive financial report for 2024 to the town board on Tuesday. “I’m happy to say there were no material weaknesses in internal control related to our finding and reporting,” he said.
The town had a total net position of $670 million, Mr. Hauser said, including total assets of all funds totaling $226.9 million, primarily related to cash on hand and investments. Liabilities totaled $59.2 million. The town’s total fund balance of $151.8 million represented the net decrease of $27.3 million.
Total revenues and other financing sources were $184 million, compared to $173.6 million in 2023, the increase related to miscellaneous sources, he said. Total property tax revenue was $65.8 million, which was within the New York State tax cap. Total expenditures and other financing uses were $211.4 million, compared to $145.3 million in 2023, the increase related to C.P.F. spending. Total debt service expenditures totaled $15.7 million, or 7.4 percent of total expenditures.
“The town did have to dip into some of its fund balances this year,” said Becky Hansen, the town’s administrator and budget officer. Put in context, however, “the post-Covid-19 high, so to speak, revenue-wise — especially with the mortgage recording tax and building permits, [certificate of occupancy] fees — greatly contributed to surpluses where you didn’t have to access any fund balance in fiscal year 2021, ‘22, or ‘23.”
But last year the town did not realize more than $400,000 in mortgage recording tax revenue for which it had budgeted. “Obviously the real estate market softened a little bit,” she said, “but we also greatly increased spending in recreation for our beaches, with our lifeguards. We’ve been fully staffed the last two summers, which has been huge,” as safety at the town beaches is “really important to the town board and to the public as a whole.”
“The town has been purchasing properties that are pricey,” Councilman David Lys said, “but they’re also special.” The town was fortunate to be in a position to buy “one of greatest pieces of property” that has been offered, referring to 66 Main Street in Wainscott, which was in the Osborn family for more than 300 years and which the town purchased from Ronald Lauder, heir to the Estée Lauder cosmetics company.
“We see, particularly in the last number of years, the cost of everything increasing,” Councilwoman Cate Rogers said, speaking of “everything from building materials to being able to staff folks to being able to keep the services that we provide to our residents going without significant giant tax increases. It’s a tough line to walk, but when you lay it out like this, we can see that we’re staying within our guardrails.”
Regarding C.P.F. purchases, “the land cost is continuing to rise at a rate we’ve never really seen before in this town,” she said. “Being able to still make purchases and stay within fiscal responsibility is also critical, and having this audit helps us see all of that.”
