“I feel like I can breathe again,” Gina Bradley, the owner of Paddle Diva, said this week of a state supreme court ruling that the East Hampton Town Zoning Board of Appeals erred when it barred her from running her business from the Shagwong Marina on Three Mile Harbor.

Paddle Diva has offered paddleboard lessons, rentals, and tours from the marina since 2012, but in 2016, the town’s head building inspector concluded that her operation constituted an expansion of the marina’s use beyond what is allowed under town code. She appealed to the zoning board to reverse that decision, but failed.

Much of the board’s decision rested on whether a paddleboard was defined as a boat or a vessel. If it was a boat, it determined in its decision, then it must be stored in a boatyard, not a marina such as Shagwong. That would have meant that Ms. Bradley would have to operate out of a boatyard rather than the marina. Alternatively, she would have been able to launch the boards from public access ramps. 

She was ready to throw in the towel and start a new career, she said this week, and even got her real estate license. But a friend, Dianne Le Verrier, who is also an attorney with Jordan & Le Verrier, convinced her not to give up without a fight. With Ms. Le Verrier representing her, she challenged the board’s ruling in New York State Supreme Court. “Everybody told me not to do it,” Ms. Bradley recalled this week.

Ms. Le Verrier and the town’s attorney, Michael Sendlenski, presented oral arguments in Central Islip last Thursday before New York State Supreme Court Justice H. Patrick Leis III. In a swift rebuke to the town, Justice Leis ruled from the bench in Paddle Diva’s favor immediately after hearing the arguments.

Ms. Le Verrier said it was the first time in her experience that a judge so swiftly rendered a verdict after hearing oral arguments in such a case. Usually, she said, it takes six months or more after oral arguments are heard before a decision is rendered. The judge, she said, found the zoning board’s decision “unreasonable and arbitrary” and annulled it.

Ms. Bradley was not in the courtroom.

Mr. Sendlenski would not comment on the ruling this week, saying he needed to brief the Z.B.A. members in an executive session first. Justice Leis has not yet released the written version of his decision, and the court reporter at the time is now on vacation, meaning the minutes of the proceedings are not yet available.

“This has been a drain on me,” Ms. Bradley said Monday. The fact that she could do business at all this year was only because of a last-minute agreement with the town, after Ms. Le Verrier filed a motion for the town to show cause. But until things were resolved, she was reluctant to put too much money into the business. “It was almost like I was on trial,” Ms. Bradley said.

With the decision last Thursday, “Now it’s on my terms,” she said, “and I get to decide what I do next. I can really get back to work.”

Ms. Le Verrier credits the work of Rick Whalen, the attorney who argued Ms. Bradley’s case before the Z.B.A., as being key to Paddle Diva’s victory. “Rick did a great job,” she said. “He made all of the arguments that needed to be made.”

Now, Ms. Bradley said, she can get back to her mission, which is “to inspire people to get on the water.”

In Finland, Tinka Topping might not be anyone special. Not in the world of education, anyway, where she advocates an alternative system — most simplistically described as favoring “how you learn” over “what you learn.” For in that tiny Nordic country many of her unorthodox values are instilled at the core of an education system that has made its schools the envy of the world.

But Ms. Topping lives in Sagaponack, and here she is practically legendary. On Sunday, her relentless pursuit of a less authoritarian approach to education will be recognized as she is honored at the 13th annual Chefs Dinner fund-raiser for the Hayground School and its kitchen and garden programs.

“Nonsense,” she exclaimed, swatting away the significance of being lauded. “They just needed someone to honor. Preferably someone old.”

Ms. Topping is a nonagenarian (there’s a reason that word is not commonplace): a plucky, outspoken 92-year-old still championing the importance of sending students on an intellectual adventure rather than through the Yale-or-fail pressures often experienced by regular children at regular schools.

Her legacy spans a half-century of education reform she brought to the South Fork. Arriving in the 1960s, divorced and with three children, she noticed a rigid public education system. “Why aren’t kids more respected?” she wondered. “Why isn’t there more flexibility in the system?” She pushed to institute alternative teaching models in the schools out here but was met with opposition.

In 1966, she was a leader in the opening of the Hampton Day School in Bridgehampton, modeled after the one-room school concept that existed in many rural areas around the world, utilizing one room and one teacher overseeing multiple grade levels and multiple skill levels. By 1991, however, the South Fork’s population had ballooned and the school became more conservative, and Ms. Topping, along with half the board members, left amid much controversy.

