It took a protracted discussion at its meeting on Monday, but the Sagaponack Village Board eventually approved a single gathering at a residence on Fairfield Pond Lane on Aug. 10. Beri Meric of Ivy Connect, which produces events that he said are intended for entrepreneurs, artists, and professionals, had asked the board to okay a weekend of members-only programs at the home of Michael Adler. He estimated that 50 to 80 people would attend each.

   Outdoor gatherings with 50 or more people require permits under village law.

   The board was asked to approve a sunset dinner on Friday, Aug. 9, an afternoon poolside discussion on Aug. 10, and a brunch on Aug. 11. He told the members of the board that the applicants had driven from the city to ensure compliance with village regulations.

    Lisa Duryea-Thayer was the first member of the board to firmly state her “problem with the three-day event,” which, she said, “virtually creates a stoppage on Fairfield Pond Lane. We’ve never had a three-day event. . . . It doesn’t benefit our area at all.”

    Mr. Meric said the gathering would involve discussions about philanthropy, art, and fashion. He promised no deals would be marketed, no music would be played outside, and there was “no intention to disturb anybody.” His company’s events are “all about conversations, not about partying. That’s our approach in Manhattan too,” he said.

    It was noted that the event would not benefit a local charity, but Mr. Meric, calling the owner of the house a “supporter of our cause,” said Ivy Connect was connected with the Jefferson Awards, which provide large sums of money for public service.    

    According to Bloomberg.com, Ivy Connect has over 2,000 members that pay approximately $45 a month or $500 a year to attend events. Mr. Meric, a Harvard Business School graduate, had initiated a Web site called DateHarvard to “link single women with university men.” The site has since become IvyDate, and is said to have a five-figure number of members.

    Among those opposed to the three-day gathering were Anthony Tohill, the village attorney. “This is mischief about to take place,” he said, adding that approval would change the use from residential to nonresidential.

    Joy Sieger, a board member, asked the applicant why he didn’t choose a conference center such as Gurney’s Inn. He responded that guests would not be staying at the house, but would be shuttled back and forth from the train or their hotels, and any cars would be parked in a nearby field by valets. He said he would do “whatever is required to be sure there is no effect on the neighborhood.”

     William Barbour, another member of the board, repeated himself. “I’m against it. I’m against it.” he said. Lee Foster, deputy mayor, agreed.

    At this point, a compromise evolved. Only the Saturday poolside program will take place, from 1 to 7 p.m. Mr. Meric’s first option had been to scale all the events down to less than 50 people, but the board wasn’t convinced.

    Mayor Louchheim asked the board to approve only the Saturday event with no on-street parking or outdoor entertainment. The board was divided, with no support from Mr. Barbour or Ms. Thayer.

    Another get-together for over 50 people was approved at the meeting for the Tannenbaum residence on Daniel’s Lane with a solo no vote from Mr. Barbour. Lisa Tannenbaum, who was also at the meeting in connection with a bike lane proposal, said the occasion was a lecture by a climatologist who stays at her house every summer.

    Dorothy Lichtenstein has given the Stony Brook Southampton Graduate Arts programs a $1 million gift at a crucial time in their development, the school announced this week at the beginning of its annual Southampton Writers Conference.

    According to Robert Reeves, the associate provost of the school, who has initiated and overseen the evolution of its programs, the gift will allow it to “prime the pump” for a number of nascent ventures and take advantage of opportunities as they arise.

    Ms. Lichtenstein, who lives in Southampton, is the widow of the artist Roy Lichtenstein and the president of the Roy Lichtenstein Foundation. A Stony Brook Foundation trustee, she is actively involved with the school, attending many of its events and taking part in its writing workshops.

    She said on Tuesday that after Long Island University decided to close Southampton College, “I was enormously pleased that Stony Brook stepped in to take over. . . . It would have been disastrous had the campus been left vacant.”

    Calling it a “cultural nexus,” she added, “the Writers Conference was especially dear to me even before I participated in a workshop. Their roster of literary giants drew me to readings, conversations, and discussions that were held as part of the conference. These events were both informative and frequently hilarious.”

    She praised Mr. Reeves’s leadership of the conference and of the programs it has spawned in theater, film, and visual art. All of these programs, which were launched during summer conferences, are being nurtured into year-round certificate and fully accredited graduate programs with classes in Southampton and New York City.

    In addition, the school has started TSR Editions, an offshoot of The Southampton Review, a literary journal the school has published for a number of years under the editorship of Lou Ann Walker. The new publisher has its own studio led by Scott Sandell and will produce artists’ books, beginning this month with a photography book by Joe Pintauro. Though he is better known for his plays, he has had several exhibitions of his photos.

    Except for the Writers Conference and the M.F.A. program in creative writing and literature, which the school has offered for several years, most of the graduate programs were founded just recently. The M.F.A. program in theater will include tracks in acting, playwriting, directing, dramaturgy, and film, much of it seeded from an existing program moved to the Southampton campus from the main one at Stony Brook. It will enroll a class of 17 students in the fall.

    When it comes to the overall graduate school on campus, the goal is to expand it from 120 core students to ultimately 200 over time, in addition to “the hundreds of people now attending the summer conference,” Mr. Reeves said Tuesday.

    From the start, the most important thing for Mr. Reeves was to find the right people to run things. Nick Mangano, the director of the M.F.A. in theater program, has a long C.V. of acting, directing, teaching, and awards to his credit. Julie Sheehan, a Whiting Writers Award-winning poet, has taken over as director of the creative writing and literature program from Mr. Reeves. Mr. Sandell, an artist with a long history in printmaking, is the director of visual arts.

    Christine Vachon, a film producer known for her long association with the director Todd Haynes, is leading the film program and working at the conference with the intensive 20/20/20 digital film program, in which 20 filmmakers on scholarship make 20 films in 20 days. It is now in its second year.

