Government

The fastest-growing sport in America — pickleball — is also the noisiest, according to a survey conducted by sound engineers hired by the Village of Sagaponack. As a result, the village board will recommend requiring new pickleball courts to be built with larger setback from adjacent properties.

A project at 33 Lily Pond Lane in East Hampton Village, with a 15-year history of court battles and angry neighbors, and tens of millions of dollars at stake, may have met its match in the Covid-19 pandemic.

A lawsuit seeking to stop the installation of an underground electric cable serving the South Fork Wind Farm was rejected by a federal judge last week.

“We did make an offer, it was rejected,” said Southampton Town Supervisor Jay Schneiderman in a phone conversation last week about the town’s attempt to purchase 2 Main Street in Sag Harbor using community preservation fund money. The building’s current owners, who bought it in 2018 for $18 million, are said to be interested instead in developing it as residential property.

“It’s hard to keep track” of all the local road work projects happening now, said the South Fork’s state assemblyman, Fred W. Thiele Jr. of Sag Harbor, for whom a drive along Route 114 is a frequent occurrence. Long an advocate for the total repaving and repairing of that road, Mr. Thiele assured his constituents this week that the inconvenience of the project will be worthwhile.

Proposed changes to the East Hampton Town code would expand the definition of litter to include “gravel, loam, dirt, and other debris,” as well as prohibit “drag-out” of such materials onto public roadways and require that the contents of any vehicle containing yard waste be covered and secured. The motivation for the proposed changes includes complaints about drag-out of debris from commercial industrial sites such as sand and gravel mines.

Covid-19 pandemic-era exceptions to New York State’s Open Meetings Law, which allowed meetings to be held, and the public to participate, via video conference, can be made permanent, thanks to changes adopted with the state’s 2022-2023 budget.

Neighbors of a potential two-story brewery and restaurant at 17 Toilsome Lane had argued that the village had misinterpreted the zoning code. Their appeal was denied.

The existing fields will be displaced by Stony Brook Southampton Hospital’s freestanding emergency department and imaging and diagnostic center, for which the town board previously approved a lease with the Southampton Hospital Association.

An engineering project to alleviate chronic flooding on Stephen Hand’s Path near its intersection with Route 114 in East Hampton is projected to begin this fall and be completed in the spring of 2023.

The findings were mixed at the East Hampton Town Trustees meeting on Monday, when Christopher Gobler of Stony Brook University’s School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences delivered an annual report that emphasized how human activity on land influences the health of the waters around it.

“Everything is on track to go from public to private use,” Bill O’Connor told the East Hampton Town Board on Tuesday.