The watering can was too heavy for any one student to lift on his or her own, but guided by the steady hands of their garden teacher, Springs School kindergartners learned how to water newly planted violas last Thursday.

Later this spring and through the summer and fall, seeds planted in Springs will grow into flowers, vegetables, and herbs that will be used in several ways. After-school clubs will learn how to cook with the fresh produce, and teachers will plan a school-wide salad lunch using the garden’s bounty. A plant sale scheduled for May 30 will help raise money to support the self-sustaining garden program, dubbed Springs Seedlings. Another idea is to set up a farm stand for the older students to learn the business side of gardening, and some of the leftover produce will go home with the students.

Hailey London, the school’s garden educator and greenhouse manager, said the Springs garden “is a seamless part of the school experience.”

“It’s an outdoor classroom that serves to help reinforce the science education going on in the school, and to enhance the kids’ nutrition knowledge and food understanding,” Ms. London said. “It really is a meaningful part of many of the grades’ learning. It helps them connect to where their food is coming from.”

In a region already known for its farming industry, schools are increasingly looking toward on-campus gardens for hands-on education and fresh produce to nourish both their students and the surrounding community. Partnerships with community members, businesses, local farms, and nonprofit organizations are part of the equation, helping to maximize the benefits of school gardens — often called edible school gardens.

In fact, the Springs program is just one such example. According to the Bridgehampton nonprofit Edible School Gardens, schools in Amagansett, Sag Harbor, East Hampton, Bridgehampton, Montauk are among those with thriving edible gardens.

In Bridgehampton, a group of parent volunteers meets every Monday at noon to maintain the school’s greenhouse and garden. Their work will supplement what the students are able to do during classes and when after-school clubs meet to plant, water, and harvest. The bulk of the food goes directly to the school’s kitchen, where the staff advises teachers and volunteers on the types of produce the kitchen can use. Bridgehampton’s greenhouse is currently growing mixed greens and sugar snap peas.

Kat McClelland, a parent volunteer and Bridgehampton School Board member, said helping in the garden is really fulfilling.

“We’re really making a difference in what the kids eat,” Ms. McClelland said. “Also, the East End of Long Island has such deep history in farming. It’s important for the kids to understand that.”

In many cases, students, parents, and community volunteers need not have extensive gardening experience in order to contribute to the life of the gardens and greenhouses. Ms. McClelland said Judiann Carmack-Fayyaz, a Bridgehampton teacher, is guiding them as they go along.

In Montauk, Donna Di Paolo, a teacher, said students have lately been busy turning the ground over and getting ready to plant. Last year, a tomato grown in the Montauk school garden won third place in an Island-wide tomato contest hosted by the Old Bethpage Village Restoration. The school’s greenhouse, which Ms. Di Paolo said has been around for 30 years, was recently renovated and dedicated to the late Carol Morrison, a founding member of Concerned Citizens of Montauk.

According to Edible School Gardens, the Hayground School was among the pioneers of school gardens, with a program started 12 years ago. The late Jeff Salaway “had a dream of the entire school sharing a meal from the school garden.” Later, a culinary building named for him — Jeff’s Kitchen — was built at the Hayground campus.

At East Hampton’s John M. Marshall Elementary School, Karen Defronzo, a teacher who coordinates the garden club, has the children planting lettuce, kale, peas, and marigolds in recycled plastic containers turned into “mini greenhouses.” She plans to make kale and fruit smoothies for the kids using what they grow, and hopes to start a farm stand in the lobby for parents to browse when they come to pick up their children. Ms. Defronzo also said East Hampton High School also has a robust garden program.

“It’s important, I feel, to start them young to take an interest in gardening, and then that should carry through to their older years,” she said. “The kids seem to really enjoy it. . . . I’m really looking forward to working with them and seeing their reactions when they see what they planted in these little mini greenhouses.”