    Mr. Reeves said the school has acted entrepreneurially in its development rather than rely on an academic paradigm. “It’s a creative arts program. Our building process for it is let the story tell you what it wants to be.”

    Noting his own writing background, he said that the “surest way to write a bad novel is to take an idea and try to fit things into it.” Drawing on the many writers on the East End has given him a model “that has weathered many storms” — from the closing of Southampton College in 2005 to the early uneasy years of Stony Brook University’s stewardship of the campus.

    Rather than have a roster of full-time faculty, which could also weigh down the institution, he said the creative community out here consists of “practicing artists who don’t want to spend all of their time teaching. One course a year is plenty for them. Academia is not a good model for creative people anyway.”

    The school’s focus, as it has always been in the writing program, is on producing. “We don’t recruit out of college. We are looking for adults who have made mature decisions to accomplish what they want in art. They want to write a novel, poems, a play, or make a film. We will help them do that and give them access to the best artists in the country.”

    Mr. Reeves added that, with the access everyone now has to publishing and filmmaking through online outlets, “there is a great democratization of the arts. It’s no longer about the gatekeepers, but what you have to say. That is what we can contribute. We can help our students find out what they have to say and how to say it in that medium.”

    Being aligned with a state school is a tremendous help, both in its current and future accreditation efforts and in keeping tuition relatively affordable, about $5,300 for a three-course semester of 12 credits. “We don’t want our students going into $150,000 of debt. It should be an affordable and inclusive program.”

    While much of the work will continue to be done on the Southampton campus, the school will build on its international programs and classes in Manhattan as well. As it does so, the endorsement of Ms. Lichtenstein, a major supporter of arts organizations who serves on the board of the Parrish Art Museum, among others, cannot help but further its mission.

    “My expectation is that Stony Brook Southampton will become a graduate school of the arts under Professor Reeves’s direction,” she said. “This will bring enormous vitality to an area that I love and that I call home.”

    A loan shark used to be the go-to guy when you needed quick, easy money and were willing to pay through the nose in interest. These days “hard money loans” don’t carry such a stigma: The term “private equity consultant” sounds better than “loan shark.” And many high-profile East End builders are taking advantage of these high-interest loans from private investors to finance their projects. It’s an industry that few know exists, and it’s hugely beneficial to lender, investor, and the middlemen who make it happen.

    Sure, banks still finance builder projects. As Jim Whitehouse, senior vice president of residential and multifamily lending at Suffolk National Bank, said, “Ben’s [Krupinski] a good customer of the bank. I hope he doesn’t run too fast to private equity.” Of course the banks charge less exorbitant fees. And they employ research and development to introduce new packages that conform to the laws that tie their hands.

   But, according to Brendan Byrne, a real estate broker with the Global Group in Southampton, “Since the banking crisis, banks are not aggressively lending — they’re more in the business of charging fees.” Mr. Byrne’s “primary stream of income is hard-money lending,” he said, which he does through his company Hamptons Financial. “I’m not the type of person doing open houses and serving brownies.” Instead, the former stock trader works the deal from beginning to end, helping builders find both lots and financing.

   Even Mr. Whitehouse admits “private equity is going to become more popular.” Governed by less stringent rules, private equity lenders “can structure deals more liberally than a bank can.”

   Because of the losses banks incurred during the financial crisis, they are risk averse. The irony, Mr. Byrne said, is “banks are willing to lend money to people who don’t need it.”

   The way these deals work is this: Private investors — doctors, lawyers, probably even Indian chiefs — looking for a generous return lend typically from $200,000 up. In return, they get 10 or 12-percent interest at the end of the loan term, usually a year, or two at the outside. Upon closing, they also receive two to five points (each point being 1 percent of the loan). Then they pay the private equity broker his commission, about 1 or 2 percent, pocketing up to the high teens. Let’s face it, the opportunities for investors to see returns in the double digits are rare.

    Why are borrowers paying such high rates, when banks are charging 4 to 6 percent? Mr. Bryne works with James Hovanec, a private equity consultant who saw the writing on the wall after the banking collapse. In 2008 he was a mortgage broker and former banker who switched from residential lending to commercial lending.

    Mr. Hovanec, managing partner in Link Asset Solutions in Lindenhurst, explained that a builder, let’s say Joe Farrell for our purposes, needs loans “for multiple projects at once.” Banks, he said, finance one at a time. According to Mr. Hovanec, getting one bank loan takes “at least 90 to 100 days,” and is often a “five-month cycle.” Not to mention the fact that it can be “stressful, time-consuming, and paper-oriented.” On the other hand, he said, “We can underwrite it in five days,” and “I don’t need your tax returns.”

    With conventional long-term mortgages, the borrower pays the interest before the capital, and by the end of the term can pay more than double the capital in interest. With a hard-money loan you are paying less than 20 percent of the capital, with both interest and capital due at end of term.

    These bridge loans are in essence construction loans, paid back once the builder finds a buyer, which could be very quickly after starting to build. The sooner a buyer makes the purchase, the better the chances of customizing the property. “We provide capital so they can build till they find the buyer,” said Mr. Hovanec. “Once they start building, they start marketing.”

    The good news for the investors is that there’s virtually no risk. “Only limited markets are investment-worthy,” said Mr. Bryne. With Mr. Hovanec, they are working other hot spots including Williamsburg in Brooklyn, Long Island City, and parts of the Bronx. “The market in the city and the Hamptons is hot,” he said. “Just west [of the Hamptons] is not.”

