As a new law requiring schools to test for lead in their water supplies awaits a signature by Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, a review of water testing procedures in local school districts shows wide variations in the frequency of testing. In districts that have voluntarily tested their water over the last three months, two found trace amounts of lead.

National attention to the presence of lead in school drinking water is part of the fallout from the ongoing water crisis in Flint, Mich., where high levels of lead were found in the water supply in residences and schools after what many residents alleged was city officials’ negligence. In March, testing found lead in the drinking water of 30 Newark, N.J., schools, prompting parents across the country to question the quality of the water their own children were drinking and washing with each day.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, lead damages organs and causes stunted intellectual development. The damages of lead exposure cannot be reversed. “Even low levels of lead in blood have been shown to affect I.Q., ability to pay attention, and academic achievement,” the C.D.C. said. Based on a survey it conducted of 102 school districts on Long Island, Newsday reported two weeks ago that 21 districts on Long Island had found elevated levels of lead in drinking water, spurring many districts to replace water fixtures or take other actions.

Test results on the South Fork, obtained through freedom of information requests, show that the Sag Harbor Elementary and Sagaponack Schools had very small amounts of lead in water samples, but in both cases the levels were considered to be within the Environmental Protection Agency’s acceptable limits of under 15 parts per billion, a level that could soon be lowered. That is also the level at which local utilities and the Suffolk County Department of Health Services say corrective action must be taken. (In contrast, testing in Flint showed some water samples contained lead at levels more than 10 times that, and in some cases far more.)

“There was no concern at all from Suffolk County Water Authority,” Katy Graves, Sag Harbor’s superintendent, said of the 1.43 parts-per-billion result at the elementary school. “They considered that trace.” There are some school districts on Long Island that are finding lead at levels requiring action, she said, “but not ours.”

Ms. Graves said the origin of the lead reading was unclear, as the plumbing at Sag Harbor Elementary had been upgraded since it was built.

The Sagaponack School had a reading of 3.6 parts per billion, still within acceptable standards for drinking water — but students in Sagaponack do not drink the tap water, which was where the water samples were drawn for testing. Rather, they drink bottled water. The Sagaponack School was built in 1885.

“We do not drink water from the tap,” Alan Van Cott, the superintendent, who just completed his third year with the school, said in an email. “However, since there has been increased attention to this issue, we thought it best to have the water tested.”

The analysis of water testing in local schools also showed how irregularly testing is done. There are no rules in place regulating testing. The East Hampton and Sag Harbor School Districts test their water supplies every year. East Hampton’s tests this year came back lead-free, as they have in recent memory, school officials there said. The Bridgehampton School tested its water for the first time in several years in 2013, a test that found no lead, before testing again this year. The school was still awaiting those results as of press time.

Neither the Suffolk County Water Authority nor the county have records of testing done at the Montauk School, and Jack Perna, the superintendent, who has been there in various capacities since 1973, said he has never known the water to have been tested there during his tenure. The school, which was constructed in 1927 and expanded in 1955, 1965, 1973, and 2000, operates on municipal water and has filters installed at its fountains. A Montauk School custodian conducted an in-house test this year using an over-the-counter kit, which came back negative for lead, and the school will repeat the test with a private company this summer, Mr. Perna said.

“We tested because of the Flint, Mich., situation,” he said. “If it’s worth anything, I’ve been here a long time and make my coffee with tap water everyday.”

A water test was performed at Wainscott’s new schoolhouse in 2007, the year it opened, according to a Suffolk County report. It was found to have a lead reading of 1.9 parts per billion, well below the remediation level. The school has since been hooked up to public water and had a filtration system installed, but its water has not been tested since 2007. Stuart Rachlin, the superintendent, said in an email that there is “no need for testing. Pipes from Suffolk County Water Authority to the new school are fine, and we use bottled water if necessary in the old school.”

The Sagaponack School’s most recent test before the one this year, according to Suffolk County Department of Health Services records, was in 2007.

Amagansett tests its water “every few years,” according to its superintendent, Eleanor Tritt. This year’s results came up negative for lead. The Springs School did not return a request for comment on how frequently the district tests its water. A test there by the Suffolk County Water Authority in April found that the water was lead-free.

Testing at schools on the South Fork has typically been done by a private company or by a public entity such as the Suffolk County Department of Health Services or the Suffolk County Water Authority. Private water testing in Sagaponack, for instance, cost less than $300, but in Amagansett it cost close to $2,000, although the county and Water Authority do not typically charge for their services.

These tests are timely now, as the New York State Senate and Assembly both passed a bill late this term, co-sponsored by State Senator Kenneth P. LaValle and Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr., that promotes the testing of drinking water in schools. If Governor Cuomo signs the legislation, periodic testing will be required and state money will be available to offset the cost of testing and remediation in case problems are found. The bill also requires schools to share test results with parents and community members, but allows a testing waiver for schools built after 1986, which was the year the federal government outlawed the use of lead pipes in school building construction.

Assemblyman Thiele said Tuesday that while the situation in Flint was in the back of lawmakers’ minds as they processed the legislation, it was a recent situation in Binghamton that ultimately led to its passage. Lead was found in a school’s water supply there, he said, but no one told the parents or the community.