Edible School Gardens will host its primary fund-raiser on Sunday between 4 p.m. and 7 p.m. at Dodds and Eder in Sag Harbor. Ms. Carmack-Fayyaz, the chairwoman of the organization, said the group hopes to raise money for programs that connect professional farmers and chefs with the schools as well as for “mini grants” for individual teachers and schools.

Ms. Di Paolo said she has observed students “expressing joy about being outside and working with the soil.”

“I always notice that they’re really motivated,” she said. “They’re using extra physical energy when they’re working — more than when they’re tackling a workbook.”

“There are so many lessons to be learned in the garden from the importance of nurturing something from start to end, to stewardship and personal responsibility. A school garden provides a space where academic concepts can be applied in real time in a real-world situation,” Ms. Carmack-Fayyaz wrote in an email. “There is nothing more satisfying and rewarding than seeing the fruits of one’s labor. In a garden, you get that experience; you come to understand within a growing season that effort and investment pays off richly, that challenges are many and that many hands make light work.”

A weekend ban on helicopters at the East Hampton Airport will not be among the restrictions designed to reduce aircraft noise over East Hampton and the East End.

The measure, which would have barred helicopter takeoffs and landings from Thursday noon through Monday noon from May through September, was the most far-reaching of four laws developed after extensive study of the noise problem and related legal issues. It was dropped because of concern that barring helicopters from the Wainscott airport would only reroute them to the privately owned Montauk Airport, or to landing strips in Southampton and Westhampton, diverting noise complaints, along with the aircraft, elsewhere.

Councilwoman Kathee Burke-Gonzalez, the East Hampton Town Board’s airport liaison and sponsor of the proposed laws, said this week that after hearing from residents and officials of neighboring towns, she became “concerned about a real risk of unintended consequences.”

“We don’t want to move the problem from the westernmost part of the town to the easternmost,” she said, or “just shift the pain.”

The three remaining proposals will be put to a town board vote next week. Those regulations, expected to be adopted and in place before the start of the summer season, would establish an airport curfew from 11 p.m. to 7 a.m., with an extended curfew from 8 p.m. to 9 a.m. for “noisy” aircraft, which would be limited to one trip to the airport (landing and takeoff) per week during the season.

At a town board meeting on Tuesday, Ms. Burke-Gonzalez stated that the three laws on the table were “not the end of a process, but the beginning of a long-term commitment to achieving and maintaining the right balance between airport operations and our community’s quality of life.”

According to the town’s noise consultant, she said, the three regulations will affect 75 percent of helicopter flights that occur on weekends and holidays, along with 73 percent of the complaints about them. Overall, she said, it would affect 23 percent of all aircraft operations annually while addressing 60 percent of the noise complaints.

“That is, in my mind, meaningful relief,” she said. “It is relief that our residents will receive without shifting the burden to other communities.”

Ms. Burke-Gonzalez cited the concerns of Riverhead and Southampton public officials who spoke at a March 12 hearing on the package of four laws. Southampton Village Mayor Mark Epley had protested that diversion of even 10 percent of the helicopters seeking to land at East Hampton to the village-owned Southampton Heliport, which is unmanned and lacks emergency services, would double the operations at that facility and create a “serious safety issue.”

Southampton Town Supervisor Anna Throne-Holst, along with Councilwomen Christine Scalera and Bridget Fleming and Riverhead Town Councilwoman Jodi Giglio, said diversion of helicopter flights to Gabreski Airport in Westhampton would have a negative impact on its surrounding communities.

Ms. Burke-Gonzalez predicted on Monday that the one-trip-per-week limit imposed on noisy aircraft would result in quieter weekdays in East Hampton. Companies that offer air service to and from the town would probably make their only weekly trip on or near the weekend, she suggested, when more visitors are seeking transport.

She also suggested that companies might start using quieter helicopters to fly here. There are several models with noise ratings below the town’s proposed noise threshold.

But Charles Ehren, the co-chairman of the Quiet Skies Coalition, which is based in East Hampton, fears, he said Tuesday, that air transportation companies will get around the once-a-week restriction by using a wider variety of aircraft for East Hampton runs. He applauded the town board’s efforts to address airport noise “with one exception,” dropping the ban.

