Government

The plan to build an emergency room annex in East Hampton, which has wended its way through multiple regulatory boards over the last four years, was the subject of several angry exchanges when it returned to the town board on Tuesday. 

Arthur Graham, an East Hampton Village trustee who is running for mayor in the Sept. 15 election, has questioned the authenticity of 200 voter registrations, and is formally challenging them with the Suffolk County Board of Elections.  

Five candidates are vying for two open East Hampton Village Board seats in the Sept. 15 election: Richard Lawler, the appointed mayor, and Ray Harden an appointed trustee, on the Elms Party line; David Driscoll on the Fish Hooks line, and Chris Minardi of the villages zoning board of appeals and Sandra Melendez on the NewTown line.

"If we do not receive federal funding, there is no way that the state and local governments can cover the deficit," the governor said Monday, citing "catastrophic budget shortfalls" that could impact thousands of workers.

A proposed law that increases the number of littering offenses in East Hampton Village and makes it easier to prosecute those who improperly dispose of garbage in public receptacles was passed by the village board at a meeting on Friday.

Due to a booming real estate market, the Peconic Bay Region Community Preservation Fund collected $61.1 million in revenues so far this year, the most for the first seven months of a year in the program's history, Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr. announced last week. 

The preservation fund, which provides money for land preservation, water quality improvement, and the protection of maritime heritage, receives the proceeds of a 2-percent real estate transfer tax. The money goes to the five East End towns: East Hampton, Southampton, Shelter Island, Southold, and Riverhead.

An annual mosquito-sampling program in Accabonac Harbor concluded for the season on Friday, and while the coronavirus pandemic meant a loss of some interns and volunteers, this year's reduced program was deemed a success by the East Hampton town trustees and the director of the Suffolk County Public Works Department's division of vector control.

Earlier this month, East Hampton Town intervened to stop an extravagant outdoor entertainment concept called Etiquette at the establishment; it featured music, aerial performances, burlesque dancers, and other acts, and nightclub-style lighting.

A plan to relocate two Little League playing fields to make room for Stony Brook Southampton Hospital's planned annex in East Hampton has at least one persistent critic, and last Thursday Charlie Whitmore delivered a withering assessment of that plan to the town board.

A State Supreme Court judge signed an order on Monday prohibiting the Marram Montauk resort, the former Atlantic Terrace, from serving food or alcoholic beverages to patrons of the restaurant it has been operating, Il Buco at Mostrador Marram, on site or on the adjacent ocean beach.

In the latest of a series of debates, the three candidates running for mayor of East Hampton Village in the Sept. 15 election offered contrasting, often contentious visions for the village.

Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo issued an executive order intended to bolster the right to vote on Monday, as anxiety mounts amid congressional scrutiny of the United States Postal Service and President Trump's repeated assertions that voting by mail will result in electoral fraud.