In 1996 a group of 24, including the late Elizabeth Thunderbird Haile, an elder of the Shinnecock Tribe, the late actor Roy Scheider, and Ms. Topping, opened the Hayground School, also in Bridgehampton, offering an alternative education for prekindergartners through eighth graders, replacing what Ms. Topping calls “unhealthy teaching conventions” with an emphasis on giving children the tools to become confident, informed citizens.

Ms. Topping seems to belong to a disappearing generation of iconoclasts who became decision makers during the dawning of the Age of Aquarius, when anything seemed possible, especially if it involved replacing the established with a new utopia. If this area lacked a school with progressive education, then they would simply build one.

Hayground, which has an enrollment of about 85, picked up where the Hampton Day School left off. According to its website, the institution was founded “on the conviction that all children can live as intellectuals. All children can become serious and passionate readers; all children can engage in genuine conversation in which people exchange information and ideas, change their minds, and work and study in a community where art is at the center, not the periphery, of life.”

Ms. Topping is clearly proud of what the school embodies today, 21 years later. “Hayground explodes with art,” she said. “It is a joyful place where teachers’ passions are brought to the classroom. Kids seem very happy, engrossed in the process of learning and making. There are mixed ages in the classrooms and an ethnically diverse student body.”

Teachers are not straitjacketed, she explained, by bureaucrats or excessive regulations but have the freedom to innovate and experiment as trusted professionals.

In many ways, it is a microcosm of the Finnish system, where before kids learn their multiplication tables, they learn simply how to be kids — how to play with one another, how to negotiate conflicts, and how to help one another. Competition is not as important as cooperation, and playtime is sacred. Finland scorns all standardized testing before age 16 and discourages homework. The first six years of school are not about academic success, but only about finding one’s passion.

Yet whatever success Hayground might tout, it can be judged only within the American education system, which appears to be hurtling in the opposite direction of Finland’s. Detractors of the school sometimes refer to it as “Playground,” mocking its lack of structure, homework, grades, or testing, which they claim leaves students ill prepared for more rigorous high schools and colleges.

Again, such thinking is swatted away by Ms. Topping. “Children who succeed at Hayground will succeed anywhere,” she said, pointing to Max Cheng, an alumnus who graduated in June from Bridgehampton High School as valedictorian of his class. “Max did great. He went from being a big cheese in a tiny school to a medium cheese in a small school, and he shined.” He finished his senior year with a 95 grade-point average and will attend the Macaulay Honors College at Hunter College in New York City this fall.

“We’ve never had any of our students go to Harvard or Yale,” Ms. Topping said without a hint of apology, underscoring her belief that academic or personal success cannot be defined by acceptance into an elite college.

For now, she can only watch as American parents continue to etch a hopeful trajectory from nursery school to elite college to making lots of money — “which is driving me nuts,” she said. “The world has fallen apart. So, it’s even more important for us to continue to nurture this small little kernel of a place, full of integrity and knowledge that will make a difference to the lives of a few kids by giving them the confidence to go out into the world as good, mindful citizens.”

As for future plans, Ms. Topping said, “Between now and death, I’ll remain actively involved in the school for as long as they want me” — and enjoy her large family, which she calls “my anchor,” many of whom will be there on Sunday to see her being honored.

The Hayground Chefs Dinner on Sunday, which starts with hors d’oeuvres at 4:30 p.m., will also honor Bill Telepan, the executive chef of Oceana restaurant and the nonprofit organization Wellness in the Schools. It will be officiated at by Toni Ross, a founder of Hayground and of Nick and Toni’s restaurant, and the chef Eric Ripert. Tickets are $1,200 and can be purchased at haygroundchefsdinner.org or by calling 631-537-7068, extension 113.

Perry Gershon, a businessman and entrepreneur who is a Democratic candidate to represent New York’s First Congressional District, announced on Monday that he has raised $102,700 since July 15. According to the paperwork on file with the Federal Election Commission, the money has come entirely from individual donors.

Mr. Gershon, who lives in East Hampton, hopes to unseat Representative Lee Zeldin, a Republican serving his second term. He plans a formal announcement of his candidacy later in the summer.