The three laws Ms. Burke-Gonzalez will offer at the board’s meeting next Thursday will be “part of a much larger package of actions,” she said, which are outlined in an eight-point airport plan.

Besides the adoption of the three local laws, the plan includes working closely with East Hampton’s Congressman Lee Zeldin, who is pressing the Federal Aviation Administration to require that helicopters maintain a minimum altitude on flights from New York City to the East End. The town will also call on the F.A.A. to establish a regional task force charged with finding long-term solutions to the problem of aircraft noise, by addressing flight tracks, altitudes, and flight procedures. In the short term, the town will work with the Eastern Region Helicopter Council and other industry groups to develop voluntary noise-mitigation procedures.

The town will also upgrade its flight-tracking and noise-monitoring systems, Ms. Burke-Gonzalez said, “to make sure we have the best data available on operations at the airport.” After this summer, professionals will analyze the effect of the new laws. The results will be presented at a public meeting, the councilwoman promised, where any changes in the restrictions will be discussed.

The plan also calls for the appointment of an airport management advisory committee, which will replace several advisory committees set up by Ms. Burke-Gonzalez toward the start of deliberations over the airport laws. The new committee will include representatives “from the range of interests who have been involved in the airport debate,” she said.

Ms. Burke-Gonzalez also addressed comments that, she said, “have appeared in local papers by the aviation interests’ paid publicists.” Contrary to their assertions, she said, a reduction in air traffic will not make it necessary to use taxpayers’ money to subsidize the airport. “The assets at the airport and revenue generated by the airport will continue to adequately fund airport operations, capital improvements, and potential litigation,” she said.

The town board is to consider an increase in landing fees before the coming summer, she said, as well as an increase in rents on airport property, as existing leases expire. Financial audits for 2014 are expected to confirm a $1.8 million surplus in the airport fund, she said, assuring the board that the airport will be maintained “as safe and efficient.”

Ms. Burke-Gonzalez said that dropping the weekend helicopter ban was based solely on concerns about the impact of diverting that traffic. Opponents’ predictions of dire economic consequences should flights be restricted were not persuasive, she said, in light of financial analyses.

In response to the councilwoman’s statement, the Friends of the East Hampton Airport, an organization made up of several New Jersey-based businesses, issued a statement of its own, reiterating its concerns.

“Unfortunately, these ‘changes’ don’t change anything at all,” said Loren Riegelhaupt, a spokesman for the group. “The proposal would close off the airport to the vast majority of traffic, resulting in a dramatic loss in revenue for the airport and economic activity for our community, and will do nothing to mitigate the obvious impact on neighboring communities across the East End. We remain committed to finding real solutions to addressing aircraft noise and welcome the town’s statement that they want to continue to partner with the aviation community.”

Adopting the three laws “is the most reasonable first step,” Ms. Burke-Gonzalez said in her statement, adding, during a phone interview, that “with any balanced approach, you’re not going to make anybody happy.”

As the rape trial of Jason Lee moved into its second day on Thursday, acting New York State Supreme Court Justice Barbara R. Kahn heard testimony from a taxi dispatcher, an East Hampton Town detective, and a retired Suffolk County forensic specialist.

Yadira Holandes-Vlazquez, a dispatcher for Lindy’s Taxi, told the court that Lindy’s received a call not long after she started her shift at 6 a.m. on Aug. 20, 2013. The caller asked for a cab from 1 Clover Leaf Lane in East Hampton to the Surf Lodge in Montauk, saying it was an emergency, the dispatcher said.

Mr. Lee was renting the Clover Leaf Lane house for the month. He and a friend had returned there for a late-night party with his accuser, a 20-year-old Irish woman, along with her brother and four others after meeting them at a nearby restaurant. 

In court on Thursday, the dispatcher repeated the phone number given by the caller; it was the same one Mr. Lee gave as his own at his arraignment in East Hampton Town Justice Court on Aug. 21, 2013. The prosecution has not yet revealed that to the judge.

