Government

Three weeks after the East Hampton Town Board heard from residents urging it to opt out of the May turkey hunting season announced last year by the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, some 30 people were in the main meeting room at Town Hall Tuesday, many of them applauding speakers who urged the board to opt in.

Owners of one of the two dozen 1700-1850 timber-frame landmarks in East Hampton Village have been called to task after making renovations affecting protected aspects of the structure. “It’s egregious, and they knew what they were doing, that’s the most upsetting aspect of this," the mayor said.

Lee Zeldin, who represented New York’s First Congressional District from 2015 through 2022 and was the Republican Party’s nominee for governor of New York in the November election, has launched a political action committee to support Republican candidates “who are committed to advancing" his "efforts to grow the diverse coalition of first-time Republican voters” who helped to make the race for governor so close in 2022.

The long-planned improvement to the navigational channel in Montauk Harbor remains on track for completion this fall, representatives of the federal Army Corps of Engineers told the East Hampton Town Board, but a delay to fall 2024 is possible.

Legislation introduced at last week’s East Hampton Village Board to create a standalone Ambulance Department “to provide a municipal paid and volunteer general ambulance service in the village and contracted-for areas of the Town of East Hampton” so alarmed a faction of the ambulance corps that it scheduled an emergency meeting. The law will be the subject of a public hearing on March 17.

The rough road near the Rough Riders Landing housing complex in Montauk has a smooth future ahead of it: Last week the East Hampton Town Board approved the issuance of $285,000 in bonds to pay for improvements to Tuthill and Fort Pond Roads.

The East Hampton Village Board is seeking ideas for the future management of the 13 Sea Spray Cottages at Main Beach, and has already received several submissions, including one from a West Palm Beach, Fla., company, and others from current tenants.

The long-awaited completion of a town-approved plan to rehabilitate the commercial fishing dock on Star Island in Montauk, which has been beset by delays and add-on costs, took a step forward last week as the East Hampton Town Board voted to amend two contracts and allocate additional money.

The East Hampton Town Planning Board had one clear message for the owners of Rita Cantina at its March 1 meeting: Clean up your act before the season begins.

While it’s still a mystery as to who actually founded the organization Political Transparency — which has been running ads in The Star and on social media that are highly critical of the current East Hampton Town Board — a spokesman for the related StopEHTownBoard.com did offer some insight into the organization and its goals this week.

Marcos Baladron, who has served as East Hampton Village administrator for just over two years, will receive the Hon. Paul F. Rickenbach Distinguished Service Award from the Suffolk County Village Officials Association next month. If he weren’t so modest, he might admit to feeling vindicated.

In their deliberations to date over proposed new special permitting rules, town board members had emphasized the recent uptick in outsize parties taking place at town beaches and how to rein them in while not spoiling the sun-soaked fun for would-be revelers. But one caterer wondered if such parties were a concern at more isolated beaches.

Candidates for Suffolk County’s elected offices have officially been nominated by the Republican and Democratic Committees, with Brookhaven Town Supervisor Ed Romaine and Dave Calone leading the Republican and Democratic tickets, respectively, for the county executive seat. Manny Vilar of Springs, a Republican, and Ann Welker of Southampton Town, a Democrat, are running for the County Legislature.

An East Hampton Town proposal to build a sewage treatment plant in Montauk appears to be dead in the water for now following a unanimous 8-to-0 vote by Suffolk County Parks Commission trustees last week to reject a proposed town-county land swap that was key to the project’s getting off the ground.

The Suffolk County Republican Committee has nominated Manny Vilar of Springs, a retired state parks police officer who is the chairman of the East Hampton Town Republican Committee, to run for the Second Legislative District seat.

A “dot” on a town map of a Springs-Fireplace Road property was a hot topic at last Thursday’s town board meeting as the board discussed a controversial car-wash plan proposed there. It is now up to the town board to decide whether to amend the underlying Urban Renewal map that “currently requires that access for the lot be taken directly from Springs-Fireplace Road,” said Eric Schantz, assistant planning director.

The East Hampton Town Zoning Board of Appeals voted unanimously at a Feb. 14 work session to reopen a hearing concerning the Shagwong Tavern in Montauk a week after upholding a determination that it was operating as a nightclub, in violation of the town code.

Suffolk County Legislator Bridget Fleming announced Thursday that she will not seek re-election to the Second Legislative District this year, and that she is endorsing Ann Welker of the Southampton Town Trustees to succeed her in office on the Democratic ticket.

An anti-littering campaign here called No Fling Spring had members of the town’s litter action committee talking up plans for a public service announcement.

A draft of the Town of East Hampton’s $15.1 million proposed capital budget for 2023, released last week, was notable for what it did not include — a line item for a new senior citizens center on Abraham’s Path in Amagansett.

With a negative environmental impact declaration in hand, the East Hampton Town Board voted last week to issue $850,000 worth of bonds to bury about 2,000 linear feet of utility lines in Montauk.

An East Hampton Village property purchased in 2017 for $57 million does not have adequate access to the beach, and so the owner, Lee Fixel, has applied for a permit to build an elevated walkway through the dunes that would connect with an easement that leads to the beach.

A week after the East Hampton Town Board unveiled a proposed management plan for the 18-acre Amagansett Plains parcel at 555 Montauk Highway, the Amagansett Citizens Advisory Committee asked for a 90-day pause before any public hearings or votes are scheduled on the plan.

New York State’s highest court, the Court of Appeals, last Thursday struck down a permit that the State Department of Environmental Conservation had awarded in March 2019 to the Sand Land mine, a business in Noyac that predates the Southampton Town law prohibiting mining.

When it comes to East Hampton Town's proposal to swap land it owns elsewhere for Hither Woods parkland in order to build a wastewater treatment plant, Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr. and State Senator Anthony Palumbo will “take no action regarding sponsorship of park alienation legislation” until the town has undertaken a full state environmental quality review act analysis, Mr. Thiele wrote this week.

Ending two years of concerted effort, the Southampton Town Board voted on Tuesday to approve the use of community preservation fund money to buy the development rights for the John Steinbeck house on Bluff Lane in Sag Harbor Village, to turn it into a writers retreat.

East Hampton Town lawmakers are taking steps to address a longstanding problem relating to the protection of trees located on town-owned property that are either near or directly on construction sites.

The East Hampton Town Board is set to opt out of a new opportunity for hunters in Suffolk County to shoot turkeys in the month of May — if there’s time.

Following a destructive “Black Cat” ransomware attack on Suffolk County computer systems beginning in September, the Town of East Hampton set out to fast-track its own cybersecurity in December, and on Tuesday approved a $360,000 expenditure to VirtuIT Systems of Nanuet, N.Y.

Having received the unanimous support of the East Hampton Town Democratic Committee, Kathee Burke-Gonzalez will lead the Democrats’ 2023 ticket as its pick for town supervisor. The East Hampton Town Republican Committee has selected Gretta Leon, a newcomer to town politics, to run against Ms. Burke-Gonzalez.