“I’m thrilled with the support I’ve received for my candidacy in the first week, and I remain confident that I can garner the financial support necessary to hold Lee Zeldin accountable,” Mr. Gershon said in a statement. “This campaign is about raising wages and improving health care for the people of Long Island, and they are fired up and ready to fight back. Zeldin has put his own interests and special interests first for too long. He isn’t fighting for the middle class — but I will.”

He is one of several potential candidates for the Democratic nomination to oppose Mr. Zeldin in the November 2018 midterm elections, including Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr., who told The Star in April that he would consider a run “when the time is right.”

Mr. Gershon founded a sports bar when he was 23 years old, later spending more than 25 years in commercial real estate finance. He and his wife, Lisa, are parents to two sons, who attend college.

Efforts to preserve farming in East Hampton, and the outcome of previous preservation efforts, were at the root of wide-ranging opinions expressed at Town Hall last Thursday during a hearing on whether the town should buy what are known as enhanced development rights on the Dankowski farm in Wainscott.

The Dankowski farm and other farmland in the town has been protected from development by the purchase, with public money, of development rights. Those rights allow anything state law classifies as agriculture to take place on the land — more intensive uses than apparently were envisioned when the first development rights programs were adopted.

Now, both East Hampton and Southampton Towns are beginning to use community preservation fund money to buy enhanced development rights — the right to restrict more narrowly what occurs or is built on a farm.

The proposed purchase for $4 million of the enhanced rights of the 29.5-acre Dankowski farm would bar its use for anything but food crops, which Peter Dankowski, who farms the property, wants on his farm in the future. The Dankowski agreement would prevent the construction of new barns or other permanent structures, limit the extent and location of temporary structures like hoophouses, and call for at least 92 percent of the land to be used for food crops.

Several speakers at the hearing thanked Mr. Dankowski for maintaining the farm and working the land. One voiced concern, however, over the proposed restriction against a horse farm on the Dankowski land. 

“I would like to see my farm stay in row crops. This is what I chose, and talked to the town board about. I don’t personally care to have horses,” Mr. Dankowski said. “It means a lot to me, for what Wainscott is, and East Hampton as well,” the longtime farmer said.  “There’s no better land in the world, believe me. I’ve been in a lot of places, thought about leaving, but my heart is here.”

“Peter could sell those acres for hundreds of thousands of dollars an acre, but that’s not what’s in his soul,” MaryAnn Dankowski, his wife, said. “His soul is to see it continued on from generation to generation.”

Betty Dankowski, his daughter, described how her father had wanted to farm since he was a young boy. “As long as my sister and I are on this lovely earth, we plan to keep the farming going.”

 Others, such as Vicki Littman and her mother, Elaine Jones, who grow vegetables and have a farm stand in Amagansett, addressed the overall concept of the town’s purchase of enhanced development rights.

All agricultural uses as defined under state law should be allowed, Ms. Littman said. Before finalizing the Dankowski deal, the town board should put legislation or a policy in place outlining East Hampton Town’s enhanced development rights program, she said. “I don’t think you should proceed until the town has a full hearing on the scope of such a program.”

She went on to say the town should decide “what should be the extent that C.P.F. funds are used to pay farmers who have already been paid for development rights — because it’s not going to be just this one property. This is the tip of the iceberg.” A second rights purchase over a tract of land would set a precedent, she said.

Reg Cornelia, the chairman of the East Hampton Town Republican Committee, agreed. “You have to be very careful,” he said, “. . . in terms of what the parameters will be in terms of using this kind of money.”

Kim Quarty of the Peconic Land Trust, which developed and promoted enhanced rights, said that purchasing those rights was not paying twice for the same protection, but paying a landowner for the right to put new, additional restrictions on a property. The original development rights purchase agreements “were loosely written,” she said, resulting in uses of farmland that were not intended. “We didn’t foresee these problems,” she said.

Ms. Littman argued that the town’s agricultural advisory committee “has been discussing this for two years, and hasn’t listened to any concerns that have been brought to them.” In addition to considering the recommendations of that committee, which was appointed by the town board and is largely made up of farmers, she said the board should seek the opinions of its various citizens advisory committees on farmland preservation.

The agricultural committee, Ms. Jones said, should not be “so self-serving,” and should include representatives of the equestrian and business communities. If the group is to draft proposed revisions to the town code, a town attorney should participate, she said. Pat Mansir, a former town councilwoman, echoed that opinion this week in a letter to the editor of The Star.