“Testing our drinking water in schools seems to be such a common sense thing to do,” Assemblyman Thiele said. “It’s hard to believe there have been issues with regard to this. No one likes state mandates, but this is something that clearly needed to be required because of the health importance and some school districts weren’t doing what needed to be done.”

Among school officials, the safety and financial aspects were key components in the soon-to-be-signed law.

“We have to be the leaders in safety, but I think our legislators have to balance funding when they pass school district legislation,” Ms. Graves said. “My hope is that they support the school districts with funding to balance this, should a district find lead or anything that is a hazard to children, especially with the tax cap burden.”

“For districts that don’t comply or aren’t proactive, I think the legislation is a really good idea,” Richard Burns, the East Hampton superintendent, said. “Things that involve the safety or well-being of children we have absolutely no issue with. We’re happy to comply and be proactive with it.”

“Why the hell can’t we get along?” Trustee Jim Grimes asked, frustration evident in his voice.

The East Hampton Town Trustees were well into a second consecutive meeting that would surpass the three-hour mark, much of the previous meeting’s agenda similarly held hostage to long and acrimonious public comment over claims to private ownership of beaches. The group’s two June meetings followed a May 23 meeting at which two residents of Springs insisted that vehicles be restricted from neighborhood beaches.

The tension reached a boil on Tuesday, as the Springs residents, Penny Helm and Susan Winkler, and the trustees resumed the debate, interrupting and talking over one another repeatedly. “Does anybody get along with their neighbor here?” Mr. Grimes finally asked, turning to the audience, which also included many residents of the Driftwood Shores development in Springs, where newly arrived homeowners are asserting ownership of the beach in front of their house. “Can we have someone, please?”

The recently concluded trial to determine the ownership of and access to parts of the Napeague ocean beach, the dispute among the Driftwood Shores property owners, and the insistence of Ms. Helm and Ms. Winkler that vehicles be further restricted have exasperated the nine-member board, which generally considers public access to the beaches, including vehicular access, an inalienable right.

But like other complaints leveled in recent years, including rampant quality-of-life infringements and ecological degradation of beaches and water bodies, these conflicts and breakdowns in civility are promoted by the overwhelming numbers of people crowding into the town in summer. Mr. Grimes was not the only speaker on Tuesday who begged for compromise, understanding, and accommodation.

“All we’re looking for, each of us, is our own little space,” Ms. Helm told the trustees, in asking that a fence be replaced at the small beach inside the channel at Maidstone Park and vehicle access restricted. She said trucks were damaging the beach and beach grass, and presented a hazard for the children and families who swim there.

Tim Bock, a trustee, was unmoved. “You’re saying there’s a safety issue,” he told Ms. Helm. “Has there been one reported? No! There’s never been one reported there, ever.” With respect to residents driving on the beach, he asked, “Who are you to say they’re not entitled?”

Many of the trustees agreed that one of Maidstone Park’s two vehicle access points has been widened to 50 feet or more and should be narrowed, but said both should remain, along with a pedestrian access. As they have done previously, they reminded Ms. Helm of the town-owned beach directly across from the parking lot, where vehicles are prohibited.

Ms. Winkler told the trustees she was “horrified” by the number of trucks at Little Albert’s Landing Beach in Amagansett. “It’s such a narrow beach that almost all the trucks park with their front end right up into the dune,” she said. “The trucks go all the way from the grass into the water,” impeding, she said, pedestrian use. “People always talk about the beauty of our beaches. We are destroying the beauty of our beaches by allowing this to happen.”

“Historically, they’ve also had access,” Francis Bock, clerk of the trustees, said of beach drivers. “You can’t just take it away from them.” A solution, he said, would be to expand vehicle access to other areas, “to stretch them out a bit, as opposed to consolidating them into little tiny areas, where they do damage.”

The clerk said that in his 60 years, “I cannot think of one beach that exists today that did not exist back to my first memory. . . . The population has expanded four or five times, and we’re still playing with the same small spaces we had when I was born. And we wonder why everybody’s fighting over it. Every town board that goes through here, nobody wants to address it.”

Tim Taylor of Citizens for Access Rights said that many compromises were made in crafting the town code sections pertaining to beaches. “Consideration was given to all user groups,” he said. “Now, it seems like people are coming back for a second bite at the apple. . . . I respect everybody’s right to not agree with everything, but what we take exception to is people banning other people from activity that they don’t like.” Vehicle access to beaches, he said, “is a traditional use we’d like to see protected in East Hampton.”

The trustees acknowledged the difficulty in finding a balance that accommodates everyone. “The best thing that starts here is recognizing some of the other people’s positions,” Mr. Grimes said. “It’s not all you. There are other people out there. . . . Reflect on this, and have some middle ground. There’s going to be places where people are going to park their trucks, they want to picnic with their kids, it’s legal. You may not like it, but it is legal. There are areas where the trucks are excluded, and rightly so.”

Several residents of Driftwood Shores returned to thank the trustees for investigating the ownership of their neighborhood’s bay beach. They also informed the trustees, however, that attempts to resolve the dispute amicably had proved hopeless. Before they had even left the Town Hall campus after the last trustees’ meeting, they reported, they had argued in the parking lot with the couple asserting ownership of the beach in front of their house.