    And the investment is secured by real estate; instead of investing in a fund, the investor is putting his money on a particular asset. “We’re lending on as high as 75 percent of the value of the property,” said Mr. Hovanec. Hard-money lending has higher equity requirements than bank lending, where it is theoretically possible to buy a house putting down 5 percent. Even if the loan defaults, the hard-money lender can foreclose on the property. “It’s a highly secured investment . . . the investor is protected by the asset. It puts everyone on an even playing field.”

    Link Asset Solutions has about $25 million out in loans in the Hamptons and another $100 million in the city.

    Mr. Hovanec and his ilk do not lend to residential buyers. The Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act (RESPA) protects consumers against what the government considers usury. This is not to say that all hard-money lenders are kittens. There are unscrupulous lenders who target residential homebuyers who, through low credit scores or lack of documentation, don’t qualify for bank loans. These are the vultures hoping you’ll default so that your equity reverts to them. “We’re not in the business of evicting people,” said Mr. Byrne.

    As for builders, Mr. Byrne said, “anyone building is getting hard-money loans.”

    The Helicopter Association International, which had challenged a Federal Aviation Administration rule requiring helicopter pilots to use a route off Long Island’s north shore when flying between New York City and the East End, lost a bid before the United States Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C., last week.

    U.S. Circuit Judge Richard Roberts said that the F.A.A. acted within its authority when it mandated use of a route one mile from shore, over Long Island Sound, in response to complaints about helicopter noise from residents, municipalities, and citizens’ groups.

    The judge ruled that the F.A.A. had properly found that “residents along the north shore of Long Island emphatically agreed that helicopter overflights during the summer months are unbearable and negatively impact their quality of life,” and that the F.A.A. has the power to enact regulations to “control and abate aircraft noise.”

    The mandated route was the result of a lengthy effort by those in noise-affected communities and regional officials including New York State Senator Charles Schumer and Representative Tim Bishop.

    Before the mandate, helicopter pilots often took a preferred route overland, which was faster and posed fewer weather delays.

    In 2010, in response to the proposed mandated northern route the East End Helicopter Noise Stakeholders Group sent a letter to the F.A.A. recommending the agency mandate both a northern and southern helicopter route, in order to “equitably distribute the volume of helicopter traffic.”

    A follow-up letter sent to the F.A.A. last October and signed by 19 elected regional, town, and village officials said that “helicopter noise remains a major, unresolved ‘quality of life’ issue for our region” and that the situation “remains unsatisfactory.” It called for the agency to act immediately to designate an Atlantic helicopter route.

    A response from the F.A.A. to Congressman Tim Bishop in February said that “the FAA lacks sufficient data to suggest that imposing a mandatory south shore route is justifiable.” It said the agency will be assessing the effectiveness of the northern route during the two years it will be in effect, and would consider whether to extend the rule requiring helicopters to fly that route. “We also will consider whether and, if so, what additional measures may be appropriate to mitigate noise over Long Island,” the F.A.A. told the congressman’s office.

    In a statement issued early this week, Councilman Dominick Stanzione, the East Hampton Town Board’s liaison on airport matters, said that the recent appeals court decision against the Helicopter Association International “is very good news for the Town of East Hampton’s efforts to regulate helicopter noise at the East Hampton Airport.”

    The court decision, he said, “upheld and strengthened the powers of the F.A.A. . . . to regulate and mitigate helicopter noise.”

    While local advocates for airport noise abatement have long argued that East Hampton must cease accepting F.A.A. money for its airport in order to gain the ability to enact regulations to reduce noise, such as mandatory flight curfews, Mr. Stanzione supports continued acceptance of federal grants for the airport, while pursuing the F.A.A.’s permission for noise-control regulations.

    Those on either side have argued about the significance of accepting F.A.A. grants, which obligate the town to a set of agreements, or “grant assurances,” regarding airport operations, and how they might impact the town’s ability to successfully gain more local control of the airport.

    On the advice of an aviation attorney consultant, the town board voted to begin the process of data collection on airport noise for a possible future application to the F.A.A.

    Mr. Stanzione said that, in his view, the court decision verifies that “the best chance for successfully regulating helicopters at the East Hampton Airport . . . is to continue working with the F.A.A. cooperatively” to enact noise control measures such as “mandatory curfews and access limitations,” and to continue pressing the F.A.A. to establish a second mandatory east-west helicopter route along Long Island’s Atlantic shore.

    “I believe that by working with the F.A.A. now, when the town’s ongoing noise studies are properly completed and submitted to the F.A.A., East Hampton’s noise regulations, if reasonable, are more likely to be upheld by the F.A.A.,” he said in a press release. “Moreover, an Atlantic route is, I believe, more likely to be approved by the F.A.A. as an addition to the existing Long Island northern route. A two-route F.A.A. system has been recommended by the town for several years.”

    “It seems now crystal clear,” he wrote. “Rejecting F.A.A. funds and having the town ‘go it alone’ and battling the helicopter industry by ourselves is neither a prudent or necessary course of action.”

    The court decision, he said, “vindicates and validates” the town’s course of action, “that is, to follow the procedures set forth by the F.A.A. to factually substantiate the disruptive effect of excessive helicopter noise on East Hampton residents and on residents of the entire East End. This decision gives great impetus to the probability of success of this town board’s efforts to effectively manage helicopter noise and traffic.”

    Jeffrey Bragman, an attorney representing plaintiffs who are challenging the town’s adoption of an updated airport master plan and layout plan, disagreed. Councilman Stanzione, he said, “represents aviation interests.”

    “Moving routes is merely shuffling noise around in the sky. It does nothing to reduce noise. When you’re under F.A.A. control, their policy — and it’s been established in case law — is unlimited airport access 24 hours a day, 365 days a year,” he said.

    “This means that traffic is going to escalate. So local control without F.A.A. funding is the only way to impose airport traffic restrictions,” such as curfews, ending weekend flights, or restricting certain aircraft, he said. “That’s the only way to actually reduce the amount of traffic,” and reduce noise, Mr. Bragman said.

