Government

Worried residents of Napeague, who live in a part of East Hampton Town that’s next door to a vast state park littered with miles of dead trees, turned out in force to hear Chris Beckert, chief of the Amagansett Fire Department, address the hamlet’s citizens advisory committee about a recent fire in the park, which came scarily close to some of their homes. 

Gabrielle McKay, who was sworn in as the East Hampton Village clerk at the end of July, is among the youngest of municipal clerks.

The East Hampton Town Board again discussed draft legislation that would allow affordable multi-unit residences on lots as small as a half-acre.

“Our season has been an amazing season,” John Ryan Jr., the town’s chief lifeguard, said of East Hampton Town’s junior lifeguard program, which teaches children ages 9 to 15 the importance of water safety and ocean awareness.

The East Hampton Town Trustees heard a pitch for the construction of a fifth and sixth oyster reef in Three Mile Harbor on Monday, a plan they quickly approved. 

Nothing belongs in the public right of way, except maybe a mailbox, a utility pole, or a fire hydrant. That was the message in a joint presentation from Councilman David Lys and Kevin Cobb, a highway project inspector from the Highway Department, at the Aug. 5 East Hampton Town Board meeting. 

Representative Nick LaLota of New York’s First Congressional District has a potential challenger, Chris Gallant, a veteran, air traffic controller, union leader, and volunteer firefighter.

Blade Air Mobility, a name that became synonymous with many South and North Fork residents’ frustration over helicopter traffic and its attendant noise, has announced the sale of its passenger division to Joby Aviation.

While CNN reports that the federal government’s credit rating with Moody’s Investors Service fell this year, East Hampton Town’s own rating remains steady. According to its latest credit report, released on Friday, East Hampton has maintained its top rating of Aaa for the ninth consecutive year.

Immigrant advocates and the East Hampton Village Board were broadly in agreement that handling code violations vis-a-vis service workers could be streamlined in a way to ease deportation fears.

Gov. Kathy Hochul pledged on Monday to respond in kind to Texas Republicans’ move to redraw that state’s congressional districts to further advantage their party in the 2026 midterm elections.

Jaine Mehring, a member of the town’s zoning board of appeals and litter action committee, and the founder of Build.In.Kind/East Hampton, announced the formation of the East Hampton Community Housing Trust to help meet a persistent crisis.

It took 50 years, but the final two lots of a four-lot duneland subdivision, created in 1975 by the Gardiner’s Bay Corporation along Bendigo Road in Amagansett, will soon be developed.

Justice allows surveyors to enter the Maidstone Gun Club, while the club’s president says it’s “in good shape to open.”

Construction could begin as early as this fall on a new, Federal Emergency Management Agency-compliant, 20-foot-high dune at Ditch Plain in Montauk following the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation's approval of a permit for the coastal restoration project.

Gov. Kathy Hochul declared a state of emergency Thursday for downstate New York and Long Island in advance of heavy rain and localized flooding forecasted to hit the areas in the evening. 

As temperatures rise in East Hampton Town’s waterways, algal blooms are appearing, growing, and, in at least one case, declining.

Neighbors of a Beach Hampton couple who live at 183 Marine Boulevard in Amagansett made it known to the East Hampton Town Zoning Board of Appeals on July 22 that they would be no happier living near a house 10 feet higher than it is now whether its roof is gabled or flat. 

The East Hampton Town Planning Board came close to scheduling a public hearing on an application for the relocation of a 150-foot communications tower at the Springs Firehouse on Fort Pond Boulevard last week. Instead, despite pressure from Elite Towers, the applicant, the board decided one more meeting was necessary. 

Gov. Kathy Hochul signed legislation at Suffolk Community College in Brentwood last week aimed at making septic system upgrades more affordable, which environmental advocates say is critical to addressing impaired water bodies, including in East Hampton Town. 

Lee Zeldin, who represented New York’s First Congressional District from 2015 to 2023 and is now the administrator of the federal Environmental Protection Agency, was heckled and admonished by climate activists at the Hampton Synagogue in Westhampton Beach, in a chaotic scene that turned violent.

The East Hampton Town Board voted last Thursday to spend $10 million in community preservation fund money to acquire a conservation easement over approximately 5.5 acres of vacant land along the shore of Georgica Cove, at 41 and 47 Cove Hollow Farm Road in East Hampton Village.

The rally coincided with the fifth anniversary of the death of John Lewis, a United States representative from Georgia and an icon of the civil rights movement, and was the latest in a series of protests against the Trump administration organized by People for Democracy East Hampton.

The underutilized Town Lane Park in East Hampton, where works by the late sculptor Sasson Soffer are on permanent display, could see a dramatic transformation, as proposed to the town board on Tuesday by Soffer’s widow, Stella Sands, and Emily Goldstein of the Drawing Room gallery in East Hampton.

The East Hampton Town Trustees voted to authorize a special season for the taking of soft clams or razor clams by the method known as powering, or churning.

ReWild Long Island and East Hampton Town have launched an initiative to encourage backyard composting by taking advantage of a “flash sale” on compost bins and expert support.

Jeff Miller, the Republican candidate for East Hampton Town clerk, will hold a campaign fund-raiser at LTV Studios in Wainscott on July 24 from 6 to 8 p.m.

Speaking at an Amagansett Citizens Advisory Committee Meeting this week, State Assemblyman Tommy John Schiavoni said that rebuilding of the Cranberry Hole Road bridge is included in the M.T.A. capital plan, “but the pace is glacial.”

As goes the little saltmarsh sparrow, so goes the salt marsh. In what could be a win for both, a team of scientists will now capture and band saltmarsh sparrows at Accabonac Harbor.

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.