Richard Whalen, the trustees’ attorney, said he had contacted a company that would try to ascertain if any deed transfers, going back to the town’s original land allotments, had improperly extended property rights to the high-water mark. “No one can convey title to more land than they own,” he said. “That was true in 1830, as it is today.”

The solution to these disputes, Mr. Grimes repeated, “is, people getting used to sharing the resources.”

But “nobody wants to share anything anymore, Jim,” the clerk responded. “Everybody is about themselves.”

Southampton Town Supervisor Jay Schneiderman is one of the many drivers who try to avoid Bridgehampton’s Main Street. He told the Bridgehampton Citizens Advisory Committee on Monday night that he is thinking about ways to fix the standstill that so often afflicts the area, while also improving pedestrian safety.

State officials recently secured $700,000 for improving pedestrian safety in Bridgehampton, which the town will be able to use to install and improve crosswalks and for lighting enhancements. Plans to make improvements have long been discussed, but the death of Anna Pump, a chef, cookbook author, and owner of the Loaves and Fishes shop, after she was struck while crossing Main Street at the Bridgehampton Post Office at night in October, heightened awareness of the problems along the busy corridor.

But what would be the solution in a hamlet that struggles with both pedestrian safety and traffic flow? The town will have to decide how to use the money — and work with the state, since Montauk Highway is a state road.

“I love downtown Bridgehampton,” Mr. Schneiderman said, but the traffic causes him to veer north or south around the backlog. He is concerned that traffic is being forced onto residential streets as a bypass, and would like to explore putting in a series of four crosswalks at the intersection of Montauk Highway, Ocean Road, and the Bridgehampton-Sag Harbor Turnpike, where a streetlight already exists.

Adding lights along the rest of Main Street to allow for pedestrian crossings is not the answer, Mr. Schneiderman said. “You don’t want to shut down Main Street completely and force traffic onto other roads.” Existing crosswalks not located at traffic lights already cause a logjam anytime someone feels like stepping across the road, creating “an almost constant interruption of flow,” he said.

Instead, he would like to work with engineers to figure out how to configure crosswalks at the light at the main intersection, which includes a tricky spot, north to south, by the Founders Monument, which sits in the middle of the highway, where a wide angle turns off onto Ocean Road. Several members of the C.A.C. said they couldn’t see a crosswalk working at the monument, even though Mr. Schneiderman said an engineer could figure out how to make the monument part of a grassy area.

“I have looked at this with traffic engineers and they said this could be done,” he said.

His plan could include eliminating the illuminated crosswalk in front of the Hampton Library, about 100 feet west, to force pedestrians to walk down to the corner. While that crosswalk has long been in existence, the illumination was added less than a year ago at the library’s request, to the tune of nearly $80,000. As part of his overall plan, Mr. Schneiderman said he would add illumination to the crosswalk in front of Thayer’s Hardware, and possibly more by the Post Office.

By the Candy Kitchen, on the corner of School Street and Montauk Highway, where there is a yellow blinking light, in part for the Bridgehampton Fire Department, which is located just up the block on School Street, Mr. Schneiderman’s idea is to put a signal there, but not a regular traffic light. The signal would stay green to allow traffic to move from east to west, and pedestrians would have to push a button when they want to cross.

Pamela Harwood, the chairwoman of the C.A.C., said she was almost run over in the crosswalk at the Candy Kitchen last year. The driver was looking down at his phone, even though there was a traffic control officer in the crosswalk. After the car stopped and she continued across the street, “then a bicyclist tried to bypass the stopped car, again nearly killing me.” Ms. Harwood said there was nothing the T.C.O. could do, as they aren’t allowed to issue tickets for moving violations. More police officers are needed, she told the supervisor.

Mr. Schneiderman said Bridge­hampton is one of the few hamlets with a substation; one is in the Bridge­hampton Commons. He said he would relay the message to the town’s Police Department that the group wants a more visible police presence. He assured the committee that he has been having conversations with police officials, as well as the candidates to take over as the new Southampton Town police chief, about instituting more foot and bicycle patrols.

One woman said she wouldn’t let her children ride their bicycles to the beach because of the traffic.

There is “no consideration of the pedestrian in Bridgehampton. It’s an abomination for a community that is as wealthy as this to pay so little attention to it,” said Peter Wilson, a committee member.

Even though an application for a mix of commercial, retail, and residential space, which would have included an affordable housing component, on the property known as the Bridgehampton Gateway, across from the Commons, is off the table, the C.A.C. is still thinking about affordable housing.

Mr. Wilson and Nancy Walter-Yvertes said they are taking part in a committee put together by Julie Lofstad and John Bouvier of the town board to come up with suggestions for housing opportunities. The committee is just getting started, but Mr. Wilson said they would come back to the C.A.C. with some ideas.

He said it was unfortunate that the town allowed a pre-existing nonconforming house with six apartments in it to be torn down for a McMansion. The price tag had been $2.5 million.

“I can’t spend $400,000 per unit,” Mr. Schneiderman said.

The supervisor mentioned his idea to establish a program to allow homeowners to create affordable apartments in their houses on smaller lots. The apartments would have to be rented to people who meet certain income qualifications and who are already working in the area. He wants to try 25 units and see how it goes, focusing on school districts with declining enrollments.

