Government

A multiuse path in the Buckskill Meadow Trunzo Preserve in Wainscott will be named to honor the late Lewis Zachary Cohen, a longtime member of East Hampton Town’s Nature Preserve Committee, during a ceremony on Monday at 11 a.m.

The Southampton Town Board is working to amend the town code to accommodate the possible arrival of cannabis dispensaries and on-site pot lounges in town. Turns out it’s a pretty contentious issue even after the town voted along with more than 600 other towns across the state to participate in New York’s newly legalized cannabis economy. 

Historical problems with both traffic safety and flooding at a multi-street intersection in Montauk may be alleviated by a redesign and installation of a roundabout.

East Hampton Town is asking residents to weigh in on the new senior citizens center to be constructed at 403 Abraham’s Path in Amagansett, with results to inform the design of the center and the programs offered there.

An East Hampton Town Trustees-commissioned study of fish migration in the vicinity of the landing site of the South Fork Wind farm’s export cable is to begin today and last approximately one week.

The East Hampton Village Board will resume public work sessions after a vote at their meeting on July 6. They will be held the first Thursday of each month, at 11 a.m., at a historic location to be determined before each meeting.

In response to the Supreme Court of the United States having overturned a 1913 New York State statute that sharply restricted the carrying of concealed firearms in public, Gov. Kathy Hochul on Friday signed legislation bolstering the state’s concealed-carry restrictions.

One year after a landmark deal in Southampton returned Shinnecock Nation burial grounds to the tribe, New York State stands poised to enact two bills that would further honor Long Island’s Indigenous populations. One would grant the Montaukett tribe its long-sought state recognition while the other would ensure that unmarked burial remains in the state are honored and preserved.

“This is exactly the type of project we hoped would come forward,” Ed Haye, a Sag Harbor Village trustee, said at Friday’s special meeting to discuss a 79-unit proposal for affordable housing in Sag Harbor’s downtown office district that was pitched to the village by Adam Potter and Conifer Developers.

Careful observers may have noticed the removal of 1,600 square feet of phragmites along Hook Pond in East Hampton Village, only feet from the Main Beach parking lot, as well as 300 feet of hedgerow that ran along Ocean Avenue and blocked the view of the pond. Here's what's happening.

East Hampton Town’s Energy and Sustainability Advisory Committee has recommended to the town board that all building permits for new residential and commercial construction issued after Dec. 31 require that all appliances, including heating and cooling systems, be electric and energy efficient.

Language is being finalized for a Nov. 8 referendum that will ask voters whether to approve a .5-percent real estate transfer tax to be allocated to a community housing fund, which would be in addition to the 2-percent transfer tax for the community preservation fund.

A New York State Supreme Court justice has ordered that more than 6,000 East Hampton beach-driving permits be revoked. The decision came in a legal battle over a section of ocean shoreline on Napeague known as Truck Beach. 

Following a Supreme Court ruling that lets states set their own abortion laws, the world's richest and most powerful democracy joined one of the poorest countries in the continental Americas (Nicaragua), the smallest country in Central America (El Salvador), and an ultranationalist Poland to become only the fourth country in the Western world where abortion care is widely banned.

Eight months after the East Hampton Town Trustees narrowly voted to approve construction of a dock on Three Mile Harbor — the first such approval in more than three decades — the town’s zoning board of appeals denied an application for the permit needed for the dock’s construction to proceed.

A Montauk property owner accused by East Hampton Town of renting his house more than 50 times over nine months could be facing over $200,000 in fines after being issued dozens of appearance tickets for alleged violations of the town's rental registry law. His attorney says "there are lots of reasons why the town's case is not going to be acceptable to an East Hampton Town jury."

Last year, the contest pit clams dug from Three Mile, Accabonac, and Napeague Harbors against one another, with previous contests including those harvested from Lake Montauk. This year's contest, the trustees' 32nd, will be on Oct. 9.

Gov. Kathy Hochul, who became New York State’s first female governor in August following the resignation of Gov. Andrew Cuomo amid accusations of sexual harassment, easily defeated two challengers in Tuesday’s Democratic Party primary election. On the Republican side, Representative Lee Zeldin of New York’s First Congressional District is the winner in a four-way race for the party’s nominee for governor.

The Supreme Court of the United States overturned a 1913 New York State statute that sharply restricted the carrying of concealed firearms in public by requiring applicants for concealed-carry permits to demonstrate proper cause. Reaction was swift on both sides of the issue.

The Coalition for Hither Woods, an organization of conservation groups that formed in 1982 to oppose proposals to develop that area of Montauk, has reformed as an incorporated not-for-profit to oppose the potential siting there of a sewage treatment plant to serve the hamlet.

Not a single person at Tuesday night’s public hearing on PSEG-Long Island’s plan to run an underground transmission line through the Long Pond Greenbelt supported the idea. Many forcefully opposed the cable, which would run beneath existing high wires, which slice the greenbelt in two and currently connect two substations, one off the Bridgehampton-Sag Harbor Turnpike in Sag Harbor, the other off Buell Lane in East Hampton.

Orsted and Eversource, joint developers of the South Fork Wind farm, have announced an agreement with environmental groups to further enhance measures aimed at protecting the critically endangered North Atlantic right whale during construction and operation of the wind farm.

During Monday's meeting of the East Hampton Town Trustees, John Aldred briefed his colleagues on a June 14 count of mosquito larvae in Accabonac Harbor, where a pilot program to sample larvae has led to a reduction in the use of methoprene, a larvicide, by the Suffolk County Department of Public Works’ Division of Vector Control.

Interested parties and others waiting for the East Hampton Town Planning Board to accept or turn down the Wainscott Commercial Center’s draft environmental impact statement were left disappointed last week, as no vote was held. But progress was made.

The East Hampton Town Board on Tuesday discussed measures that would clarify the code with respect to outdoor seating for delicatessens and takeout restaurants. Outdoor string lighting also got a look.

The day after the Sag Harbor Village Board passed a long-anticipated measure allowing for affordable work-force housing developments in the office district of the village, a 79-unit whopper was proposed. The project seeks to combine five parcels owned by several limited liability companies of which Adam Potter, the founder of the nonprofit Friends of Bay Street, is the principal.

Early voting for the Tuesday primary started on Saturday and continues through Sunday at the Windmill Village 2 housing complex at 219 Accabonac Road East Hampton. In Southampton Town, early voting is at the Stony Brook Southampton campus at 70 Tuckahoe Road.

The Aug. 23 Republican primary for the nomination to represent New York’s First Congressional District may have a third candidate following last week’s campaign announcement by Michelle Bond, who is the chief executive officer of the Association for Digital Asset Markets.

A site near the former landfill in Montauk is promising as a potential location for a wastewater treatment plant to serve several locations in that hamlet, East Hampton Town Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc said last week.

New wastewater management measures would make great strides toward reducing nitrogen in Hog Creek in Springs, Molly Graffam and Ron Paulsen of Cornell Cooperative Extension told the East Hampton Town Board on Tuesday.