Minutes after the first call for a taxi came in, the man called back asking, “ ‘Where the f*** is my taxi?’ ” the dispatcher told the court.

Asked on cross examination if the caller had an accent, the dispatcher said that he sounded like a "typical city person" who "wants everything now."

East Hampton Town Police Officer Sarah Mortensen was originally responding to a report of a stolen vehicle, called in by Mr. Lee’s friend Rene Duncan. Testifying on Wednesday, she said that after she learned that the alleged victim -- identified only as D.D. -- was in distress, she brought her to her squad car, where the 20-year-old said that she had been raped by Mr. Lee. The officer said she noticed that Mr. Lee, who had been standing in the street before, had disappeared.

Shortly afterwards, the Lindy’s taxi arrived and the driver told Officer Mortensen that he was there to pick up his fare, she had testified. Officer Mortensen sent the taxi away. Mr. Lee was found two hours later curled up in the back seat of his Range Rover, which was parked just a few feet away.

Also testifying for the prosecution on Thursday were two detectives, Ryan Hogan of the East Hampton Town Police Department, and William H. Rathjen, a forensic specialist recently retired from the Suffolk County Police Department.

The trial will resume on Monday morning. The alleged victim is expected to testify next week.

Mr. Lee, a former managing director at Goldman Sachs, faces a minimum of five years in state prison if he is convicted on the rape charge. In addition, he faces two misdemeanor charges: assault in the third degree and sexual misconduct.

Members of Sag Harbor’s teachers union clashed politely with the school superintendent in a forum on standardized test refusal Thursday that was attended by about 40 people from the district and neighboring communities.

Jim Kinnier and Anthony Chase Mallia, who are math teachers in the Sag Harbor schools, disagreed with Katy Graves, the district superintendent, that students should take New York State’s standardized math and English tests for grades three through eight.

The tests begin next week. Sixty-minute sections in English language arts will be given on Tuesday, Wednesday, and next Thursday. Similar testing periods in mathematics will be the following week

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“I would like to capture real data on our students to show that we’re doing a really great job. . . . The opt-out movement will not give us that,” Ms. Graves said following the forum, which was held at the Old Whalers Church in Sag Harbor.

Mr. Kinnier and Mr. Mallia hope parents will see refusing to allow their children to sit for the tests as a way to get the attention of state officials, in particular Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo. They believe the governor's education reforms – which include increasingly tying teacher evaluations to test scores – are doing more harm than good.

“I haven’t been overly enthusiastic about the opt-out movement. I feel bad that the kids are being put in this place. . . . They’re in the middle of this,” said Mr. Kinnier, who is the president of the Teachers Association of Sag Harbor. "From my perspective, we’re out of strategies. There’s only one strategy left that I see.”

That, Mr. Kinnier said, is to have the children refuse to take the tests. “In my view, to let your children take the tests is to endorse the governor’s efforts to make public schools be like charter schools. I don’t want to be here either, I don’t want to have this opinion, but I only see two possibilities. Either sit here and take it, or do this.”

Ms. Graves said the number of refusal letters Sag Harbor has received was not available on Thursday night, but last year, she said, the district received six. She said students who do not take the tests will be allowed to take part in other activities elsewhere in the school while the tests are being given.

In the neighboring East Hampton School District, an email from an administrator to a parent, which detailed initial plans to have students who refused the tests sit at their desks and wait silently while the tests were going on, made its way to Facebook on Wednesday night.

Richard Burns, East Hampton’s superintendent, said in an interview on Thursday morning that the decision had not been set in stone and that the district would, in fact, allow students to have age-appropriate reading material in a separate location. This is a decision consistent with the previous year, when the few students who refused to take the test – Mr. Burns said there were three – were allowed to sit elsewhere and read. He said the district initially took a wait-and-see approach this year.

“We make decisions depending on need. I think it makes more sense to have a separate location, though we’ll be tight in terms of space,” he said. So far, Mr. Burns said, the administration has received refusal letters from eight elementary parents and two middle school parents. 