Peter Feder, a C.A.C. member, said when he lived in Manhattan he used to commute 40 minutes to work on Wall Street by taking three subways. He said it seems as if people who were born and raised in Bridgehampton think there’s “a birthright” to live there.

“There’s no birthright,” Mr. Schneiderman said, but there is a labor demand. If people don’t live here, they will live farther west and commute in, leading back to the traffic problem. The economic and cultural diversity “is part of a soul of the community,” he said. “If a community becomes all one income bracket, to me it’s a less interesting place to live.” A balance is necessary, he said, to a small round of applause.

A woman in attendance said she would prefer it if Bridgehampton’s volunteer firefighters lived nearby and weren’t coming from Hampton Bays.

A costly contest to secure the Democratic Party’s nomination to represent New York’s First Congressional District in the House of Representatives remained too close to call after votes were counted in Tuesday’s primary election. The race will come down to absentee ballots; 1,667 were distributed and are to be counted next week.

With 100 percent of machine votes counted shortly after 11 p.m. on Tuesday, Anna Throne-Holst, a former Southampton Town supervisor, maintained a lead of just 29 votes over David Calone, a businessman, former federal prosecutor, and former chairman of the Suffolk County Planning Commission. Ms. Throne-Holst had 5,446 votes to Mr. Calone’s 5,417. The winner will face Lee Zeldin, a first-term Republican, in the Nov. 8 election.

In a statement issued shortly before midnight, Ms. Throne-Holst said, “We are waiting for all votes to be counted, but are proud to have a lead at the end of election night. We are confident going forward that victory will be ours now and in November.”

Mr. Calone’s campaign released a statement yesterday in which he called the 29-vote margin “a victory of the volunteer grassroots.” He took aim at “Wall Street fund-raisers” for Ms. Throne-Holst, adding that “we did not have $720,000 of SuperPAC funding poured in for us in the last three weeks, but here we are in a virtual tie.”

Despite some $3 million spent on the primary campaign, turnout at the polls was around 9 percent of the district’s 137,695 registered Democrats.

The November election for the First District seat is expected to be close. The Rothenberg and Gonzalez Political Report, a nonpartisan newsletter covering political campaigns, calls the race a “tossup/tilt Republican.” The district includes East Hampton, Southampton, Shelter Island, Southold, Riverhead, and Brookhaven Towns, and most of Smithtown.

Mr. Calone has called Mr. Zeldin, the incumbent, “a proud defender of Donald Trump,” the Republican Party’s presumptive nominee for president, “who voted to defund Planned Parenthood and voted against prohibiting people on the terrorist watch list from buying guns.” On Tuesday, he continued, “we proved the power a strong volunteer grassroots organization can have against big money, and this is exactly what Democrats will need this November to defeat Lee Zeldin.”

Should Ms. Throne-Holst prevail in the primary and win in November, she would be the first woman to represent the First District, in a year in which Hillary Clinton, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, would also be a first. Ms. Throne-Holst told The Star earlier this month that she hoped Ms. Clinton’s coattails would be long enough to carry her to victory. “There’s some synergy there,” she said. “I think we have an excellent chance of winning this in November.”

Voting machines must be returned to the county’s Board of Elections and inspected, along with any ballots gathered but not registered at polling stations, an assistant to the board’s commissioner said yesterday. A count of absentee ballots will follow.

It’s been almost a year since Montauk residents stormed a meeting of the East Hampton Town Board clamoring for action after a Fourth of July weekend when crowds overwhelmed the hamlet, prompting complaints about noise, public drunkenness, share houses, and overcrowded clubs.

This year, while acknowledging continued challenges in dealing with a swollen summer population, town officials expect a number of new laws, policies, and procedures to tone down and maybe even avert mayhem.

So far this year, East Hampton Town Police Chief Michael Sarlo said in an email on Monday, noise complaints are “down significantly. Many hotel and retail business people have commented that weekday business is better and the family atmosphere is returning.”

Party scene chaos last summer in Montauk was the subject of so much media coverage that the Montauk Chamber of Commerce produced a video touting the hamlet’s traditional, family-friendly atmosphere.

Coordinated enforcement efforts across town agencies have been beefed up with additional staff in “an efficient and effective process,” according to Mr. Sarlo. He has also taken to making personal, on-the-ground surveys of the Montauk weekend scene.

“On my rounds this past Saturday night, I saw a fire marshal outside one bar, two code enforcement officers on foot handling taxis near another, a Marine Patrol truck at a beach access, and several of our foot patrols on Main Street. Consistent presence and enforcement have been key,” he said.

A cross-section of town department heads, staffers, and elected officials has been meeting regularly, as has a committee including Town Councilwoman Kathee Burke-Gonzalez and Councilman Fred Overton that vets requests for permits for large gatherings.

The latter effort, which has been in place for several seasons, has helped the town avoid the general chaos, traffic congestion, and strain on resources, including traffic police, that simultaneous large events can cause, officials say. Unlike the past, when just about every fund-raising organization or party host was assured a town permit, the committee has turned down requests, including permits for the Shark Attack party hosted by Ben Watts and, recently, a permit for filming a new Bravo TV reality show based in Montauk.  

“We are really dealing with a tremendous amount of people and a wide variety of issues,” Chief Sarlo said.

