Government

The Lars Simenson Skatepark, on South Essex Street in Montauk, will reopen Friday after an extensive renovation made possible through a public-private partnership.

The East Hampton Town Board, citing rising instances of overclearing of parcels during building construction, voted last Thursday to increase the fees for vegetation compliance reviews. The vote followed an Aug. 16 discussion during which an assistant town attorney and Natural Resources Department official relayed numerous examples of overclearing.

The East Hampton Town Trustees voted on Monday to conduct an aerial drone survey of approximately 50 miles of shoreline, a companion to the recently commenced on-the-ground survey of docks in waterways under their jurisdiction.

East Hampton Village will soon be home to an enormous platinum bull, in the form of an art installation by the sculptor Enrique Cabrera that will graze for a time in Herrick Park.

Nicholas LaLota, the chief of staff to the Republican majority in the Suffolk County Legislature, is now the Republican Party nominee to represent New York's First Congressional District. He will face the Democrat Bridget Fleming, a county legislator, in the general election.

The East Hampton Town Board, citing inflation and its potential impact on employee recruitment and retention efforts, announced a one-time supplemental payment to employees on Thursday. The payments will total an estimated $660,000 and will come from surplus funds. 

A coalition has formed to stop the proposed redevelopment of the former Wainscott sand and gravel pit into a 50-lot commercial and industrial subdivision and to advocate instead for East Hampton Town to purchase the property for open space and municipal purposes.

The East Hampton Town Trustees have commenced a survey of docks in waterways under their jurisdiction, a plan agreed upon shortly after the nine-member body approved construction of an 80-foot dock in Three Mile Harbor in October and subsequently enacted a 12-month moratorium on new docks catwalks, floating docks, floating structures, and floating platforms.

Tuesday’s primary election will determine the Republican Party’s nominee for New York’s First Congressional District. Nicholas LaLota, Anthony Figliola, and Michelle Bond are vying for the nomination

Gardiner’s Marina, on Three Mile Harbor in Springs, hasn’t changed much since 1962. It's owners want to expand not by adding slips, but enlarging the boat basin so that roughly 10 slips can accommodate larger vessels and renovating the existing bulkhead.

After yet another hour in front of the town planning board last week, all that stood between Hero Beach, Montauk’s westernmost resort, and its application to convert two units into a kitchen was a handful of words and two lawyers.

“Dark sky” advocates are concerned about East Hampton Town’s plan to convert all streetlights in the town to LEDs, worrying that a "color temperature" of 2700 kelvin is not dark-sky-friendly enough.

A community survey revealed a desire for offerings including exercise, workshops and classes, lectures, a dining room and coffee bar, outdoor gardens, arts, games, social clubs, and outdoor games. People want a “community not ‘senior’ center,” “a happy place,” “croquet plus shuffleboard,” "bigger tables, bigger kitchen, more help, a lanai so we can sit out even in the rain.”

A March 2018 lawsuit filed against East Hampton Town on behalf of Wainscott residents whose wells were discovered to be contaminated with perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS) is treading water as hundreds of similar lawsuits make their way through the court system.

Christopher Clapp, who chaired East Hampton Town’s Water Quality Technical Advisory Committee since its inception, has left the committee as he takes on the role of executive director of the Ocean Sewage Alliance.

Informed that cumulative 2022 air traffic at East Hampton Airport was down by about 28 percent through July, members of the Wainscott Citizens Advisory Committee found themselves on Saturday asking, “Really?”

East Hampton Town's Coastal Assessment Resiliency Plan, which highlights a spate of ominous predictions as to how climate change will impact the town, is "a nation-leading effort to prepare this town for the future with a lot more water, one where residents will adapt to live with all that water rather than fighting a losing battle against it," one speaker said during a public hearing last week.

Moody’s Investors Service has assigned its highest bond rating, Aaa, to East Hampton Town. The town’s finances have earned the top-tier rating continuously since 2017.

Anthony Figliola and Nick LaLota, who are vying with Michelle Bond, for the Republican nomination for New York's First Congressional District, debated the issues with the League of Women Voters this week in advance of the primary on Aug. 23.

An audit of East Hampton Town for the year ending Dec. 31, 2021, found the town in strong fiscal health, a certified public accountant told the town board on Tuesday.

An overflow crowd packed into the Municipal Building in Sag Harbor Tuesday evening on one of the hottest days of the year and half the people were there to talk about Adam Potter’s large-scale development proposal for the village’s office district.

East Hampton Town will soon enter into a partnership agreement with the Army Corps of Engineers for long-planned improvements to the navigational channel in Montauk Harbor that include a deepening and widening of the channel. Work is scheduled for the fall of 2023.

National Grid wants to construct two 20,000-gallon fiberglass water tanks at its East Hampton generating station at Cove Hollow Road, but the East Hampton Town Planning Board does not yet have enough information to vote on the plans.

The Wainscott Citizens Advisory Committee will mostly support a proposal to add new stop signs at intersections on Town Line Road, the street that divides the hamlet from neighboring Sagaponack Village.

The East Hampton Town Planning Board did not approve Hero Beach’s request to convert its basement into a kitchen at its July 27 meeting. The sticking point was the Montauk motel’s refusal to restrict food service to “overnight guests” rather than just “guests,” and worries about how that seemingly slight difference might affect parking.

Suffolk County Legislator Bridget Fleming, the presumptive Democratic nominee to represent New York’s recently redrawn First Congressional District, has released results of a poll that shows her in a neck-and-neck race with her potential Republican opponent in the Nov. 8 midterm election.

East Hampton Town’s code governing its rental registry may be modified to address updates that an assistant town attorney called “pretty obviously the product of forgery or falsified information.”

The East Hampton Town Board voted unanimously last Thursday to revoke all beach driving permits previously issued by the town clerk's office and declare that no permit issued by the town before or after the resolution confers the right to drive on the 4,000-foot stretch of ocean beach at Napeague popularly known as Truck Beach. Postcards mailed to permit-holders will act as temporary permits.

One side, calling itself the Tri-Community Working Group — the presidents of the three communities along with 14 residents — seeks an overlay district as the best means of preservation for the historically Black communities of Sag Harbor Hills, Azurest, and Ninevah. The other wants historic designation that would go a step further.

Throughout New York State, "people are talking about their safety, their freedoms, and their economy," Alison Esposito, the Republican Party's nominee for lieutenant governor of New York State, said last Thursday at the Clubhouse in East Hampton.