Alec Baldwin has given a baby grand piano to the Springs School District, but whether the school can use the instrument is part of a larger ensemble of problems the district is facing.

Due to burgeoning enrollment, space is at a premium, and some officials said at a March 24 meeting that the school, which already relies on six outdoor, modular classrooms to make do, simply does not have enough space to give the piano a proper home.

The district has 743 students in kindergarten through eighth grade, according to a presentation in December, and is projecting continued growth next year.

“We’ve really outgrown the space there currently,” John Grant, the board’s vice president, said last Friday. “Initially, we were hoping this would just be a bubble in the population and we would be able to manage, but it seems like the population is here to stay and continues to increase at some grade levels.”

The space concerns in the school have caused some related scheduling issues. Mr. Grant cited the gymnasium as an example.

“Sometimes there’s a whole grade in one gym class because of the scheduling requirements,” he said. “That can be up toward 90 kids in one gym class. One of the thoughts is to have a middle school gym that is large and modern enough for a middle school.” With one gym then reserved for the elementary classes, “that scheduling pressure can be relieved,” Mr. Grant said.

Indeed, Springs is in the process of putting together a facilities committee, consisting of both school representatives and community members, to work with an architect to maximize the space the school district does have, and consider future needs as well. The committee will meet in April and May.

Roger Smith, principal architect with the Patchogue firm BBS, in December recommended building a 16-classroom addition onto the school over the next couple of years to expand the building’s capacity to 950 students. Mr. Smith said it could be paid for through capital reserves combined with a potential bond that the community would have to approve. During the same meeting, Eric Casale, the school principal, predicted that enrollment could reach 900 students by 2019.

The district has “been able to absorb the students under local and state guidelines” for quality education thus far, said the superintendent, John Finello.

“We want to be very prudent in our budget process because we want to ensure that we have all the services to meet our state and federal educational requirements, and at the same time we are abundantly aware of the difficulties that increased budgets put on our local taxpayers,” he said. “That’s why this committee is now being formed. That’s why the board is talking to the architect, to say, what are we going to do in the future?”

Mr. Finello said the Springs community is growing.

“While we’re using the projections, it’s difficult to ensure that they will be accurate. It’s a function of the growth in the community in terms of school-age children,” he said.

Mr. Grant said the district is grateful for Mr. Baldwin’s gift and still hopes to use it in some fashion, for instance in a potential PTA fund-raiser that could benefit the music program.

Because of the space issue, the Springs School Board has not yet voted to officially accept the donation, which was made more than a year ago. Mr. Grant, who has been storing it for the district in a vacant commercial space he owns, told his colleagues that a decision regarding the piano will need to be made soon because a new tenant is set to move into that space.

“The musical director’s room is about the size of the piano, so it wouldn’t fit in there,” Mr. Grant said. “There’s no practical way, unfortunately, for the school to use it.”

A representative for Mr. Baldwin confirmed last Friday that the actor did indeed offer the piano to the school district.

“I had a very nice piano sitting around my New York apartment for many years. Oddly enough, I do not play the piano,” Mr. Baldwin said in a statement to The Star. “So when I moved to another apartment I thought about giving it to someone who could make good use of it. I choose the Springs School because I have many friends whose children are enrolled there so it seemed like a logical choice. Hopefully they will get good use out of it.”

Mr. Grant said the piano is a Yamaha. As of last Monday, Yamaha’s United States website listed only one baby grand piano model available for purchase — at a cost of $23,099 — along with several discontinued models, for which prices were not available.

Goldberg's Famous Bagels in East Hampton was the scene of a one-car crash Thursday morning that ended up sending the elderly driver and his passenger to the hospital.

Paul Wayne, a partner at the store on Pantigo Road, was behind the counter when the accident occurred at about 10 a.m. The store was particularly crowded, with people picking up special orders for the Passover and Easter holidays, he said.