    The Lion Gardiner, said to be the last of the heavyweight dining cars in the United States, is in danger of being scrapped. Few people may know of its precarious state, or even of its existence, but the run-down and deteriorating dining car is now officially endangered.

    The car was named after the English-born East Hampton settler who in the 17th century bought what came to be known as Gardiner’s Island from Wyandanch, the sachem of the Montauketts. It was built after World War I and served as part of the 20th Century Limited of the New York Central Railroad, which the Empire State Railway Museum in Phoenicia, N.Y., described as one of “America’s greatest trains.”

    The Lion Gardiner also was a car on the railroad’s other trains through the 1940s, a shining example of fine railroad dining during that era.

    The car played an important role in the railroad preservation movement. It served as the dining car for “High Iron” excursion trips in the 1960s, which introduced many people to the concept of reusing historic railroad equipment for recreation.

    Today, the historic car remains in Kingston, N.Y., where it has been deteriorating for the last three decades. Its floor has collapsed, but the stainless-steel kitchen is reportedly still in good shape. Its drastic decaying, however, will soon require the whole car to be scrapped, unless action is taken.

    In April, in its first-ever “most at risk” list to raise awareness of railroad resources facing imminent demise, the National Railway Historical Society listed the Lion Gardiner among the top eight endangered U.S. railroad landmarks of 2013. In response, the Empire State Railway Museum, the Catskill Revitalization Corporation, and the Ulster and Delaware Railroad Historical Society entered into a partnership to “stabilize, assess, and restore” the dining car.

    The restoration has only just begun and remains in the money-raising stage. “Funding is very slow,” said Dakin Morehouse, the president of the Empire State Railway Museum. “We still need an awful lot more.” He did say, however, that going on the National Railway Historical Society’s endangered list has been positive in that it has helped raise some awareness and donations since.

    The Empire State Railway Museum, which is at the forefront of the effort to raise money, has confirmed its first $5,000 grant, though it was a “lower amount than promised,” as Mr. Morehouse put it. He said he expects three more grants to be on their way before too long.

    Otherwise, the project relies on donations, which can be made through the Empire State Railway Museum. Once they receive more funding, the three collaborating organizations plan to move the Lion Gardiner to Arkville, N.Y., where the Ulster and Delaware Railroad is now based, to start assessments and restoration.

    If the restoration succeeds, there is also the question of what the car could be used for. “Operation is possible,” Mr. Morehouse said. “Personally, I would like to see it on the rails again, but it will all depend on the new owner.” He suspects that the car will end up being put on display if restored.

    The Empire State Railway Museum faces a local financial predicament that makes funding more difficult. After Hurricane Irene, Ulster County received $2.3 million from the federal government, but the county executive refused to release any of the money to the railroads, despite the damage done to them during the storm.

    In its grant application, the Empire State Railway Museum described the Lion Gardiner as significant and worth saving for two primary reasons. One was that it is the “sole surviving, unmodified representative of a distinctive period in railroad passenger car body construction.” The other being that the car served on the country’s “most consistently prestigious train,” and on one of the “few railroads to turn a profit on passenger service during the heyday of the passenger train.” As the museum said in summation, it is a “symbolic representative of an iconic era.”

    Despite the odds, most railroad enthusiasts remain hopeful. “I knew these kinds of trains from when I was a kid,” Mr. Morehouse, who is 75, said fondly. “It’s just unfair that so many of them have been forgotten.”

    Support for the Lion Gardiner car has been increasing, but the next few months will be crucial for its restoration. “There’s still a lot to be done,” Mr. Morehouse said, and a “long fight ahead of us.”

    A family of 12 made the East Hampton Library courtyard its new home last week, when a mallard hen became mother to 11 ducklings.

    “I guess the mother flew in, but nobody saw her hiding in the bushes until last Thursday, when all of the ducklings appeared,” said Dennis Fabiszak, the director of the library.

    Now trapped within the walls of the courtyard, the brace of ducks has nowhere to go. So the East Hampton librarians have taken them under their wing.

    “The staff have all chipped in. They are like the library’s children,” Mr. Fabiszak said.

    Within the courtyard, staff members have installed a full kiddie pool, a feeding tray with bird feed, and a water container. The water in the kiddie pool is changed daily to combat the heat.

    As the mother duck watched close by, the ducklings splashed in the water and pecked away at the mounds of feed in the tray. But when someone stepped out into the courtyard, they all waddled away behind their mother into the bushes. They have made their home there, there, but it doesn’t mean they feel completely comfortable around humans yet.

    Looking ahead, no one is exactly sure what is going to happen with them. “The staff are worried about them going over to the pond,” said Mr. Fabiszak. They had recently heard of a gosling being killed by a snapping turtle across the street.

    “I think calling local animal control will be the best option,” Mr. Fabiszak said on Tuesday.

    Dell Cullum, the owner of Hampton Wildlife Removal and Rescue and a contributing nature photographer for The Star, had some different ideas for the future of the ducks. “What they should do is let them get to be a little bigger. Get some duckweed from the [David’s Lane] Nature Trail and let them eat it, so when they are brought to the Nature Trail they will know what to eat and will have a better chance to survive,” he said.

    “Ducks have so many predators — fox, turtle, raccoon — that they need every advantage they can get.”

    For now, visitors can check out the ducklings from the windows of the courtyard at the library.

   The South Fork is the ideal place to build your dream house, right? Well, yes, but there are restrictions up the kazoo about how to go about it. Each town and village has it own regulations, not to mention various agencies that weigh in on whether you can build that artist’s studio/dock/heliport — take your pick — or not. Looking down on your project from above are planning boards, zoning boards, building departments, boards of trustees, and natural resource departments all ready to dampen your dreams.