More Policing

Following last year’s complaints, the town board authorized overtime for key enforcement personnel and put money in the budget for new staff. Weekend enforcement in Montauk had already been stepped up before the Fourth of July last year, Chief Sarlo said, but “the increased staffing and overtime support . . . allowed us to take that another step further, which gave us quite a bit more presence and has continued to be a positive step in calming the overall atmosphere. The crowds are still big, and offenses have not gone away, but the overall feeling is that safety and good order are improving steadily.”

 Diane Hausman, who heads the Montauk Citizens Advisory Committee and is an owner of a Montauk motel, said Tuesday that “we’re hoping” for a successful, problem-free holiday weekend. The Police Department, she said, “has been working extremely hard” to turn the tide against rowdiness. Nonetheless, she said, the Sands has hired private security for the first time since her grandparents ran the place in 1951.

Increased enforcement began in May this year, East Hampton Town Supervisor Larry Cantwell said, with, for instance, fire marshals dispatched every weekend night and at other times to see if bars and restaurants were complying with maximum occupancy and other safety laws.

The Ordinance Enforcement Department has investigated an increasing number of cases, which last year was up 50 percent from 2013. Enforcement officers also have received professional training on the use of new, sophisticated noise meters, and will have another training session soon, David Betts, the town director of public safety, said Tuesday.

  The police, who routinely report infractions of State Liquor Authority licenses to that agency, made more than 60 referrals last year, and, said Mr. Cantwell, coordinated with county and state agencies on drug, driving-while-intoxicated, and liquor license enforcement efforts.

The town’s inquiries to the liquor authority this spring into whether businesses offering live music had proper S.L.A. designation to do so caused a number of places to suspend music until they could amend their licenses, an administrative, but necessary, detail. Local musicians subsequently complained about heavy-handed town tactics, particularly just before their prime moneymaking season began on Memorial Day.

To Rein in Nightclubs

In early September, the board passed a law requiring bars or nightclubs that can legally accommodate more than 100 people to use a mechanical or electronic counting device to keep tabs on the number of patrons allowed inside.

Another new law, designed to rein in the transformation of hotel restaurants and bars into nightspots that draw in customers who are not hotel guests, which has been the source of problems in Montauk neighborhoods, was put in place last July. It prohibits hotels in residential areas from adding new restaurants and bars. Any in a nonresidential district must obtain a special permit and meet standards such as locating their dining area away from neighbors.

Complaints about share houses and short-term house rentals, fostered through online booking sites such as Airbnb, have also been a source of contention. Following hearings and considerable opposition, the town board established a rental registry earlier this year requiring landlords to obtain a registry number before renting property and to file information about lease agreements. The board reasoned that having information about approved rentals would enable better identification of illegal rentals and allow summonses against them. To date, more than 2,800 registry numbers have been issued.

Growing numbers of people partying on the beaches day and night have also caused concern and complaints about rowdy behavior and detritus from beach fires. Last summer the board mandated that beach fires be built inside fireproof containers, and it issued a permanent ban on drinking alcohol on high-season weekends when lifeguards are on duty at Indian Wells Beach in Amagansett, which had become a popular party spot.

The town board also extended no-parking zones along Edgemere Road in Montauk near the Surf Lodge, a popular club, and outlawed parking on the dirt road leading from Edgemere to the Montauk Firehouse to address congestion and pedestrian safety. It also reacted to the use by Gurney’s Inn of nearby residential streets for employee and valet parking by banning on-street parking in those areas.

Rules for Taxis

To address taxis from out of town wreaking havoc, the town board revised a licensing law requiring cab companies operating here to have a business office in the town. That made drivers for Uber, the app-based ride-summoning service, ineligible, making waves last summer as the company mounted a campaign to get its customers to lodge complaints against the town for “banning” Uber. Every vehicle used as a cab must now be inspected prior to licensing; a system for background checks on drivers, which must be coordinated with the state, is still pending.

In addition, proposed traffic laws to tame  some taxicab practices will be the subject of hearings next Thursday. One would prohibit parking taxis and waiting for fares on any public road in Montauk, or in the public parking lots at Kirk Park or on South Euclid Avenue, except when dropping off or picking up passengers. Another would clarify prohibitions against stopping in travel lanes, on sidewalks, and the like.

Another hearing next week will be on a modification of the town’s public assemblies law to make it clear that noise from parties — even those held under a town permit — cannot exceed the levels allowed under the town’s noise ordinance, unless specifically exempted.

Another Montauk issue involves eateries that have outdoor seating, with or without official permission, and those that co-opted parts of sidewalks. The town board asked a citizens committee to look at the issue and held a hearing earlier this month on a trial program legalizing al fresco dining in downtown Montauk. Technically, the seating that has proliferated on public property outside takeout shops is not permitted and recommendations for what to do about it are forthcoming.

Trouble Spots Targeted

In an email this week, Supervisor Cantwell also pointed to board action that increased fines for various violations, including littering, and successful prosecution by the town — including some in State Supreme Court — of citations for zoning violations, public safety infractions, and overcrowding and illegal occupancy of single-family houses. Mr. Cantwell said that in response to the town’s enforcement efforts “a number of establishments have changed their operations,” while others were starting afresh under new management, including Harbor Raw Bar, Ciao, Cyril’s, and Sloppy Tuna.

