Two years and two days after East Hampton Town declared a state of emergency because of a surging Covid-19 pandemic, Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc announced on Tuesday the rescinding of that declaration and of its accompanying executive orders, saying that he was "really excited that things are looking up, finally, after two very long years."
Next to a display of 34 recovered handbags and a phalanx of Suffolk County police officers, including East Hampton Village Police Lieutenants Gregory Brown and Jeffrey Erikson, County District Attorney Ray Tierney told a crowd of reporters and photographers on Wednesday that an “organized retail theft ring” was behind the March 3 grab of $94,000 worth of handbags from Balenciaga, a high-end retailer in East Hampton.
“The dishes in my dish rack rattle,” said Andy Rosenthal, a resident of Manhattan’s Upper West Side and the president of Stop the Chop, an organization seeking to end nonessential helicopter flights, including air shuttles to and from the Hamptons and tourist flights over the five boroughs.
A relaxation of outdoor dining rules for restaurants, put in place during the Covid-19 pandemic, could become permanent. East Hampton Town officials have been working on changes that would allow most restaurants to double their seating capacity, but with one catch: the total numbers of patrons would have to remain the same. A three-year trial period is planned.