   But Hamptons habitués, from homeowners to those they employ to build their fantasy homes, are nothing if not creative. And, more often than not, it takes creative solutions to overcome pervasive restrictions.

   Take height restrictions. If you talk to Chris Coy of Barnes Coy Architects in Bridgehampton, expect him to throw around the word “stupid” a lot when discussing East Hampton Town’s height restrictions, which are limited to 32 feet for a pitched roof and 25 feet for a flat roof. Mr. Coy is upset that the apparatchiks who oversee this are essentially dictating the type of architecture being designed. Oceanfront houses are allowed 42 feet above sea level, but if your property is already at, say, 19 feet, you’ve only got 23 feet to play with. Ditto if you’ve raised the floor to prevent flooding.

   “It’s forcing people to do pitched roofs,” said Mr. Coy. “They’re not supposed to; they’re a planning board, not an A.R.B [architectural review board]. . . . It creates bad architecture. It’s unbelievably stupid. It has to be changed. . . . These are building department people, the last people you want dictating architecture.”

   In Southampton Town, where height restrictions can reach 32 feet, “It permits much more freedom in architectural design,” he said.

   But all is not lost, even in East Hampton. Architects including Mr. Coy and his partner, Rob Barnes, have figured out a way to give a luxurious spin to low-slung flat roofs: roof terraces. Essentially extra rooms, without ceilings, these aeries offer an entertainment area where residents can gather to catch unobstructed breezes, sunsets, and often water views.

    But, this being the zoning-mad Hamptons, there is, of course, a catch: Handrails are included in total building height, “probably because they don’t want you to do it,” according to Mr. Coy. So, Barnes and Coy cleverly drop down the roof height in places that can withstand an eight-foot ceiling. Think: bathrooms. The architects cluster bathrooms together and use the sunken area as the floor to the roof terrace.

    Let’s not forget lot coverage restrictions. Creative solution number one: walkout basement, which literally means you can “walk out on grade,” or in laymen’s terms, enter and egress through an outside door, not necessarily through the house. “We’re almost always doing them now,” said Mr. Coy. These erstwhile basements are called “lower-level space” in real estate parlance.

    We’re not talking about squat, dank cellars. These spaces often lead out to terraces and boast 10 to 13-foot ceilings, full-height doors, fireplaces, and curtain walls of glass. If the land doesn’t provide a natural contour for placing them in, “we create it with a sunken courtyard,” said Mr. Coy. More good news: They stay cool during otherwise hot days. “It gives you more allowable square footage because basements don’t count as part of lot coverage,” said Mr. Coy. Owners are using them to put in a bar, pool tables, even a second dining table. “You don’t even know you’re in a basement.”

    Homeowners are also being allowed to put apartments in their basements, according to the designer and builder Michael Mensch of Michael Mensch Design in Sag Harbor, “except in East Hampton Town,” he said. It all stems, he said, from movements in wealthy communities countrywide providing affordable housing for service workers. “It still looks like a single-family residence” from the outside. 

    When it comes to coverage restrictions, Mr. Mensch, who considers himself a modernist, claims that the open plans in modern houses allow for the “feeling” of more space. When the kitchen, dining room, and living room share their space, “You can save a good deal of square footage.” This is a feat more difficult to pull off in a traditional house with its “symmetrical arrangements of glass and form.”

    “You can make a modern house have the same feeling of volume as a traditional house twice the size,” he said. Another way he lowers square footage is to reduce the size of bedrooms. “Are bedrooms a destination?” he asked rhetorically. “As long as they have decent light and views and doors going outside, they don’t have to be large.”

    Houses are only half the equation of a Hamptons property, landscapes being the other half. And, of course, umpteen restrictions apply. Landscape architects have many tricks up their sleeves to create pastoral landscapes where even the types of plants allowed are dictated. Many owners, unaware that a percentage of natural vegetation is required to remain undisturbed on their land (the number varies with municipalities), have “over-cleared” their properties. (Ironically, the trio of flora that has come to represent the South Fork’s manicured landscape are all non-native: privet, boxwood, and hydrangeas.)

    Landscape professionals such as Michael Derrig, owner of Landscape Details, are called in to “revegetate” the area by planting from the dozens of native species listed in local natural resource department handbooks. One native species used in revegetation is the blueberry bush. Once planted thoughtlessly on a grid, artistry has become paramount with landscapers “creatively laying them out so there’s an aesthetic to it,” according to Mr. Derrig. The challenge to landscapers is to educate their clients that natural habitats can be more beautiful than “frou frou ornamentals.”

    When dealing with coverage issues — there are certain things that contribute to the coverage limit (buildings, driveways, etc.) — Mr. Derrig might lay down a pine needle path or gravel terrace, both of which don’t count as coverage, thus turning a restriction into a “design opportunity.” He’s even used something called Grasscrete (grass pavers), a more bucolic answer to driveways and parking areas.

    Pools are another item that can be manipulated for the better to conform to restrictions. Mr. Mensch is fond of placing them next to a house, so that the house, itself, becomes part of the pool enclosure. An added boon to this way of thinking is that “it compacts coverage and expands vistas so that the remaining lot looks as natural as possible.”

    There were 86 cab companies with 547 registered drivers licensed in the Town of East Hampton as of Tuesday, according to East Hampton Town Clerk Fred Overton, and most of those cabs are operating in Montauk and Amagansett, said Police Chief Edward Ecker Jr.

    The number of taxi cabs in the hamlet of Montauk has continued to proliferate since last year, when members of the Montauk Citizens Advisory Committee suggested additional regulations be put in place to keep out-of-town cab companies from profiting unfairly during the South Fork’s busiest season.