“We have more work to do,” Mr. Cantwell said in the email. But, he said, “we are beginning to make good progress toward restoring peace and good order in our community.”

Fort Pond and Lake Montauk are more vulnerable than ever, according to the Concerned Citizens of Montauk, because of threats coming from above and below ground.

The problem of polluted runoff into waters after it rains is already well documented here, but concern is growing over aging, underground septic systems in developed areas around the lake and the pond that have begun to affect water quality. To address this, C.C.O.M. has launched a campaign dubbed Save the Lake, Save the Pond.

"As beautiful as it is, it's in peril. . . . The unfortunate reality is that our water quality is not what we want it to be," Jeremy Samuelson, the executive director of C.C.O.M., said during a news conference on Friday at Carol Morrison Park on Fort Pond.

C.C.O.M.'s water testing program, carried out by citizens who were trained by the Surfrider Foundation, has noted consistently high levels of the bacteria enterococcus tied to rain and seasonal warming of the waters in Fort Pond and Lake Montauk since the testing began four years ago.

Mara Dias, the national water quality manager for the Surfrider Foundation, said during the news conference that the bacteria as well as elevated levels of nitrogen likely come from septic systems and lead directly to problems such as harmful algal blooms, the closure of swimming beaches, and the die-off of fish.

Right now, according to Victor DePietro, who owns Hamptons Septic Services and is another expert called in by C.C.O.M., many homes built in the 1970s or earlier have septic problems that their owners may not know about.

"There's a good probability that [your septic system] has roots growing in it, or it's full of solids," said Mr. DePietro, a 39-year resident of the South Fork who keeps a boat in Lake Montauk. "Most people don't service theirs until they're backing up. They call us up when it doesn't go down anymore."

Save the Lake, Save the Pond combines stewardship and advocacy in the hopes of making a difference, Mr. Samuelson said.

Trained "ambassadors" from among C.C.O.M.'s members, who were coordinated by Michelle Carlson, the project manager, over the past several months, will help guide volunteer homeowners and landowners, to be called "stewards," in learning how to better manage wastewater and runoff. Landscaping practices will be evaluated to make sure people aren't overfertilizing or using toxic chemicals, and septic systems will be inspected to determine whether they are adequate, declining, or altogether failing. Failing septic systems threaten more than just the health of lakes and ponds -- they eventually threaten the drinking water supply, too.

The advocacy part relates to East Hampton Town's planned referendum in November asking residents to approve an extension to the community preservation fund. It would allow up to 20 percent of the money collected as part of the C.P.F. to be used for water quality initiatives. C.C.O.M. supports the extension and is "pushing for the maximum," Mr. Samuelson said.

Such a program could benefit homeowners who need to replace failing septic systems by awarding tax credits to those who install better wastewater management systems at their properties, which would benefit the region as a whole.

C.C.O.M.'s goal is to attract 35 percent of the approximately 1,600 property owners around Lake Montauk and Fort Pond to become stewards over the next three years.

"We know it's a long-term problem, and it's going to be a long-term fix," Mr. Samuelson said. If the goal can be reached, he said, "we'd start to make some real progress here."

He said hundreds of volunteer hours have gone into the Save the Lake, Save the Pond campaign so far.

"This has been easily, hands down, the best volunteer program that C.C.O.M. has ever put together," he said. "We have never tried to mobilize such a large volunteer effort to get out there and engage the community around a problem that means so much, from property values to quality of life to human health."

More water quality information and resources for property owners can be found at preservemontauk.org/save-the-lake.

Thomas Gilbert Jr., whose family house in Wainscott was sold after he was charged with murdering his father in his Manhattan apartment on Jan. 4, 2015, made a rare appearance Tuesday in the Centre Street courtroom of State Supreme Court Justice Melissa Jackson. Mr. Gilbert, who is being held on Rikers Island, has attempted suicide on at least one occasion since being locked up, according to the prosecutor, Craig Ortner.

At issue Tuesday was whether Mr. Gilbert, a Princeton graduate whom police said had staged the murder scene to look like a suicide, should undergo yet another round of psychiatric tests. Three doctors have already offered conflicting opinions as to his sanity. Now, two more doctors have asked to be allowed one more exam, which, unlike the others, would not be videotaped.

If in the end the defendant is deemed mentally incompetent, he will not stand trial. His lawyer, Alex Spiro, argued this week that Mr. Gilbert’s having swallowed a small battery and then claimed to be radioactive, was a sign of mental incompetence.

“The defendant did, in fact, swallow a battery,” Mr. Ortner said. “That appears to have come on the tail end of a series of gestures that could be interpreted as suicide attempts. . . . It is sad but not surprising that someone in the defendant’s unenviable position, incarcerated, facing the prospect of life in prison” would be suicidal, he said.

“He is telling me that he can’t think because he is radioactive,” Mr. Spiro countered.

The two also jousted over the accused’s repeated calls to a cable television provider, previously identified as Cablevision, the provider of the signal to Rikers Island. In fact, Mr. Ortner said, those calls were to Cablevision’s Optimum Online, the provider of the signal to the Gilbert family’s former home on Georgica Association Road. “He wants records from his parents’ home in the Hamptons of telephone usage from around the time of the murder,” Mr. Orton said. “The cable company has been refusing his request to provide them, because the account holder of record, Thomas Gilbert Sr., is dead. Because the defendant, Thomas Gilbert Jr., is not the account holder of record, the cable company will not send the phone records” to the jail.

