Government

East Hampton Town

A Poxabogue Sale Go-Ahead

    A $261,985 bill from a consulting firm that had overseen the process of gaining federal approval for the air traffic control tower at East Hampton Airport created shock waves — and a heated exchange — at a town board meeting on Tuesday when Councilwoman Theresa Quigley suggested the work had not been authorized by the board. In a lengthy discussion, it also was reported that the 2013 airport budget was likely to be exceeded by $200,000, and perhaps $300,000.

    The East Hampton Independence Party and Friends of Dominick Stanzione, both of which had not filed detailed financial disclosure statements for the first half of the year by the July 15 deadline, filed their statements with the New York State Board of Elections in the past week.

    The East Hampton Independence Party listed no contributions in its report, but paid out $2,518.98. A $2,000 contribution on April 28 to Friends of Jay Schneiderman, supporting his re-election bid for county legislator, accounts for the bulk of that.

    In a split vote last Thursday, the East Hampton Town Board agreed to join a coalition of municipalities surrounding the Peconic Estuary, in order to work together on water-quality goals.

    The proposed inter-municipal agreement had been a matter of contention for several weeks, as Councilman Peter Van Scoyoc and Councilwoman Sylvia Overby pressed for East Hampton to join in, while Councilwoman Theresa Quigley and Supervisor Bill Wilkinson said the proposal had not yet been thoroughly vetted, and raised questions about details of the agreement.

    “I wish,” said Nathaniel Miller, “that whoever it is would be a man and come and talk to me, or yell at me, or something.”

    In recent months, multiple acts of vandalism have targeted the boat, mooring line, nets, and truck belonging to Mr. Miller, a 13th-generation bayman and, since his election in 2011, an East Hampton Town Trustee. Last winter, windows were broken at the Lamb Building in Amagansett, where the trustees meet. Floodlights were cracked, a fence rail was broken, and a tire iron was found on the floor of the meeting room.

    On July 16, Representative Tim Bishop introduced a bill that would prevent further development on Plum Island by decoupling its sale from the construction of the National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility in Kansas.

    In addition to a proposal that East Hampton Town establish a rental registry, which is covered separately, two other regulations to address problems in residential neighborhoods were discussed this week by the town board. One involves trucks parked on house lots; the other whether permits should be required for backyard sporting events.

East Hampton Town

Eyeing Cemetery Expansion

    The East Hampton Town Board is pondering a land purchase that would allow for expansion of the Oak Lane Cemetery in Amagansett. Board members said Tuesday that, before deciding to proceed, they will first examine the status of other cemeteries in the town to see if additional space will be needed, review the costs, including purchase price and ongoing maintenance costs of the expansion, tally the potential proceeds from gravesite sales, and discuss who would be able to purchase the cemetery plots.

    Establishing an East Hampton Town rental registry, and requiring landlords to inform the town about their plans, would not solve housing code violations, nor even give town officials the clout that had been hoped for when the idea was first broached. So said Patrick Gunn, a town attorney and head of East Hampton’s Division of Public Safety, on Tuesday.

    The East Hampton Town Republican Committee, which did not nominate a town supervisor candidate through the usual channels this year, has instead turned the selection process over to rank-and-file Republicans by successfully petitioning for a write-in primary on Sept. 10.

    Approval of an agreement through which East Hampton Town would join forces with other East End municipalities to work together on water-quality protection issues, including those mandated by federal and state agencies, got put off for the second time at an East Hampton Town Board meeting on Tuesday.

    The Peconic Baykeeper organization has taken legal action against the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation over what it says are more than 1,400 septic systems and sewage treatment plants across Suffolk County that are not being held to environmental standards.

    In a split vote last Thursday, the East Hampton Town Board declined to join forces with other municipalities bordering the Peconic Estuary in an effort to pursue ecosystem and water quality protection goals.

    An intermunicipal agreement calls for each entity to contribute to the costs of achieving the goals of a comprehensive conservation and management plan developed by the Peconic Estuary Protection Committee — goals such as restoring and enhancing tidal wetlands, controlling and reducing pollution, and complying with federal, state, and local coastal regulations.

East Hampton Town

Arts Council Appointments

    After establishing an East Hampton Arts Council last month, the East Hampton Town Board appointed 12 members to the group at a meeting last Thursday. The group includes visual artists and art instructors along with an art lawyer, a collector and photographer, a theater director, a writer and publisher, and owners of a gallery and a music store.

    Residents of a Springs neighborhood near Three Mile Harbor who are members of the Duck Creek Farm Association are poised to begin caring for a town nature preserve along Babe’s Lane, fronting on the harbor, as soon as a officials approve a management plan.

    The association is the first to “adopt” a preserve under a program established by the town, and will work to remove invasive species from the two-acre waterfront area under a restoration plan.