    Town law requires that cabs post their rates on the back of the driver’s seat but that does not mean they abide by them, a committee member said. Members talked of rides costing $75 from the downtown area to Old Montauk Highway and $80 from downtown to the Lighthouse.

    It was the main topic of conversation at the committee’s Monday night meeting. While part of the updated regulations that were approved by the East Hampton Town Board earlier this year required that a cab operating in East Hampton Town must show proof of a local office address, Diane Hausman, the committee’s chairwoman, said that her research found that 51 of the permitted companies do not have local addresses and 9 of them used post office box numbers on their permit applications.

    The town realizes that many of the cab companies are operating out of the setup, Councilman Dominick Stanzione said Monday, adding that the Police Department had issued a substantial number of tickets. But several of the companies, he said, are still using permits that they obtained last year, which were grandfathered in and are good for two years. The town will take a closer look when those companies reapply for permits next year, he said.

    Several cabs have been ticketed for illegal vehicle use and for code and traffic violations, said Chief Ecker.

    From her office in downtown Montauk, Laraine Creegan, executive director of the Montauk Chamber of Commerce, has a prime view of the cabs’ activities, she said, and she is frustrated that the taxis are taking up parking spaces for long stretches of time that would normally be used by customers of surrounding businesses. She says that 10 to 15 cabs are parked near her office each day.

    “They bring their families. They’re having lunch and dinner in the cabs. They don’t use a dispatch. They’re all on cellphone,” she said. She suggested a specific site be designated for the cabs to park while waiting for a call.

    On a given day, you can see a slew of new cabs in the hamlet, many of them with names that make them sound local. Business owners have taken it upon themselves to chase the cabs away when they’re parked in front of their establishments.

    At Monday’s meeting, a subcommittee was formed to look into the taxi cab matter. It will include Ms. Creegan, Ms. Hausman, and Marilyn Behan, the committee’s secretary. They will report their findings at the C.A.C. meeting next month.

    The citizens group had mixed reactions to the Shark Attack Sounds Party held Friday night at the Montauk Yacht Club and said to attract close to 4,000 revelers.

    A group of businessmen, including one who docks his boat at the club, said the party was handled in a professional manner and went over well. When one of them said more events like it should be allowed, some applauded.

    Others said the party brought too many “sloppy” people into other areas of the town afterward. “How much did it cost me, as a taxpayer,” asked Lisa Grenci, the committee’s former chairwoman.

    Mr. Stanzione said it was estimated that it cost the town about $2,500, which drew some groans. “Apiece?” someone yelled out.

    The yacht club’s general manager, Lloyd Van Horn, who attended the meeting, said that he had contacted Mr. Ecker to ask if a fee should be paid for the extra town services anticipated and was told it was not necessary. “The administration of the town is not my responsibility,” he said.

    Overall the yacht club tries to keep dangers and disruptions at a minimum in consideration of its motel and marina guests, Mr. Van Horn said. Asked how much would be donated to the Montauk Playhouse Community Center, Mr. Van Horn said the club was still compiling the numbers and that the amount of the donation had not yet been established. Unbeknownst to Playhouse Foundation members, during the permit process, party organizers had promised a contribution to the not-for-profit community center.

    Mr. Stanzione said at Monday’s meeting that the crowd was a “high quality of people.”

    In a follow-up call yesterday Mr. Van Horn said the party was fantastic, but that he is not yet sure if it will be held next year at the yacht club.

    Talk at Monday’s meeting also touched on the Memory Motel, where an outdoor bar and picnic tables are taking over a number of parking spaces. By eliminating some on-site parking, the Memory is forcing its customers to use parking spaces that should be available to customers of other establishments, some in the group said. “These guys are going to make a quick acquaintance with our police,” Mr. Stanzione.

    The Police Department is having trouble with early and late-night crowds at the Memory, Chief Ecker said, adding that there had been two recent noise complaints and an ambulance call. Code enforcement is on it, he said.

  T.E. McMorrow

This article has been changed from its original online and print version to remove the names of cab companies who were referenced in a sentence on new companies with names that make them sound local. Owners of three of those companies called The Star after reading their company names in the article to report that the companies are, in fact, locally-owned.

    East Hampton Town’s beaches were the subject of several discussions at the first July work session of the East Hampton Town Board.

    At the behest of Councilwoman Theresa Quigley, who has advocated establishing a new life-guarded ocean beach to accommodate the growing numbers of people using the beaches, town staffers were dispatched over the July Fourth weekend to count the numbers of people on beaches from Wainscott to Montauk.

    A photographer was commissioned as well, to take aerial photographs of those beaches, at a cost of $2,800.

    The result, observed Councilman Dominick Stanzione at Tuesday’s meeting, could allow the board to assume “the beaches were crowded.”

    “It was Fourth of July weekend; we could have guessed it would be crowded,” said Councilwoman Sylvia Overby.

    The count, which was conducted on the ground at 2 p.m. on July 4, 5, and 6, included a tally of people within the life-guarded “green” zones as well as in a “yellow zone” extending 100 yards east and west of the guarded area, as well as a count of people on the beach in the unprotected areas between yellow zones. Ms. Quigley said it was a good beginning, “that we as a town can look at and start figuring out where our people are going, what are they doing, and where we should put more support, if needed.”

    Swimmers at unprotected beaches are a concern. Where lifeguards are stationed, there must be a public bathroom within 1,000 feet, according to county health law. Regulations also prescribe the area of beach considered protected, surrounding each lifeguard.

    Accordingly, said John McGeehan, the town’s assistant chief of lifeguards, “We’re maxed out at every beach,” with the exception of Kirk Park beach in Montauk. At Kirk, a second lifeguard stand could be added, he said, extending the protected swimming area.