"I was slicing nova," Mr. Wayne said Thursday. "There was a big boom. I looked out the window. An elderly couple in a Suburban had hit the building." The vehicle hopped the sidewalk and hit the brick exterior of the building in front of a handicapped parking space. The airbags deployed on impact.

Mr. Wayne said it appeared that the driver hit the gas pedal instead of the brake while parking. The point of impact was less than a yard from a glass window, behind which Mr. Wayne and his staff were preparing food.

Amongst the many customers who stream through the deli each day are a number of police and firemen. At the time of the accident, four emergency medical technicians happened to be inside. "They were sitting in the back eating sandwiches. Two hobos and two pastrami," Mr. Wayne said. He prides himself in knowing what his regulars order. "The E.M.T.s rushed right out," Mr. Wayne said.

"The couple seemed okay, but the man was bleeding. Both were taken to the hospital," Mr. Wayne said. Police have not yet released their names.

Also in the area was Tom Baker, an East Hampton fire marshal. He checked the building and the electrical system, and determined there was no structural damage.

Two months ago, a similar accident occurred at the Southampton Goldberg's Bagels on County Road 39. In that occasion, a car went through a plate glass window. There were no injuries after that incident, but the damaged facade is still boarded up.

"But, we're still open," Mark Goldberg, a partner at both stores, said Thursday. He had arrived at the East Hampton store shortly after the crash.

"We've been lucky," Mr. Wayne said about both incidents. "Lucky is nice."

 In response to requests from baymen, the East Hampton Town Trustees voted on Friday to extend the season for harvesting scallops for one month. The extension, which expires on April 30, applies solely to Three Mile Harbor.

With five of the nine trustees present at a specially called meeting at the Donald Lamb Building in Amagansett, a resolution to extend the season in Three Mile Harbor passed with little discussion. The move followed the State Department of Environmental Conservation's announcement one week earlier of an extension of the scallop season in state waters. That extension will also expire on April 30.

The town code allows the trustees, who oversee most of the town's beaches, waterways, and bottomlands on behalf of the public, to adjust seasons, harvest methods, equipment, and sizes and quantities of shellfish.

Scalloping will only be allowed with hand tools, such as look-boxes, nets, and rakes. The trustees reserved the right to revoke the resolution should violations or any unforeseen negative effects on bottomlands, waters, aquatic vegetation, or other marine species occur, according to the resolution.

The trustees' decision mirrored the state D.E.C.'s rationale that harsh winter conditions had affected commercial fishermen's income. Trustee Nat Miller, who is a bayman, referred to several of his colleagues on the water "that have been going down for the last month . . . getting a bushel, half-bushel."

"If we can offer something to a few baymen," said Diane McNally, the trustees' clerk, "that would be great."

The trustees have determined, according to the resolution, that the extension of the season in Three Mile Harbor "should not be detrimental to the availability of this resource" when the scallop season reopens in November.

Restricting the scallop harvest to one water body, Ms. McNally said, would not overwhelm enforcement efforts.  

The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation has denied an application from Sand Land Corporation to expand operations at a mine south of the Bridge Golf Club. 

The proposal from Sand Land, also known as Wainscott Sand and Gravel, was denied based on a long list of issues that had been raised by environmental organizations, neighbors, and officials, according to a letter from Marc S. Gerstman, the executive deputy commissioner at the D.E.C. in Albany, to David E. Eagan, the attorney for Sand Land, and John Tintle, the principal at Sand Land on April 3. The issues include failure to disclose certain information, failure to consider the mulching operation that is atop the mine on Millstone Road in northern Bridgehampton, and concerns that were raised by the Town of Southampton and the Suffolk County Department of Health Services.

The mine is located in one of the county's six special groundwater protection areas. Sand Land also processes construction and demolition debris, land-clearing debris, and yard waste on the same property.

The decision came down after Sand Land made a "five-day request" for a determination, a provision in the state uniform procedure act that requires a D.E.C. decision after a period of time, or a default approval if that decision is not made. 