“This program . . . is needed if we’re going to preserve farming in East Hampton, “ William Babinksi, another Wainscott farmer and a member of the town’s agricultural advisory committee, said.

John v.H. Halsey, the president of the Peconic Land Trust, agreed. “If we don’t do this, we’re going to lose food production farming. The problem is that non-farmers are buying this land for astronomical prices. . . . This is about preserving a heritage industry — food production — food to feed us.”

The outcome of a lawsuit regarding the county’s development rights purchases could have an impact on restrictions East Hampton might seek to place on farmland, David Buda, another speaker, suggested.

  Of the 1,464 acres of farmland in the Town of East Hampton, 1,054 acres have been protected through the purchase of development rights or by placing the farms in an agricultural reserve, Scott Wilson, the town’s director of land acquisition and management, said at the hearing last week.

East Hampton’s community preservation fund program, he said, which makes protection of farmland a priority, has been successful at preserving farmland itself, “but not in the preservation of farming, or the business of farming.” A recent study found that agricultural production does not play a significant role in the town’s economy, but has the potential to do so.

Mr. Wilson pointed out that the Dankowski enhanced development rights purchase would reduce “the value of the farm so a resale to a qualified farmer is even possible.” The Dankowski parcel would be valued at $25,000 an acre, plus the value of any physical improvements after the purchase of enhanced development rights. In contrast, he said, farmland over which development rights have been purchased, but with no agreement to limit its future value or sale price, has recently been sold at prices ranging from $171,000 to $384,000 an acre.

Two years ago, Mr. Wilson said, his department inspected all the farmland in town in an effort to determine how it was being used. The majority, 665 acres, was being used for row crops. Nursery stock, including trees, was being grown on 150 acres, while 140 acres were devoted to a combination of nursery and crop cultivation. Active horse farms were on 113 acres, 70 acres appeared to be pastureland with no horses, and 107 acres were fallow, scenic land.

Sixty-four acres were “mostly open,” Mr. Wilson said, with some wild vegetation growing in the fields, 72 acres were overgrown, and 58 acres were being used by private property owners for pools, houses, or as part of their lawns. There were 15 acres that could not be accessed or viewed, Mr. Wilson said, and 10 acres were devoted to chicken farms or other agricultural uses.

According to the analysis, Mr. Wilson said, there are 70 parcels of agricultural land comprising some 316 to 386 acres “that do not appear to be farmed. But for more than 100 of those acres, he said, efforts had been made to preserve the land for farming, either through placing the tracts in an agricultural reserve or by purchasing development rights.

Under the Dankowski agreement, if the land remains fallow for two years, the town could step in and lease it to a qualified farmer. If the land is to be sold, it must be to an approved bona fide farmer.

Town board members will consider the comments made at the hearing before acting, Town Supervisor Larry Cantwell promised. “It’s really a historic farm,” he said to the Dankowkis. “It’s really the heart of Wainscott, in many ways — important to the community, not just to you and your family.”

A plea to the East Hampton Town Trustees to allow expanded research of Wainscott Pond in order to develop remedies for its degraded water quality was approved at a meeting on Monday.

Simon Kinsella, representing a group of private property owners, told the trustees that $179,000 had been raised to fund a study similar to one done of Georgica Pond, which, like Wainscott Pond, has had repeated blooms of harmful blue-green algae. At a July 18 meeting of the property owners’ group, which was attended by Jim Grimes and Bill Taylor of the trustees, a plan was developed to begin research as soon as possible.

Christopher Gobler of Stony Brook University’s School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences would be hired to expand the research of Wainscott Pond that he began for the trustees last year, Mr. Kinsella said. Dr. Gobler has been monitoring conditions in waterways under trustee jurisdiction, including Georgica Pond, for several years. More recently, he has worked on behalf of the Friends of Georgica Pond Foundation, another group of private property owners.

The plan for Wainscott Pond, which Mr. Kinsella called “the forgotten pond,” was smaller in scope to the research underway at Georgica, but would include installation of a telemetry buoy that would transmit real-time data such as temperature, pH, and levels of chlorophyll, dissolved oxygen, and blue-green algae, or cyanobacteria. A telemetry buoy has been placed in Georgica Pond in the spring and summer for the last two years.