    Putnam Bridge, the Connecticut developer seeking to build a senior citizen housing development on the former Principi property east of the Amagansett commercial district on Montauk Highway, has downsized its plan for the development following the Town Planning Department’s critique of the proposal.

    Initial plans for 555 Amagansett, as the proposed development is known, called for 63 cottages and 26 apartments, for a total of 89 units. These dwellings were to average 1,550 square feet and be priced between $850,000 and $1.8 million.

    “We offer on-premises, heated, indoor, winter storage for your vehicle in our state-of-the-art, 12,000-square-foot facility,” Kalbacher’s Auto in Springs proudly states on its Web site.

    The problem, according to East Hampton Town’s chief building inspector, Tom Preiato, is that in 2006 the town planning board approved only half that for indoor car storage at the Fort Pond Boulevard site. And that discrepancy is part of what is holding up a certificate of occupancy for the property.

    Mayor Paul F. Rickenbach Jr. welcomed the members of the East Hampton Village Zoning Board of Appeals at the board’s meeting on Friday, saying that zoning “probably is the core issue with respect to the governance of a municipality,” and suggesting that they “be mindful that as the zoning code evolves and is applied and manifests itself, that’s how your community maintains its personality and aura of cooperation and embracement.”

    The hand-painted “Clam Pies” sign in front of the dilapidated building on Pantigo Road in East Hampton that was once a restaurant called the Crystal Room is no longer there, and soon the building itself will disappear, to be replaced by six houses, if an initial site plan presented to the East Hampton Town Planning Board on July 10 is approved.

    A discussion at an East Hampton Town Board meeting on Tuesday centered on how to limit the parking of commercial vehicles and large trucks with equipment at residences.

    Under the town code, residents of a house may park their own commercially registered vehicle or “light truck” there. Businesses, “commercial operation[s], or other nonresidential activit[ies]” are generally not permitted in residential zones, with a few limited exceptions.

East Hampton Town

Wildlife Group Does Not Endorse Deer Plan

    Bill Crain, the president of the East Hampton Group for Wildlife, appeared before the East Hampton Town Board on Tuesday to request the removal of his organization’s name from a recently adopted town deer-management plan, which it does not endorse.

    A well-credentialed aviation law consultant hired by the East Hampton Aviation Association has issued a report mirroring the advice given East Hampton Town by its own aviation consultant — that, in order to enact rules restricting access to the airport in an effort to reduce noise, Federal Aviation Administration permission will be needed, even if the town ceases to accept new federal airport grants.

    In a report to the East Hampton Town Board on Tuesday, Jim Brundige, the East Hampton Airport manager, said that the number of planes landing at or departing from the airport during the Fourth of July holiday period, from June 28 through July 8, were notably fewer than the number using the airport during the same period last year. The “total operations” over the recent holiday week numbered 921, he said; last year there were 1,913 operations — takeoffs or landings — during the June 29 to July 9 holiday period.

    Diane McNally, clerk of the East Hampton Town trustees, reported at their meeting on Tuesday that the trustees were copied on a letter from Suffolk County to Supervisor Bill Wilkinson regarding the 2013-14 dredging season. The county, she said, seeks an up-to-date condition assessment of waterways affected by shoaling, including a map of soundings, by July 27.

Trustees also debate Georgica Pond, vector control

Shark Attack Sounds, a party for 3,900 beginning tomorrow night at the Montauk Yacht Club and slated to continue into the wee hours of Saturday, will go on, thanks to a last-minute approval by the East Hampton Town Board.

    Sean McPherson, the owner of the Crow’s Nest restaurant and motel in Montauk and a collector of exotic cars, wants to build a new, 600-square-foot garage on his Miller Avenue property in Montauk’s Ditch Plain neighborhood. His application was discussed at a June 25 public hearing before the East Hampton Town Zoning Board of Appeals.

    A small building lot on an acre of waterfront property on Fort Pond in Montauk brought out a large group of neighbors at an East Hampton Town Zoning Board of Appeals hearing on June 11.

    Timothy and Noell Twiggs, who own the undeveloped acre at 85 South Edgemere Street, had obtained several setback variances as well as a natural resources special permit in previous applications to the board. At their first hearing, in early 2012, no member of the public attended, a fact not lost on the board members.

    While the votes for the two candidates for Sagaponack Village trustee were close in number on Friday, the race was not.

    Joy Sieger and William Barbour were each re-elected for two-year terms. Ms. Sieger got 47 votes; Mr. Barbour 46.

    The village board holds public meetings on the third Monday of each month and meets on planning issues on the second Monday of each month. A monthly calendar and legal notices are posted on the village’s Web site, sagaponackvillage.org.

    In a near-unanimous vote last Thursday, the East Hampton Town Board adopted a deer management plan for the town, after hearing the results of a March survey that identified only 877 deer living here, far fewer than is generally believed.

    The plan contains a number of possible actions and alternatives to further assess the deer population and monitor the herd, measures that could be used to reduce it, and other long-term management options.