"It's probably as much of a win as you can get — it's an outright denial," said Robert DeLuca, president of the Group for the East End, adding that his organization's principal concern was the potential for groundwater contamination and planning and zoning issues on a property that has a pre-existing, non-confirming use in an acquifer protection overlay district. "Obnoxious uses like this are essentially supposed to be going out of business over time not growing," he said. 

The whole process began last year when Sand Land renewed its existing permits. "This operation has been there for decades, but it's coming to the end of its life, which is why they want the expansion," Mr. DeLuca explained. "I'm very happy that the Albany office took this over and looked at it in its full context." 

The mine, which has been permited since 1981, covers 50 acres and goes down to a depth of 80 feet. The application calls for mining an additional 4.9 acres and excavating an additional 40 feet in depth. 

The corporation also owns a now defunct sand mine in Wainscott.

In its decision, the D.E.C. said that several alleged violations regarding dust, standing water, mulch fires at the composting facility, and more have the department's attention and will be subject to further evaluation. 

Sand Land can request a public hearing in writing within 30 days of the denial, at which time both the applicant and any opposing parties could be heard again. 

Mr. Eagan and Mr. Tintle could not immediately be reached for comment.

A Supreme Court judge ruled Thursday that PSEG Long Island, an electrical energy provider, and the Long Island Power Authority, for which PSEG is a contractor, are not subject to local zoning and other laws.

The ruling clears the way for PSEG to finish work at an Amagansett electrical transmission substation, the only thing left before new, high-voltage transmission lines that have caused consternation among residents of neighborhoods along their route can go online.

PSEG had challenged the authority of East Hampton Town to require a site plan for changes at the substation, which the company was upgrading for high-voltage line use.

Last April the town ordered a stop to the work at the substation, at the foot of Old Stone Highway adjacent to the Long Island Rail Road station, but not before the site and its surroundings had been cleared of screening vegetation, a building erected, and a chain-link fence installed.

The town claimed that a building permit and site plan approval were needed for the work, while PSEG argued that the company was exempt from those requirements.

The installation by PSEG of high-voltage lines on poles larger than those they replaced along a six-mile route from an East Hampton Village substation to the Amagansett site caused an outcry from residents who asked to have the lines installed underground, and is the subject of ongoing litigation by a private group against PSEG.

PSEG officials said they would bury the lines, but only if East Hampton residents shouldered the entire cost, estimated at $25 million. Cost-sharing scenarios, such as one that was effected when LIPA buried electric lines in Southampton Town, were suggested, but discussions between the company and East End local and state officials broke down.

Residents have cited concern for the proximity of high-voltage wires and poles coated with pentachlorophenol, a toxic chemical, to their houses, with potential impacts to their health and safety as well as to property values.

In the ruling issued last week, State Supreme Court Justicee Thomas F. Whelan nullified the stop-work order and said that LIPA and PSEG are "exempt from the application or enforcement of any local laws, regulations, rules and/or ordinances that would otherwise govern the construction and maintenance of the LIPA transmission and distribution system."

Under the LIPA Reform Act, PSEG was designated as LIPA's service provider, with "complete operations and maintenance responsibilities for LIPA's electric transmission and distribution system," Judge Whelan wrote. LIPA, he said, "is an agency of the State of New York," under the Public Authorities Law, and therefore granted the power to construct power generating or transmission facilities without local approval.

In its court filing, PSEG claimed that LIPA had not filed for a municipal building permit for any substation project since January 2001, and noted that the project received approval from the state's Department of Public Service, the agency charged with overseeing LIPA, in order to increase the reliability of the electric system by providing a secondary, or "redundant," system to supply electricity in case of a power line failure.

Two-hundred sixty-seven replacement poles have been installed and 23 and 33-kilovolt lines strung from LIPA's Buell Lane, East Hampton, substation, through East Hampton Village, and along Town Lane to Old Stone Highway to reach the Amagansett substation.

Update, April 9: Firefighters freed a man who was trapped for an hour and a half under a collapsed trench at a construction site in Water Mill on Tuesday afternoon.

