Seeking to help small businesses survive the shutdown of commerce due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the federal government on Friday launched a $349 billion loan program that business owners can use to cover two months of payroll costs, including benefits, plus utilities, rent, and interest on mortgages.

The final 2020-21 New York State budget, passed Friday, includes major “common sense” adjustments to the controversial criminal justice reforms enacted last year. 

People seeking an East End refuge during the Covid-19 pandemic caused a rush in real estate rentals in March, but the market is now at a complete standstill, according to brokers from Town and Country and Nestseekers. 

Proposition 2 in East Hampton

Ensuring that businesses and residents comply with measures meant to stop the spread of Covid-19 remained at the top of the agendas for the East Hampton and Sag Harbor Village Boards this week. 

Despite recommendations to stay home during the Covid-19 outbreak, several people were caught drinking and driving over the weekend, two on Sunday after accidents that occurred around the same time. 

Stephen L. Friedes, M.D., of East Hampton died of pancreatic cancer at the Kanas Center for Hospice Care in Quiogue early Tuesday morning.

George Nicholas, who, along with his wife, Stacey, was the owner and operator of the Sunset Cove Marina and Cottages on Three Mile Harbor in Maidstone Park, East Hampton, died of complications from a fall on March 28.

John Gordon Noakes, an award-winning advertising executive and a summer resident of Montauk, died on March 23 after having a stroke at a hospital in New Canaan, Conn.

Ira Hedges Washburn Jr., a former Ford Motor Company executive who lived on Windmill Lane in East Hampton, died on March 23 at Peconic Landing in Greenport.

James H. Loper Jr., a lifelong East Hampton resident until his retirement in 1997, died last Thursday at home in Hurlock, Md.

Kathleen Ann Surrey, a night manager at Montauk Manor for many years, died of liver failure on March 16 at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City.

Barbara Ann Johnson, who when young began summering on Jefferys Lane in East Hampton Village with her four siblings and her parents, Thomas A. and June Hess Kelly, and who later made the village her year-round home, died at the age of 87 on April 1 at the Kanas Center for Hospice Care in Quiogue. She had been ill for about a year.

Ruth Appelhof, the director at Guild Hall from 1999 to 2016 and an art history scholar, died last Thursday at home in Springs after living with leukemia for two years, according to her husband, Gary Adamek. She was 80.

Supplies for Success, a national organization founded 18 years ago and now based in Sagaponack, has handed out thousands of art kits filled with coloring books, crayons, construction paper, washable glue, and other items to help keep children learning and busy during the Covid-19 pandemic.

There were welcome hints of normalcy during the East Hampton Town Board’s meeting on Tuesday despite its five members’ remote participation via videoconference.

Word spread like wildfire in a matter of hours: Go down to Stony Brook Southampton Hospital and make some noise for the health care workers combating Covid-19. 

With public gatherings prohibited by Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s New York State on PAUSE executive order, Perry Gershon, an East Hampton resident and candidate for the Democratic Party’s nomination to challenge Representative Lee Zeldin in New York’s First Congressional District, has taken his series of town hall-style meetings to cyberspace.

While most of us have never experienced anything like the Covid-19 pandemic, the parallels with the 1918 influenza pandemic are significant.

Southampton Town is weighing in on short-term rentals in light of the Covid-19 pandemic, with Supervisor Jay Schneiderman directing the ordinance enforcement division to crack down on illegal rentals during April.