Bollards
East Hampton
November 13, 2025
To the Editor,
I have subscribed to The Star since buying a house in East Hampton about two years ago, and it is perhaps the best part of life here. The Letters to the Editor and the police blotter are always highlights of amusement, so I am thrilled to be included for the first time in the former rather than the latter.
Re: the article regarding the new Target under construction in Bridgehampton Commons (Nov. 6, page A7), I initially thought it was a most sublime satire of the absurdly persnickety local planning process on the East End, but then realized it was an actual news story.
Apparently, the Southampton Town Planning Board had a "pervading concern" (yes, that's right, a "pervading concern"!) that if the new Target parking lot had red bollards to protect pedestrians entering the store from dangerous car traffic, those might constitute illegal "signs," since Target's famous logo is also white and red.
Now, a regular civilian might erroneously think red bollards make sense because they are very visible and automatically connote danger/safety. But the planning board feared that some low-I.Q. members of the public shopping at Target might mistake the red bollards as forbidden "signage" promoting Target. Quite the conundrum. But, in their infinite wisdom, they went with a "formal interpretation" by a town building inspector that "the bollards painted red would be considered a sign, however, painted gray would not be considered a sign." Wow, such a feat of logical gymnastics! (This even though the board had already required the Target store's signage in the Commons to be white and gray rather than the tawdry white-and-red color scheme allowed throughout the rest of the civilized world.)
To those who have a passing knowledge of quantum mechanics, this cannot help but bring to mind the famous paradox of Schrodinger's Cat, which is a thought experiment illustrating quantum superposition, to the effect that a cat in a sealed box with a radioactive element is simultaneously both alive and dead until the box is opened.
In other words, a bollard can be both a sign and not a sign until its color is seen by the observer — assuming the observer is not color-blind, in which case would not the gray bollard still be viewed as a sign? (I assume the planning commission might need to have another meeting to address that disturbing possibility.)
Inattentive drivers with normal color vision would presumably be more likely to run into a gray bollard than a red one. Which is probably why stop signs and traffic lights are not gray, even though that color may be more aesthetically pleasing to members of the planning board.
Perhaps the best solution would be to paint the bollards red with gray stencil letters on them saying, "This is not a sign" (with apologies to Rene Magritte for stealing his idea). Then public safety would be promoted without allowing those sly capitalists at Target to sneak in extra marketing under the pretense of keeping people from being run over.
Your faithful and bemused reader,
STACEY OLLIFF
For Kids
East Hampton
November 6, 2025
To the Editor:
On a recent family trip to the South Shore of Boston, we were blown away by the abundance and quality of children's playgrounds. Within just a 10 or 15-minute drive, we found multiple fenced-in playgrounds designed for kids of all ages. They offered clean and safe equipment, thoughtful layouts — and, notably, none of them were part of a school.
It really struck me how few comparable public playgrounds we have here. Many of the best playgrounds in our town are located on school grounds, which means they're off limits to the public during school hours — when many parents of young children are looking for somewhere to go.
Families shouldn't have to plan around school schedules to find safe, clean, accessible outdoor spaces for their children. I hope our town can prioritize creating or upgrading public playgrounds that are open to all residents, every day of the week. It would be such a meaningful investment in our community's families.
MIA PLITT
Enduring Stain
Sommerville, Mass.
November 6, 2025
Dear Editor,
In this review, Scott Chaskey says, "As many people know, President Biden pardoned [Leonard Peltier] . . . ," which is, absolutely, 100-percent false and untrue. Biden commuted Peltier's sentence to home confinement for life. (He's limited to a 100-mile reservation travel range, I believe, has a monitor he must regularly check in with and has to get permission to go anywhere outside his home, like the post office.)
Here's why correcting this falsehood matters: To receive a pardon (at least, this was the case before Trump), a convict would have to admit guilt and remorse for the crime for which they had been convicted.
Throughout his entire unjust incarceration Peltier has maintained his innocence for any culpability in the deaths of F.B.I. Agents Jack Coler and Ron Williams and wholeheartedly believed the exculpatory ballistics evidence suppressed at his original trials and recantations of false testimony would lead to his exoneration — if he could only have one more day in court, which President Clinton's Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act precluded. In fact, The Leonard Peltier Defense Committee has, throughout the decades, repeatedly asked well-meaning supporters not to call on presidents to pardon him for the very reason Peltier could not, for spiritual reasons, perjure himself by saying he was in any way responsible for Agents Coler's and Williams's deaths (see "Prison Writings: My Life as a Sundance," by Leonard Peltier). That's why he remained in prison so long: because he refused presidential pardons when offered to him. He remains a wrongly convicted political prisoner to this day — just one more thing Joe Biden should be ashamed of.