Also included in the proposed study are expanded sampling of water from both the center and multiple points at the perimeter of the pond; core samples of the soil and sediment using a manual sampling tool, and a noninvasive study of the pond’s hydrology.

With only five of the eight trustees present (a ninth trustee, Pat Mansir, resigned in May), the group voted 4 to 1 to approve Mr. Kinsella’s proposal for expanded research, on the condition that a comprehensive application with a more clearly defined scope be presented at or before their next meeting on Aug. 14.

Diane McNally, the trustees’ former clerk, cast the dissenting vote. She told Mr. Kinsella and her colleagues that her vote was because, “in my experience, no matter how benign a particular project may seem the very first time you’re looking at it . . . I have found that with a little time to think about it, you come up with some questions or concerns that make the whole project more beneficial. While I’m going to say no for tonight, I certainly support the project and look forward to what you bring to us” at the trustees’ next meeting.

“There’s no remediation discussed yet,” Mr. Taylor said. “You’re basically going to do what we did in Georgica Pond: Gather as much information as you can.”

Those attending the Ladies Village Improvement Society’s 121st annual fair on Saturday may witness a moving illustration of continuity in the face of impermanence.

In an 11:30 a.m. ceremony, members of the Everit Albert Herter Veterans of Foreign Wars post in East Hampton will officially conclude a duty they have fulfilled on behalf of the L.V.I.S. for many years: the placing of American flags at sites throughout the village on national holidays and other important dates.

But the task of planting scores of flags at sunrise, and their subsequent removal, has been taken up by other civic-minded residents. Officials of the East Hampton Chamber of Commerce and the Y.M.C.A. East Hampton RECenter have taken the baton and will, as of Saturday, oversee the duty.

The L.V.I.S. has bought, repaired, and stored over 100 flags, and its partnership with the V.F.W. post lasted more than 60 years, according to a letter to The Star from the society’s board of directors. “Unfortunately, the V.F.W. can no longer continue with this responsibility because of its aging membership, a major concern for V.F.W. posts across the country,” the letter read. “For the L.V.I.S., the ending of this partnership with the V.F.W. is a poignant moment in our history. We are deeply indebted to all of the gentlemen of Everit Albert Herter Post 550.”

Anne Thomas, president of the L.V.I.S., remembers the call from John Geehreng, the post’s commander. “He said our problem is, ‘We are too few and we are too old,’ ” she said. “That is the heart of the matter.”

While armed conflicts continue to create veterans, many younger vets, unable to afford the cost of living on the South Fork, have relocated to other regions. Among those who remain, many lack the time for membership in the V.F.W. or its activities, said Brian Carabine, the Everit Albert Herter post’s quartermaster and a past commander.

“The post is aging out,” Mr. Carabine said. “It’s difficult to get new members because people, when they go into service, tend not to come back, unless they have a family situation — housing is almost impossible for a young person. We’ve had a couple of younger members, but they’re working three jobs.”

The post has approximately 100 members, Mr. Carabine said, though around 30 of them live elsewhere. “Most of them are elderly,” he said. “It’s difficult, because once people retire, many sell out, move south, and have a nice life in retirement, where they couldn’t here. People can manage to hang on while they’re working, but once they retire, it becomes more difficult. A few of us have managed to be here for the long haul, but it’s difficult for most. We ran out of people to manage to do this.”

But a tradition started by the L.V.I.S. in 1896 will live on. Ms. Thomas spoke with Steven Ringel, the chamber of commerce’s executive director. Mr. Ringel, in turn, contacted Glenn Vickers, executive director of the RECenter. “Steve is such a go-getter,” she said. “I went to him and said, ‘We have a problem.’ He said, ‘How can I help?’ ”

“I, and the chamber, feel very deeply committed to this happening,” Mr. Ringel said, “and approached the Y.M.C.A. East Hampton RECenter, who felt the same way. We decided to jointly take on the project.” Mr. Ringel said that he and Mr. Vickers, and the volunteers they recruit, will place and remove the flags on behalf of the L.V.I.S.

“We always push to make sure that we’re very involved in the community in everything we do,” Mr. Vickers said. “When the opportunity came about, we felt it was our civic duty to support a great organization. We’ve got plenty of people, members and staff, that are fully engaged here, and we always say the more, the merrier.”

