Richard Lawler, the deputy mayor of East Hampton Village, was promoted to mayor by his fellow trustees at a board meeting on Friday. He will fill out the final six months of the term of Paul F. Rickenbach Jr., who resigned from office Dec. 31.
According to state law, when a mayor resigns, a village board can either appoint a new mayor from its ranks with a majority vote or leave the office vacant until the next election, with the deputy mayor assuming mayoral duties, but not the title.
At a Jan. 2 board meeting, the trustees had agreed that it would be best to have an official mayor, and resolved to appoint one.
Mayor Lawler, who is known as Rick, said on Tuesday that in the days leading up to his appointment, he had talked to each of the trustees individually to see where they stood.
“There was a consensus that the right way to go was, since I was already deputy mayor, it would be a natural progression for me to become mayor,” he said.
Arthur Graham, Rose Brown, and Barbara Borsack, who is a candidate for mayor in the election in June, each voted to appoint Mr. Lawler, who abstained.
The vote, said Ms. Brown, was “in no way a reflection of any of our abilities to do the job, as I think we are all capable, but we are in good hands with Rick.”
Jerry Larsen, a former East Hampton Village police chief who is running for mayor against Ms. Borsack, had said at the Jan. 2 meeting that it would be “offensive” for the trustees to appoint Ms. Borsack mayor because it would give her the advantage of incumbency. On Friday, he commended the board’s appointment of Mr. Lawler. “They did the right thing,” he said.
Mayor Lawler’s first official act was to offer a resolution to appoint Ms. Borsack as deputy mayor. It passed in a unanimous vote, with Ms. Borsack abstaining.
The election for the open mayor’s seat, and two village board positions, is set for June 16. Mr. Lawler, who had been in his second term as a trustee prior to his mayoral appointment, and Ray Harden, a co-owner of the Ben Krupinski Builder construction company and vice chairman of the village’s zoning board of appeals, are trustee candidates. They are running mates with Ms. Borsack on the Elms Party line. Sandra Melendez, Mr. Larsen’s New Town Party running mate, is an attorney who is vying to be the first Latina elected to the village board.
Also at the meeting on Friday, a public hearing was held on a proposal to install two stop signs on James Lane, one on the northbound side, the other on the southbound of its intersection with Mill Road, a short two-way street that cuts through the village green across from St. Luke’s Episcopal Church. The intersection has been the site of three accidents since 2016.
When the board discussed the proposal at a meeting in December, the Very Rev. Denis C. Brunelle, St. Luke’s rector, who resides at the church, had said cars speeding on James Lane were the main safety issue.
With no opposition, the board passed the legislation, but Ms. Brown said she would have preferred to make Mill Road one way heading west. The road, she said, is too narrow for two cars to use safely, and its intersection with Route 27 has proven equally dangerous.
Mr. Lawler said that, according to police reports, there have been five collisions there over the past 10 years.
Mr. Graham and Ms. Borsack agreed that making Mill Road one way might be necessary in the future, but thought installing stop signs on James Lane would be a good first step.
The board approved a five-year plan to pay for large capital improvements and other expenditures, including the renovation of Herrick Park, and the restoration of the Dominy clock and woodworking shops on North Main Street. It approved an agreement with the East Hampton School District to have two school resource officers at the East Hampton Middle School and the John M. Marshall Elementary School. The school district will cover the cost of one officer.
The board accepted Andrew J. Bennett as a member of Fire Department Engine Co. #2, and it accepted the resignation of Richard Roberts, the chairman of the village ethics board. Frank Newbold, the former chairman of the zoning board of appeals, was appointed to fill out the rest of Mr. Roberts’s one-year term.
After receiving no bids on Jan. 14 for the summer rental of Sea Spray Cottage number 8, a three-bedroom, two-bath cottage at Main Beach, the village announced that it has lowered the minimum bid from $115,000 to $105,000, and will accept sealed bids through 2 p.m. on Feb. 11.