“He is not just trying to contact the cable company,” Mr. Spiro responded. “He is trying to contact the president of Cablevision. I have tried to present him with the phone records. He won’t receive them from me.”

The defendant, wearing an orange jail-issue jumpsuit, his blond hair now down to his shoulders. sat silently next to Mr. Spiro as the lawyer continued giving examples of his presumptive insanity. “In addition, he has asked me to tell the court that there is a witness he needs to speak to and therefore wants the court to issue a subpoena to the Iraqi Consulate.”

Justice Jackson weighed in. “I [previously] found your client to be fit,” she began. “I disagreed with the state psychiatrist, after seeing your client not only on video, but in person in court. The only reason I ordered [another mental health test] is your representation that your client is not competent. The issue is competency. It is not mental health. Is your client mentally competent? What is different today?”

“It seemed to me that the court was seeking an acute example of psychosis. We have never had one conversation about the defense of the case, the facts of the case,” Mr. Spiro answered. The various incidents he had described, he said, “suggests extreme psychosis, that he is unfit, I am asking that he be allowed again to meet with the doctors, under the conditions we discussed.”

Justice Jackson asked if Mr. Gilbert wanted to address the court. Mr. Gilbert repeatedly shook his head, “No.”

“The court is compelled to exercise caution,” Justice Jackson finally said, ordering the exam to go forward. She asked Mr. Spiro and Mr. Gilbert when they would like to return to court, giving them several dates in August. They chose the last one available, Aug. 17.

The defendant was led away, not looking back, and Mr. Spiro accompanied Shelley Gilbert, his mother, out of the courtroom. Mr. Spiro was asked in the hall if the current psychiatric exam the court had ordered was standard.

“I’m not commenting, but I wouldn’t call anything here standard,” he responded, as the two stepped into the elevator.

East Hampton Town police have asked for the public’s assistance in locating the vehicle that struck a bicyclist on Three Mile Harbor-Hog Creek Road in Springs Saturday night, then sped off without stopping.

The cyclist, Michael Pour of Springs, was thrown from the bike and knocked unconscious. He was taken to Southampton Hospital with injuries described as non-life-threatening. He had been wearing a bicycle helmet, which police said showed major damage. It may well have saved his life.

Mr. Pour, a local musician, was headed north near Flaggy Hole Road when the northbound car struck him. He could not remember anything about the collision. A caller reported the incident at 9:24 p.m.

According to Capt. Chris Anderson, the car lost its passenger-side mirror in the crash. Police collected material from the scene, and are investigating. Anyone with information about the vehicle or driver is asked to call 631-537-7575. All calls will be kept confidential.

Jay Jacobs, the owner of an East Hampton house that was cited last summer for being used as a dormitory for counselors at Mr. Jacobs’s Hampton Country Day Camp, is ready to challenge the town law that says no more than four unrelated people can live in a single-family house.

“You mean to say to me, if I buy a 15-bedroom mansion in East Hampton, I can only have four unrelated people?” he asked yesterday in a phone interview. “Everyone else has to be family? I would say that is an unconstitutional taking of my property.”

Sixty-one citations were issued last August for alleged violations at the Ocean Boulevard house, including overcrowding and lack of a certificate of occupancy — an enforcement effort that Mr. Jacobs called overzealous, with unfounded violations.

According to the town, 25 adults were living in a 2,940-square-foot, four-bedroom residence that had been configured to contain eight dormitory-style bedrooms. Those charges are before the East Hampton Town Justice Court, with the camp named as defendant. The house was in its current state when he purchased it, Mr. Jacobs said this week.

The town sought an injunction barring use of the residence for counselor housing. Mr. Jacobs and his attorneys have moved to have that motion dismissed, asserting that the town law limiting occupancy is unconstitutional. A hearing before the State Supreme Court earlier this week was adjourned until later this summer.

A co-owner and manager of the Hampton Country Day Camp in East Hampton and other camps, Mr. Jacobs also serves as the Nassau County Democratic Committee chairman. He said he would like to come to an amicable agreement with the town, but that he is prepared to pursue the question of the town code provision’s legality all the way to federal court.

“The town has a legitimate interest in making sure neighborhoods are quiet and have a certain character, and I respect that,” Mr. Jacobs said. “There are things the town has an interest in protecting. However, that does not mean that in order to do so the town can come up with an arbitrary number.”

The number of family members that can live in one house is not addressed by the town code, but a state building code that sets a minimum required square footage for each person sharing a bedroom does apply.

Under a current agreement with the court, eight counselors are right now living at the house, in compliance with that state code. There were no complaints about noise or other issues at the house last summer, Mr. Jacobs said, and housing for camp employees is desperately needed. “There are dozens of businesses like mine that have the same issues,” he said.

The town does not have the right to say how many people can live in a house, he said. “You cannot have unequal enforcement of the law,” he added, citing a town decision allowing the Ross School to house boarding students in residences.

In a 2009 decision, Tom Preiato, a former town building inspector, determined that students from the Ross School living together in single-family residences with “house parents” were the equivalent of a family, and so the practice was allowed under the code. However, last year when the school reportedly planned to use two eight-bedroom houses that were being put up in Springs as dormitories, neighborhood residents complained and town board members said they would seek to overturn the building inspector’s decision.