The man, whose name Southampton Town police had not released as of press time yesterday, was working for an electrical subcontractor at 45 Summerfield Lane. He was trying to lay electric line to a newly built pool house when the narrow, 12-foot-deep trench caved in on him, according to Jeff White, a first assistant chief with the Bridgehampton Fire Department, who was in charge of the rescue operation. He said the trench was two feet wide at the bottom and about four feet wide at the top.

Chief White said the electrical line was being run underneath the footing of the pool house when the dirt started pouring in on the worker sometime before 1 p.m. He was waist-deep when fellow workers first tried to free him. Workers at a neighboring house helped out, using a small backhoe, but the situation only worsened. They called police at 1:17 p.m.

“When I got there, he was buried about up to his shoulders,” Chief Whitesaid of the man, who was about 6-foot-2. The man had been standing upright in the trench when he was trapped, and his hands and armed were covered by the wet dirt. “He was perfectly conscious and perfectly coherent.”

Despite the efforts of the Bridgehampton Fire Department’s heavy rescue squad, with the help of firefighters from Sag Harbor Fire Department, who brought their aerial ladder truck to gain a better vantage point, the situation wasn’t getting any better, Chief White said. “It was up kind of around his chin at one point.”

The Hampton Bays Fire Department, which once had a trench rescue team, was called to assist, Chief White said. While they sent manpower and tools, a full cadre was not available. The Air National Guard’s high and low-angle rescue team, based at the Francis S. Gabreski Airport in Westhampton Beach, was also deployed, but firefighters were able to free the man just as they arrived.

“They were digging it out by the bucketful at that point,” Chief White said.

The man was taken to a medevac helicopter waiting at the ball field next to the Bridgehampton Firehouse to transport him to Stony Brook University Hospital. His condition was not known as of yesterday, but the fire chief did not believe he was badly injured. Southampton Town police detectives, who were unavailable to comment, are investigating the incident in conjunction with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.

About a half hour into the rescue operation, the Bridgehampton Fire Department was dispatched to the Long Island Power Authority building on Montauk Highway in Bridgehampton for a patient in cardiac arrest. Because so many resources were being used in Water Mill, Chief White immediately asked that a neighboring district send an ambulance. Southampton Village Volunteer Ambulance picked up the call.

The Southampton ambulance had also sent advanced life support providers to assist with the trench rescue.

Bridgehampton also received assistance from East Hampton Fire Department Chief Richard Osterberg Jr., who was in the area and offered to stand by at the firehouse while the helicopter was waiting. An ambulance from the East Hampton Village Ambulance Association also stood by at the firehouse.

Update, 5 p.m.: The man who was trapped from the waist down wass freed from under dirt that had collapsed on him as he was working on Tuesday afternoon. He was airlifted to Stony Brook University Hospital around 3:30 p.m. 

Southampton Town police remained at the construction site to investigate. 

Update, 2:30 p.m.: The National Guard's trench operation rescue team has been called to the scene to assist. 

Update, 2:15 p.m.: The Hampton Bays Fire Department is also responding to assist with the trench rescue. Meanwhile, Southampton Village Volunteer Ambulance had to assist Bridgehampton in responding to a call for a patient in cardiac arrest at the Long Island Power Authority building on Montauk Highway in Bridgehampton just after 2 p.m.

As of 2:15 p.m., the man was still stuck in the trench at the Water Mill construction site, and a Suffolk County medevac helicopter was landing at the Bridgehampton ball field, next to the firehouse, to transport him once he is freed.

Originally: A man was reportedly trapped in a trench at a construction site in Water Mill on Tuesday afternoon. 

The Bridgehampton Fire Department was called to 45 Summerfield Lane at about 1:20 p.m., after a man's legs were said to be trapped in a 10-foot hole. The department's rescue squad and ambulance responded, and fire chiefs requested assistance from the Sag Harbor Fire Department. 

A helicopter was put on standby in case the patient needed to be transported to Stony Brook University Hospital.