“This is a three-way partnership between the L.V.I.S., the chamber of commerce, and the RECenter,” Mr. Ringel said. “We just want this tradition to carry on. We’re very honored to do that with them, and with all the respect and ceremony that something like this should have.”

Ms. Thomas said that more than 60 flags would be placed on Main Street, between the large flagpole on the village green and the veterans’ monument at the Hook Mill green, on approximately nine days each year. Flags will adorn Main Street on holidays including Martin Luther King’s Birthday, Armed Forces Day, Memorial Day, Flag Day, Independence Day, Labor Day, and Veterans Day. The flags will also be erected on the day of the L.V.I.S. fair and on Sept. 11, the anniversary of the 2001 terrorist attacks in New York City and Washington, D.C.

“It’s going to be quite an inaugural run on Saturday,” Mr. Ringel said. “The V.F.W. will be coming with us for their last journey, so to speak.”

“It’s not that hard to do,” Mr. Carabine said, “but it’s a commitment, which is the difficult thing. It never goes away.”

“Thanks to the chamber and the Y,” Ms. Thomas said. “This is a lovely triumvirate, a great example of the community all pitching in to work together. We should see more of that.”

A study has found that one in five South Fork waterways tested between 2013 and 2016 had bacteria levels above a federal health standard at least 40 percent of the time.

During the summer months, volunteers from the Concerned Citizens of Montauk and Surfrider Foundation Eastern Long Island Chapter Blue Water Task Force sample up to 52 sites from Westhampton to Montauk each week. The samples are processed at the C.C.O.M. Montauk office and at the Stony Brook University Southampton campus.

In the study, the Surfrider's Blue Water Task Force explained that the primary sources of water pollution on the South Fork are failing septic systems and cesspool and animal waste.

A surf movie night to help pay for Surfrider's water testing work will be held on Wednesday at 7 p.m. at Guild Hall in East Hampton.

According to an analysis released this week by the Surfrider Foundation, three sites in Lake Montauk exceeded the health standard for the enterococcus bacteria in 44 percent of the tests, with the high numbers primarily occurring in June, July, and August. At Surfside Place in Montauk, which drains through a pipe onto the ocean beach, 70 percent of the tests were above the acceptable level.

Over the three years analyzed by C.C.O.M. and the Blue Water Task Force, samples from Pussy's Pond in Springs and the Georgica Pond kayak launch off Montauk Highway exceeded the safe standard more than half the time.

A stormwater outfall pipe at the Montauk Shores Condominium in Montauk exceeded the standard in 39 percent of the tests between 2013 and 2016.

Fort Pond Bay in Montauk exceeded the standard 16 percent of the time.

In the winter, sites are tested biweekly or monthly. Each sample costs about $10 to collect and process, according to Colleen Henn of Surfider, who prepared the 2013-16 study. Together, the C.C.O.M and Blue Water Task Force testing expenses add up to about $10,000 a year, according to the organizations. About 700 samples are taken on the South Fork annually.

The Concerned Citizens of Montauk has urged residents and businesses to have their septic tanks and cesspools pumped regularly or upgraded. East Hampton Town and Suffolk County are working on rebate programs for residents in close proximity to wetlands and waterways who replace outdated or failing wastewater systems.

E.P.A. Standard

Enterococci come from the intestines of warm-blooded animals. A presence of the bacteria in water signifies that fecal matter and harmful pathogens, which can lead to infections and disease in humans, can be present.

Most South Fork waters have relatively low bacteria counts, under the Environmental Protection Agency health standard of 104 colony-forming units, or viable cells or clumps of cells, per 100 milliliters of water. However, the C.C.O.M.-Surfrider work has consistently pointed to certain hot spots.

Among the bathing beaches with elevated enterococcus bacteria levels reviewed in the study was Fresh Pond in Amagansett, at which 39 percent of the samples between 2013 and 2016 were above the level considered safe. In results released by the Concerned Citizens this week, the bacteria count at the bay beach there was at 121 per 100ml of water and the shallow, warm creek popular with the parents of small children was 6,131, a spike casued by a recent rainstorm, Kate Rossi-Snook of the Concerned Citizens said.

Rain plays a significant role in bacteria levels. In Lake Montauk, the average enterococcus count at a west-side site increased from 102 to 1,637 after a rainfall; at South Lake Beach, the level increased from 14 to 123.