The legal definition of “family” also figured in another case that has been the subject of legal action.

Mr. Preiato had also initially ruled that residents of the Dunes, a residential substance abuse treatment center operating in a house in the Northwest Woods, constituted a single-family unit, but later reversed that decision, prompting a lawsuit against the town

A storied 210-year-old house on Union Street in Sag Harbor Village, long abandoned and called a safety hazard by officials, has a new owner who has promised to work with the village and restore the house to its former glory. As long as all the particulars that come with the purchase of a property at auction fall into place, the old Morpurgo house is about to get some long-needed attention.

Mitch Winston, an Amagansett resident and developer, emerged from the public auction, held under court order Friday morning on the steps of Southampton Town Hall as part of a foreclosure process that has spanned several years, as the next owner of the blighted property. The winning bid was $1.325 million.

The auction was neither swift nor simple. Despite its 10 a.m. start time, it did not begin for another 45 minutes, because neither the lawyer acting as the referee nor the lawyer for the mortgage lender could produce the required terms of sale. Joel Zweig, representing Atlantic View Holdings, the lender, made a trip to the Rogers Memorial Library, about a half-mile away, to print out copies.

Upon his return, Michael Ahearn began the auction by reading out the three pages, his soft voice all but lost amid the hustle and bustle on the steps of Town Hall. It was a far cry from the lively auction that had been held for the property in 2005, on the steps of the Sag Harbor Municipal Building.

“Are we supposed to be able to hear this?” asked Mia Grosjean of Sag Harbor, who was among several residents watching the proceedings.

The minimum bid — the amount of the outstanding mortgage on the 4,000-square-foot house -— was $1.146 million, but a principal of Atlantic View Holdings was able to drive the price up about $200,000 in a few tense minutes by bidding against Mr. Winston, who was his only opponent. The man, quiet and heavyset, standing next to Mr. Zweig offered $1.2 million after Mr. Winston’s opening bid. He declined to give his name.

Mr. Winston asked to see his certified cashier’s check, which was required of all bidders. It turned out, however, that the mortgage lender was exempt from the requirement.

Frustrated, Mr. Winston bid $1,000 more. The heavyset man then offered $1.25 million. Mr. Winston pressed the question about identification, asking for proof that this man represented the lender. Mr. Zweig and the referee both said it was not needed, and that Mr. Zweig’s vouching for him was enough.

After a brief conference Mr. Winston offered $1.325 million, which won him the property. Afterward, he said he hadn’t expected the lender to drive up the price, but did think there might be other bidders and had been prepared to spend more. He turned over a certified check for $135,000, a little over than the required 10 percent down payment. He has 30 days to close, or risk losing his deposit.

“The priority right now is to make sure the place is safe,” said Scott Strough, who, with Christian Lipp, both from the Compass agency, helped broker the deal.

“Amen, brother,” called out Ed Deyermond, a village board member. The board had debated whether to tear down the house, which, with its front porch in danger of collapse, an open septic tank, and crumbling roof, is considered a health and safety hazard. There is a chain link fence in front of the house and a fence separating it from one neighbor, but two other sides, including the one it shares with the John Jermain Memorial Library, have been left exposed.

Asked how quickly the new owner needs to address the safety issues, Mr. Deyermond answered, “Forthwith.” 

The challenge now, Mr. Strough said, is safe entry, in order to do an architectural assessment and document the interior photographically. “I think right now, the physical condition of the property may warrant at least some of the structure to come down,” he said. The new owner is committed to working with the village.

Jane Peterson, who lives on nearby Latham Street, asked Mr. Winston to try to save as much of the façade as possible. She suggested that Mr. Strough, who has been active in the sale of other historic properties such as the old Methodist Church on Madison Street, could do it.

Jason Crowley, who until recently was a director of the Society for the Preservation of Long Island Antiquities, has called the house a contributing resource to the local and national historic district, and said that every effort should be made to repair it, and that it should be demolished only as a last resort.

A two-and-a-half story, Federalist-Italianate structure, it has long been known as the Morpurgo house. Two sisters, Annselm and Helga Morpurgo, fought over it for decades while it fell into disrepair. Twice, a judge put it up for auction at more than $1 million, all of which created a buzz but no bids. One sister tried to sell it on eBay for $19 million. By 2007, when it had had no heat or running water for years, the village deemed it unfit for human occupancy, and the last sister finally moved out.

In November 2007, a limited liability corporation called Captain Hulbert House bought the house at auction for $1.46 million. Annselm Morpurgo had said the house was built by and for Capt. John Hulbert, hero of Ticonderoga and crafter of the Hulbert flag eulogized by Francis Scott Key in “The Star-Spangled Banner.” However, the sister also said it was build around 1810 for a Captain Vail, a whaler.

The property went into a lengthy foreclosure, made even longer by its being tied up in the phony mortgage schemes that landed former Suffolk Legislator George O. Guldi in jail.

Mr. Winston, who said he had several partners in this project, told those gathered at Town Hall that he was committed to restoring the house, saving what can be saved, and keeping the historic character of the neighborhood. While he has not worked before in Sag Harbor, he said he has developed homes elsewhere on the South Fork.