In his State of the Town address last Thursday, East Hampton Town Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc highlighted areas of concern, conflict, and possibility that East Hampton will encounter this year.

“Even in the grave, all is not lost,” wrote Edgar Allen Poe, but Poe never encountered the all-powerful New York developer and real estate lobby that ultimately helped persuade Gov. Kathy Hochul to veto a popular gravesite-protection bill on Dec. 30.

Everybody must get zoned: That was the message coming out of a Southampton Town Board meeting last Thursday as the town continues to work its way toward rules to guide the new world of marijuana legalization in New York State.

Freshly minted Representative Nicholas LaLota says the Republican Party’s dramatic and dayslong effort to elect a speaker of the House last week didn’t have much of an impact on his ability to hit the ground running as the new representative for New York’s First Congressional District.

After months of discussion at Sag Harbor Village Board meetings, members of the public will have their say in front of the Southampton Town Board at 1 p.m. on Jan. 24 regarding a potential use of community preservation fund money on the John Steinbeck house on Bluff Point Lane in the village. Residents can also submit written comments to the board before the 24th.

The powerful storm that hit the East End just before Christmas left Accabonac Harbor in need of help: A particularly pronounced sand spit emerged, causing boaters and fishermen difficulty in navigating the area off Louse Point.

When clients of Phoenix House visit East Hampton High School, it’s usually on invitation from Jim Stewart, the school’s longtime health teacher, who wants his students to understand how substance abuse, treatment, and recovery look and feel.

“I have been told by students it’s one of the best classes of the semester,” Mr. Stewart said this week.

On these winter days, there's a lot to keep kids and teens busy.

This December 1989 photo from The East Hampton Star’s archive depicts Percy Heath, Montauker, sportfisherman, artist, and bassist who co-founded the Modern Jazz Quartet.

Two men were charged with drunken driving last week, in what was otherwise a quiet week on local roads.

A “tall white male” was asking patrons at the post office Saturday afternoon if they’d give him some money so he could “restore a broken flagpole,” and someone called in a report of peddling. By the time police arrived, the man had departed.

Marilyn Thompson of Montauk, an abstract artist whose career spanned 50 years, died on Dec. 11 while vacationing in Madeira, Portugal. She was 90.

Jim Miller, formerly of Springs, an illustrator, art director, and graphic designer behind some of theater’s most memorable shows, died of congenital heart disease on Dec. 15 at home in Vero Beach, Fla. He was 83.

Elizabeth Kaplan Fonseca of East Hampton died on Dec. 19 of long-term Alzheimer’s disease. She was 93.

Alice Byrnes Cooley, who began working as a telephone operator before she graduated from high school, and in her retirement was a familiar face at East Hampton Town’s senior citizens center, died at home in Bluffton, S.C., on Jan. 1.

Susan Sullivan Saiter, an author, freelance journalist, and educator, died of pneumonia on Dec. 27 in Winston-Salem, N.C. A part-time Water Mill resident, she was 76.

Gunther Schlessinger, a summer resident of Amagansett who had a 60-year career in finance, died on Dec. 17 of pneumonia caused by Covid-19. He was 93.

Jacqueline Ann Mitchell, a retired elementary school teacher who grew up in East Hampton, died in Newark, Ohio, on Dec. 21. She was 77 and had been ill with liver cancer.

Kathryn D. Vegessi, who had lived in Montauk for many years, died at St. Francis Hospital in Roslyn on Sunday of complications from a staph infection. She was 70.

Visiting hours for Louis J. Sapienza of East Hampton will be held today from 2 to 8 p.m. at the Yardley and Pino Funeral Home in East Hampton. A graveside service is planned for tomorrow at 11 a.m. at the Jamesport Cemetery.