In East Hampton Village's Nature Trail, which flows into Hook Pond, enterococcus levels sampled by a volunteer were 2,279 units on June 19 and 14,136 units on July 17. They had fallen to 589 in a test this week.

Circle Beach in Noyac had a high bacteria level of 426 in a test sample taken on Monday. Sagg Pond in Sagaponack had levels rated high on Monday and July 17. Surfrider works with the Peconic Baykeeper organization to test waters in Southampton Town.

High bacteria levels were also recorded at Settler's Landing and Folkstone Creek at Three Mile Harbor on Monday, and at 2,445 units per 100ml on June 5 on the East Hampton Village Green.

Open Water

Beaches generally have lower bacterial presences than closed bodies of water. This is because any bacteria entering a large, moving ocean or open bay will be quickly diluted. Ocean beach bacteria counts were above the health standard in, at most, 3 percent of the C.C.O.M.-Surfrider samples. However at the Georgica Association ocean beach in Wainscott on Monday a sample tested at 107 units per 100ml, just above the level considered potentially harmful.

C.C.O.M. and the Blue Water Task Force have advised the public to swim only at ocean or open-bay beaches where there are lifeguards on duty, and to not enter the water 24 to 48 hours after rainfall, to not wade in streams or touch runoff at the beach, to not enter areas where there are blue-green algae bloom warning signs posted. They also recommended swimmers rinse off with freshwater before eating or leaving the beach, if possible.

Weekly results are posted via a link on the Concerned Citizens website, preservemontauk.org, and for Southampton Town, at surfrider.org/blue-water-task-force/chapter/49.

The Suffolk Department of Health Services has a seasonal water monitoring program and posts warnings about beach closures at suffolkcountny.gov.

Wednesday's fund-raiser will feature "Fishpeople," a documentary produced by Patagonia about the transformative effect of the ocean, which will be screened with several short surf films. The first 200 guests will receive limited edition t-shirts, and there will be a series of interactive exhibits in the courtyard and a silent auction and raffle. Tickets are $20, available at the door or on www.eventbrite.com.

East Hampton officials moved Wednesday to shut down a Montauk oceanfront residence used as a party spot for the app-based dating site Tinder, authorizing the town attorney to seek an injunction against using the house as hook-up central.

The property at 230 and 234 Old Montauk Highway was apparently rented by its owner, Michael Hirtenstein, a New York City entrepreneur, for $135,000 for the month of July to an executive at Tinder for company-sponsored parties.

The dating site advertised parties for members of Tinder Select, an exclusive, invitation-only area on the dating app for celebrities, models, and the like, at the property, which is along a stretch that includes residences owned by Ralph Lauren and Robert De Niro. A house formerly owned by Bernie Madoff, which was seized by the feds after Mr. Madoff was implicated and later jailed for defrauding investors in a Ponzi scheme, is nearby.

Mr. Hirtenstein sold his telecom business, Westcom Communications, for a reported $270 million in 2005, got involved in the New York real estate world, and became a partner in the EMM Group, which owns restaurants and lounges.

According to Michael Sendlenski, the East Hampton town attorney, town enforcement officers visited the property multiple times over the July 14 to 16 weekend when one of the events taking place was a party for Montauk's Whalebone magazine. They issued summonses for noise violations and the hosts' failure to obtain a mass gathering permit.

Last weekend, police were called to the property twice, and ordinance enforcement officers and a fire marshal also visited; citations for numerous other alleged violations were issued, Mr. Sendlenski said. As of Wednesday, an investigation was  ongoing, with other charges possible, he said, including those related to lack of a town rental registry permit and the commercial use of a residential property.

At a special meeting called on Wednesday, the town board authorized the attorney's office to seek  a court order to prevent further illegal use of the property. Mr. Sendlenski said that afternoon that he was in touch with a lawyer for Tinder Select, and that a settlement, expected by the end of the week, could prevent the need for an injunction.

Town code enforcement officers were on the property again on Wednesday, Mr. Sendlenski said, observing the dismantling of some of the party equipment at the house, such as an outdoor wigwam and clothing rack.

“Are these art?” That was the question from more than one visitor to the gallery space above Grain Surfboards in the old Amagansett Applied Arts building recently, where in a long back room of creaking floorboards and whitewashed walls five gleaming Budnitz bicycles were lined up for display, wheels tilted just so, like so many Harleys in front of a biker bar.