    Mr. McGeehan said that when the town’s five life-guarded ocean beaches “are so saturated that . . . people then go to unguarded beaches,” it was appropriate for the board to discuss what to do.

    However, he and others said, some beachgoers will deliberately choose more remote spots. “People like to go by themselves, but that’s dangerous at an ocean,” said John Ryan Sr., chairman of the East Hampton volunteer rescue squad’s water safety committee and a tireless advocate for water safety. “I do think we need more protected beaches,” he said.

    According to Betsy Bambrick, the town’s chief of ordinance enforcement, who oversaw the beachgoer count, the tallies over three days were averaged to get a numeric count of the people in each zone at each beach.

    At Indian Wells beach in Amagansett, she said, there was an average of 496 people in the life-guarded zone, 753 people surrounding that area, and 347 people in the “red zone,” considered a dangerous place to swim as it is not only unprotected but far enough away from lifeguards to preclude an immediate response to a swimmer in trouble.

    At Atlantic Avenue beach, also in Amagansett, the tally was 921 in the green zone, 512 in the area 100 yards east and west of the lifeguards, and 1,798 people spread out elsewhere along the beach.

    In Montauk, there were an average of 169 people near lifeguards at Kirk Park beach, 354 people in the yellow zone surrounding them, and 1,373 along the unprotected stretch of beach to the west.

    The unprotected area of beach in downtown Montauk, between the life-guarded beaches at Kirk Park and South Edison Street, averaged  1,178 beachgoers, with an additional 510 people on the unprotected beach east of South Edison beach.

    Near the lifeguard stands at South Edison, the number of people averaged 869; the number in the yellow zone around them averaged 1,215.

    At Ditch Plain, where erosion has limited the official bathing area, there was an average of 304 people near the lifeguards, 388 people in the 100-yard zone east and west of lifeguard stands, and 240 people at the far reaches.

    The aerial photographs have not yet been reviewed.

    “The reality is, these numbers are so dramatic, that you’re over capacity,” Supervisor Bill Wilkinson remarked. But Ms. Overby and Councilman Peter Van Scoyoc warned about making decisions based on the July Fourth weekend scenario.

    “We were in the middle of a heat wave,” Ms. Overby said. “You can’t base it on one set of statistics, on one weekend.”

    By a similar token, asked Mr. Van Scoyoc, should the town look at summer traffic and then expand the road system to accommodate the peak days? “At some point, it’s about capacity,” he said. “And you’re never going to meet the demands of the people who want to be here. . . .”

    Another discussion Tuesday centered on the metal posts being used by beachfront property owners to affix wooden fences along the beach, often used to trap sand and help sand dunes accumulate. The town code allows only wooden posts to be used.

    With approximately 20 cases being investigated by the ordinance enforcement department, and lifeguards daily accumulating 10 to 20 metal posts that have worked their way out of the sand and ended up in the surf, the board discussed possibly changing the code.

    Steve Kalimnios, a Montauk hotel owner, said that, with hardpan rock close to the surface on the Montauk beach, it was difficult to install wooden fenceposts. And, he said, the cost is three times that of metal. By installing fencing in front of his motel, he said, he is helping to build dunes on town-owned property. If forced to comply with the town code, he said, “the price of us protecting the town’s property has just skyrocketed.”

    He said an “unintended consequence” in that case was likely to be that property owners abandon fencing efforts. Wooden posts, he noted, break off and become stakes that pose danger and liability issues.

    Board members questioned why holes could not be drilled in the rock to install the wooden posts, and Diane McNally, an East Hampton Town trustee, suggested that in certain cases, different types of larger wooden posts might be allowed. A committee will be convened to discuss the issue, the board agreed.

    “I’m giving notice to the town right now that that beach could be considered unsafe to swim in,” Mr. McGeehan said of the downtown Montauk beach in the area where metal posts are being put in.

    “We’re saying, put it all on hold,” said Ms. Quigley — both the addition of more posts and the enforcement efforts against those who have violated the existing, wood-only code.

    The board also discussed a recent request from Rutgers University’s Coastal Ocean Observation Lab to install a 35-foot antenna and receiver on the dunes at Ditch Plain, which would collect ocean wave and activity data. The information, which is used by the Coast Guard among other agencies, would be provided to the town as well and could be useful in making decisions about coastal erosion issues.

    Ms. Quigley objected strenuously to the proposal, calling the location inappropriate, and questioned why “those who care about the environment, to my left” — apparently referring to Mr. Van Scoyoc — had not insisted on a full environmental review of the project. “Don’t we need a SEQRA? I can’t do anything without a SEQRA,” she said, meaning the State Environmental Quality Review Act.

    John Jilnicki, the town attorney, informed the board that the project falls into a category for which SEQRA review is not required. “It’s aesthetics, it’s safety, it’s too much in one spot,” Ms. Quigley said. Although the board was told the antenna would be “30 feet high,” she said that in a photograph provided it “looks more like 100 feet high.”

    Mr. Wilkinson agreed that he had a “personal issue with the aesthetics of putting an antenna or two down in the dune grass at Ditch Plains.”

    At Councilman Stanzione’s request, board members agreed to hold off on a final decision until after the proposal could be presented to the Montauk Citizens Advisory Committee.

    “They have taken over Amagansett, like they took over Montauk.”

    “They,” according to a speaker at Monday night’s Amagansett Citizens Advisory Committee meeting, are the visitors, most of them upscale young professionals, who crowd the hamlet’s share houses and, especially, Indian Wells Beach. They litter, use the dunes as a bathroom, and, to deafeningly loud musical accompaniment, party until dawn.

    “You cannot enjoy your home anymore,” the woman, a resident of the Bell Estate neighborhood, complained, to many nods of agreement. “You cannot go outside. But over all, the whole atmosphere of Amagansett seems to be taken over by outsiders. It’s no longer a place for us.”