Please bear accurate witness to this enduring stain of racism on American jurisprudence and correct Mr. Chaskey's book review forthwith.
Thank you,
ASHLEY STEARNS
—
It is not necessary to admit to a criminal act or to express remorse to receive a presidential pardon in the United States. Individuals also have the right to reject pardons. Ed.
Community Pride
East Hampton
November 11, 2025
Dear David,
East Hampton deserves leadership that listens, acts, and delivers. That's why I am announcing my candidacy for East Hampton Town supervisor.
For the past five years, I've had the privilege of serving as mayor of East Hampton Village. In that time, we've proven that government can be efficient, responsive, and transparent, that it can both respect taxpayers and improve the quality of life for everyone who calls East Hampton home. We modernized village services, strengthened public safety, and created a real sense of community pride through events that bring people together rather than divide them.
Now, it's time to bring that same approach to the town level. Too often, decisions in Town Hall are made behind closed doors or without a plan. Residents deserve a government that communicates clearly, manages money responsibly, and focuses on real results.
My campaign will be about accountability, accessibility, and common sense. I want every resident, from Montauk to Wainscott, to know that your voice matters and that your town government will work for you.
Building a better East Hampton together!
Sincerely,
JERRY LARSEN
Status Quo
Amagansett
November 9, 2025
To the Editor,
I remember being young and my mother saying, "Watch this." It was the Berlin Wall coming down, Nov. 9, 1989. I will always remember April 12, 2024, Amagansett School began building a wall. That day our child was injured at Amagansett School. We found out days later. Not by another student, but a grown adult, the gym teacher with no valid Student Building Leader certificate who was somehow also "acting principal," Michael Rodgers.
The issue is and will always be. Accidents and incidents are to be reported to the school nurse by school policy. This one was not. Why? Our only guess as parents concerned with our children's safety and well-being is because this was in the middle of the sham show that was called a superintendent search. A complicit inter-term superintendent and school board were fine with the cover-up. Heck, they were fine with that 3020A hearing we all got to endure.
Why not for this? For the man who admitted this did happen. Making the claim a 5-year-old (at the time) didn't request to go to the nurse. I demand, like I have already, a 3020A and to be fired for just cause. The statute hasn't passed and won't for another 518 days for this particular event and others.
How was the "top candidate" someone who can't follow school policy? By his actions, our child suffered a concussion. That "leader," who, in my opinion, lusted more over a position and power imbalance than a child's care, has since made our child, children, and our family's life a living hell. How come? For questioning inaction?
Remember, Maria Dorr gets a 3020A hearing for allegedly stealing a gift card. Michael Rodgers injured a child, fails at duty of care, admitted it, shows no remorse, gets promoted. The falsehoods that are allowed to be peddled. That's acceptable? Here it has become status quo.
Still here,
JOE KARPINSKI
No Longer Agonize
East Hampton
November 6, 2025
Dear Mr. Rattray,
Listening to the post-election speeches last week, I was struck by what Gavin Newsom said: "Don't agonize, organize." I discovered that these words of advice were the motto of Florynce Kennedy, a lawyer and feminist and civil rights activist who died in 2000. I also realized that my Letters to the Editor over the past few months have not reflected this advice.
My agony over what Trump has done since starting his second term has spilled over all these letters. I look forward to the day when I no longer agonize but rather begin to organize my efforts to help the Democrats take control of the House. My hope is that the Democratic candidate for our congressional seat will campaign based on how last week's party winners conducted theirs: Don't agonize, energize.
SALVATORE TOCCI
Corrupt Cesspool
Montauk
November 10, 2025
Dear David,
When are the mass media political pundits and news reporters going to stop using the word "authoritarian" to characterize the corrupt cesspool of the anti-democratic Trump regime and his gang of incompetent sycophantic cabinet members, the Chain of Clowns?
Instead of "authoritarian," a more accurate definition of the regime would be "dictatorial" or "fascist." Either one or both would define Trump's actions since his inauguration:
* The purge of the federal Civil Service, the F.B.I., the C.I.A., the military, and the Department of Justice.
* The pardoning of 1,500 traitors who, at his encouragement, tried to overthrow the American republic on Jan. 6, 2021.
* The suspension of habeas corpus for undocumented and documented immigrants.