Jamesine Staubitser knew exactly what the gawkers meant. “They’re just so pretty,” she said Sunday afternoon, having met a viewing appointment barefoot, fresh from the beach, her blond locks a salty thicket. The floor models ranged from what looked like brushed stainless steel with seat and handlebar grips of leather to a striking royal blue to sleek all black.

Ms. Staubitser, a Montauker just home from college in California, is the rep for the Budnitz showroom this summer. “I’ve had many beach cruisers, but there’s no comparison. These are such a smooth ride. And they’re really light,” she said, easily hefting one from its stand.

The company gave her a bike to ride around on — for word of mouth; people see, people ask questions, questions are answered, interest is generated.

About that smooth ride, the company literature weighs in: “The iconic Budnitz twin-tube cantilever frame flexes vertically to absorb road vibration while remaining laterally stiff to deliver energy to the pedals.”

Which is done by way of a carbon-reinforced belt, not a chain — no grease, no rust, no maintenance, no noise.

And at times even no exertion. “Some of these have motion-pedal assistance” — electric, that is — “that kicks in after you pedal backwards,” Ms. Staubitser said. “As long as you’re pedaling,” an online brochure has it, “the 250W motor assists to exaggerate the effort you put in.”

“A pink Bella E, an electric step-through model, is on its way to the showroom,” Ms. Staubitser said. That model starts at $3,950, but more affordable bikes are available. “The lowest-price single speed is around $2,000,” she said, “but it’s more for 11 to 14 speeds.”

The bicycles are handmade in Burlington, Vt. — in fact custom made to a buyer’s own specs, measurements, and riding style, all of which can be submitted by way of what Budnitz calls its “interactive, online builder.” The wait time is four to six weeks.

Appointments to the showroom can be made by emailing [email protected].

According to data from Town and Country Real Estate, one of the firms that has released its home sales report for the first half of 2017, the total number of home sales across all Hamptons markets decreased by 1 percent in the first half of this year compared to the same time period last year. That said, total home sales volume, or the cumulative price of home sales, and median home sales price both increased.

The Town and Country report, which compares home sales reports year to year, was released on July 18. The company uses three criteria to monitor home sales: number of home sales, median home sales price, and total home sales volume in dollars.

The total number of home sales decreased from 899 in the first half of 2016 to 891 so far this year. Only Southampton Village and Amagansett saw increases, but median home sales prices rose in Noyac, North Haven, Sag Harbor Village, North Sea, Southampton Village, East Hampton Village, Montauk, and the Bridgehampton, Water Mill, and Sagaponack area. 

In Southampton Village, the number of home sales rose from 37 in the first half of 2016 to 44 sales in the first half of 2017; total home sales volume rose 142 percent, and the median home sales price rose 58 percent from $1.95 million to around $3.1 million so far this year. According to the release, Southampton Village saw the greatest increase of all Hamptons markets, and four home sales were over $20 million.

The Water Mill and Sagaponack areas also saw increases in total home sales volume with over $333 million in sales. Seven homes sold for between $10 million and $19.99 million and one sold for over $20 million each.

Sag Harbor Village had a 3-percent decrease in the number of home sales, but an increase in the total home sales volume. The median home sales price increased nearly 20 percent, which puts it around $1.6 million. In the Noyac and North Haven areas there was a 20-percent increase in the median home sales price to $1.45 million.

Shelter Island did not fare as well as the other towns. All three criteria decreased, including the number of home sales, which went down 25 percent. The total home sales volume dropped 16 percent and the median home sales price went down nearly 11 percent, from $848,250 to $755,000.

Wainscott similarly saw decreases in the three criteria, but East Hampton Village saw a nearly 38-percent increase in the median home sales price, which is now at $3.3 million. Total home sales in dollars increased in Montauk, as did the median home sales price, which is now at $1.1 million. 

The Town and Country report said that Southampton Village, East Hampton Village, and Bridgehampton were the crown jewels of the real estate world, but “looking at all Hamptons markets combined it is clear the high end has made an impressive comeback from 2016.” Sales of houses priced in the $10 million to $19 million range rose 30 percent and sales in the $20 million range “shot up 50 percent.” But plenty of action occurred at the less-high end of the market, the report noted: “88 percent of all Hamptons home sales occurred under $3.5 [million].”