    With the four-day holiday weekend behind them, committee members and a capacity crowd of guests shared their experiences and observations. The multiple expressions of frustration underscored the uneasy balance between year-round residents’ quality of life and the town’s dependence on tourist dollars. How much is too much? Those at the meeting appeared to have reached — and surpassed — an undefined but acutely perceived threshold.

    East Hampton Town Councilwoman Sylvia Overby, the committee’s liaison to the town board, reported mixed results of the town’s effort to control crowds and excessive drinking at Indian Wells Beach. She has fielded many complaints about taxis, she said, noting that the attendant in the booth at the entrance to the  parking lot, whose job is to check vehicles for resident parking stickers, was often ignored. And, said Ms. Overby, “There’s been a lot of use of the dunes as bathrooms.”

    Kieran Brew, the committee’s chairman, reported a July 4 count of 1,300 people at the western portion of the beach, outside the lifeguard-protected  area. “When we first started talking about this, we were concerned because it grew from a group of about 100 to 300, 400, or 500. But now we’re talking about over 1,000 people. It was shocking,” Mr. Brew, who lives on Indian Wells Highway, said. Conditions in the parking lot itself, however, were greatly improved, he said, by the addition of an attended booth and enforcement by a Marine Patrol officer. Congestion has eased, and residents are able to find parking space, said Mr. Brew.

    Other members of the committee saw the situation differently. “Fourth of July was the worst weekend I’ve ever seen in 60 years,” said Joan Tulp. She agreed that resident parking has improved, but “everything else just went to pot. After five o’clock, the taxis were where they were not supposed to be. Those kids were walking in groups of 10 or 12, or 40, sometimes. Some were drunk, passed out on the grass.”

    Many residents she spoke with, she said, agreed that alcohol should be banned from guarded beaches. “People even asked me to start a petition. . . . Main Beach does it, Fire Island does it, Southampton does it,” Ms. Tulp said. “I do thank the town and Sylvia, but I think a lot more has to be done.”

    Kathleen Vadasdy, who said she has had a house in Amagansett for almost 20 years, complained about a nearby house, on Acorn Place, that she likened to a nightclub. “The owners rent it on a weekend basis,” she said.

    “What are our enforcement resources?” asked Jeanne Frankl. Citing the hundreds of violations assessed at a popular Montauk establishment last year, she expressed skepticism, along with others, that complaints to code-enforcement officials would have any effect. “Is it going to be something like Surf Lodge? They’ll get a ticket and sometime in the middle of next winter they’ll negotiate a settlement? I’m wondering if there should be some law changes.”

    “Is it that we don’t have the laws, or we don’t have enforcement, or both?” Mr. Brew asked. “This conversation always comes together: those people on the beach are symptomatic of what’s happening in a larger way in Amagansett.”

    “Our fines are too low for almost everything,” Ms. Frankl said. “As essentially a recommending group, we shouldn’t hesitate to recommend what we really would like to see and let some lawyer for the town say it’s excessive. We shouldn’t worry about whether we’re asking for too much. We should ask for what we want and let someone tell us we can’t have it.”

    Someone else then raised the topic of share houses. The town code limits use of single-family houses to residency by the owner’s family or, when the owner or her family is not in residence, “occupancy of the entire residence by one family as guest of owner or as tenant.” “Family” is defined as persons related by blood, marriage, or legal adoption, “or any number of persons not exceeding four . . . where not all are related by blood, marriage or legal adoption.”

    The existence of share houses, said Mr. Brew, is “part and parcel of this whole thing. You have to call code enforcement.”

    What would that do? he was asked.

    “At the moment, it doesn’t do anything,” Mr. Brew said, but “you have to take every little step.”

    Rona Klopman, who lives in Beach Hampton, showed photos taken by another resident of a bus that dropped off 30 passengers at a house on July 3, a Wednesday, and picked them up on Sunday. “The neighbor called code enforcement, and code enforcement said there was nothing they could do,” Ms. Klopman said. Code enforcement officers, she asserted, “are being told not to do anything. That’s why you have share houses, that’s why you have houses overloaded.”

    Ms. Overby gave voice to many committee members’ frustration. “From my point of view, code enforcement is political will,” she said. “And if the political will does not want to enforce our code, it’s not going to be done. At this point in time, I feel that the political will is not there to enforce our share laws.”

    After the lengthy discussion, the committee voted unanimously to write to the town board demanding better enforcement — “or any enforcement,” Mr. Brew said — of share house regulations and excessive mass gatherings, whether permitted or not.

    “It has become notorious that the law is not being enforced,” Ms. Frankl said. “We in Amagansett are seeing this first-hand.”

    In another illustration of how ever-larger crowds are affecting Amagansett residents, Martin Ligorner of Leeton Road urged the committee to join him in opposing the creation of a new beach on Napeague, which is under consideration by the town board as a way to accommodate the summer crowds. He and other nearby residents, he said, had commissioned a study by a former FEMA official, the results of which would be presented to the town board. Mr. Ligorner cited the flooding that occurred during Hurricane Sandy, and the ecological sensitivity of the area, in his opposition to a new beach and its attendant parking lot and restrooms.

    “You can’t get to the beach without disturbing the dunes,” he said. “Any disturbance of the dune could cause extensive flooding, cutting off Montauk.” Mr. Brew asked Mr. Ligorner if the report could be distributed to the committee, to which Mr. Ligorner agreed. Mr. Brew said the matter would be on the agenda of the committee’s meeting in September.

    Finally, on a night when the late Sheila Okin, the committee’s vice chairwoman, was remembered and mourned, the committee nominated and elected Michael Diesenhaus, a new member, to be vice chairman. Ms. Okin died on June 28.