* The warm welcome and hand-holding of the international war criminal and assassin Vladimir Putin.
* An extra-legal campaign of retribution against those who are deemed political enemies and "deep state" agents.
* The cover-up of his involvement with sex trafficking at Epstein's Fantasy Pedophile Island.
* Using way too many CAPITAL LETTERS in his Truth Social late-night rants after drinking a quart of Diet Coke and eating too many double cheeseburgers.
Please note that Trump has successfully deflected attention away from the Epstein files recently by making poor folk starve while he parties with his rich friends at Mar-A-Lago.
Can this individual who has been convicted of 34 felonies and sexual assault really be a pedophile? Release the files!
Cheers,
BRIAN POPE
Living in Fear
Amagansett
November 11, 2025
Dear David,
It is important that the East Hampton Town Board take action that will protect our Latino community from harassment, deportation, or family separation without due process and a thorough investigation. People are living in fear. We need to ensure their safety.
I am asking the town board to pass regulations barring town employees from asking individuals about their immigration status and also not honor requests from Immigration and Customs Enforcement to detain people unless they are suspected of violent crimes. I am also urging the board to make clear that a signed arrest warrant written to a particular individual must be obtained before a person can be detained.
Thank you, East Hampton Town Police Department, for your professional and courteous guidance during the community protests of the federal government's policies, which are unfair and cruel and target our Latino community.
And thank you East Hampton Town Board members who have participated in the protests held in front of Town Hall. Young residents of East Hampton, including Latino families, have also participated in the protests. It was wonderful to hear the crowd chant in English — and in Spanish.
We are fortunate to live in this beautiful place and we need to ensure that everyone here is protected by the Constitution of the United States and by local law.
SUSAN RETZKY
Bratty 'Retribution'
North Haven
November 11, 2025
To the Editor,
During Trump's 2024 presidential campaign launch at the Conservative Political Action Conference he promised:
"In 2016, I declared: I am your voice. Today, I add: I am your warrior. I am your justice. And for those who have been wronged and betrayed, I am your retribution."
"I am your retribution" is the only promise kept by this vulgar prevaricator, as he continues to destroy our country. But, who are those people looking for retribution anyway? They are not our own peaceful lawful citizens.
SNAP was disrupted. U.S.A.I.D. was terminated. SALT deductions were minimalized. the U.S. Department of Defense was renamed the Department of War — while senior military officers were insulted and purged of "beardos," our citizens are dragged off the streets by ICE. The federal government continued shut down over a month with no government workers, including the F.A.A. and unpaid air traffic controllers; flying has deliberately been made more dangerous, requiring cancelations of flights.
At home we see ICE refocused from removing convicted criminals to simply rounding up our neighbors for arrest who "look like immigrants." These humans disappear into their "system" without public record.
Wednesday, without advance notice to any of our own legitimate, well-trained, properly identifiable police officers, incognito goons showed up mustering at a fire department property wearing only a patch with the word "police" stitched onto their sloppy battle outfits. This thuggery then swept through Hampton Bays.
An ICE spokesperson said, "ICE New York City conducted operations targeting known criminal illegal aliens in Westhampton and Hampton Bays, Long Island. ICE officers from the Long Island sub-office arrested 12 illegal aliens, several with criminal convictions and all in violation of the Immigration and Nationality Act. Violating immigration laws is a crime and carries consequences, which includes arrest, detention, and removal from the United States."
Only three of those arrested actually had criminal convictions. This has become a sweep of identity politics, not legitimate criminal control.
Does anyone, anywhere, or on the East End of Long Island notice any of this? Probably not Nick LaLota, Lee Zeldin, Steven Miller, Mike Johnson, Steve Scalise, or even Howard Lutnick (on his 40-acre spread in the middle of the estate section of Southampton Village!)
But the rest of us? We are being abused in so many serious and dangerous ways. Even small insults matter, as we often travel to the city on the Long Island Expressway and may notice very few cars in the high-occupancy vehicle express lane now. Traffic in the other lanes is worse because the overhead signs announce Clean Pass H.O.V. access is terminated.
We have a vindictive D.J.T. to thank for that. He hates windmills and renewable energy, in favor of fossil fuels simply because this pig was fed at his favorite lobbying trough with billions by the oil and gas industry.
Environmentally clean electric vehicles are now unnecessarily crowding the congested lanes.
Thank you once more, Donald, for your school-yard bratty retribution. It's wake-up time, folks. Time to stop these domestic terrorists.
ANTHONY CORON