The Wainscott Citizens Advisory Committee named its yearly award winners — the East Hampton Town Board, Simon Kinsella, and Sara Davison — at its monthly meeting Saturday. 

In an announcement, Barry Frankel, a committee co-chair, said the group had created a Most Valuable Board award for the entire East Hampton Town Board, citing its “tireless efforts on a number of initiatives, including the East Hampton Town Airport, the business district moratorium, and others.” East Hampton Town Supervisor Larry Cantwell accepted the award, saying there was “mutual respect among all of the board members to working things out in a way that resolves problems and comes up with decisions that are beneficial to the town.”

Mr. Kinsella received the annual Most Valuable Person award for what Mr. Frankel said is his “energy, passion, and intensity.” Mr. Kinsella had sent letters of concern about the possibility of chromium-6 in Wainscott groundwater to a number of government agencies last month. Rick Del Mastro, chairman emeritus of the committee, said Ms. Davison won the committee’s Citizen of the Year award for her commitment to the community.

 “She is hardworking and has taken on many challenges, including the moratorium, pushing to get the hamlet study completed after years of inaction, and she has taken charge and added to every committee she has joined,” he said. Ms. Davison is the Friends of Georgica Pond Foundation’s project manager.

A building on one of the busiest and most prominent corners in Bridgehampton, once planned to house a CVS pharmacy, is now complete and ready for occupancy. What retailer, or retailers, will end up on the first floor remains unknown, with space still available for lease. The property, at 2510 Montauk Highway, next to Starbucks and on the corner of Lumber Lane, has also been listed for sale with Saunders and Associates for $10.75 million for about a month.

Lee Minetree, the listing’s broker, said all of the 3,500 square feet of retail space on the first floor of the 9,000-square-foot building is still available for rent. “We’d like somebody like Ralph Lauren, Apple, something like that,” he said, with a long-term lease. The downstairs can be three separate retail spaces or one. The asking price is about $70 per square foot for the main floor, $45 per square foot for the upstairs, plus additional fees for real estate taxes and common-area maintenance that will be divided among the tenants. 

The zoning allows for three offices on the second floor. About 2,300 square feet has been leased, with about 1,220 square feet still available, Mr. Minetree said. While zoned retail, the ground floor could also be turned into office space, he said. 

The property is on the site of Wick’s Tavern, which stood from the end of the 17th century to 1941, when it was razed. 

BNB Ventures bought the lot for $3.5 million in 2007 from Matthew Worrell, who owned and operated Bridgehampton Beverage in a building that was subsequently torn down. There was interest in Southampton Town purchasing the parcel with money from the community preservation fund, but the idea stalled. 

Residents railed against a proposal for a CVS pharmacy in the building, in part because the intersection was already so busy. The Topping Rose House, an upscale restaurant and hotel in an 1840 structure, the Nathaniel Rogers House, also from 1840 and being restored, and Almond restaurant, in a building dating to 1907, are on the intersection’s other three corners. Protests were held over the summer of 2014. The chain store withdrew from the project in early 2015, though construction went forward.

Correction: The downstairs retail space is being rented for $70 per square foot, while the upstairs is $45 per square foot. 

The holiday season can be stressful for a multitude of reasons, from a hectic social calendar and overindulgence in food or alcohol to loneliness, ennui, even despair. On the South Fork, however, those feeling blue amidst the Western world’s revelry can look to a tradition from the East.

Instruction in “the nuts and bolts of meditation” is offered on a daily basis at the Kadampa Meditation Center, based in Sag Harbor but soon to relocate to Water Mill, and its classes are now also to be held in East Hampton, Southampton, Riverhead, and Greenport. 

The center, formerly the Vaj­ravarahi Meditation Center, is led by Gen Kelsang Norden, a Buddhist nun who has taught Buddhism and meditation for more than 20 years. A native of Bath, England, Ms. Norden came to the center five years ago at the request of Geshe Kelsang Gyatso, the Tibet-born founder of the New Kadampa Tradition-International Kadampa Buddhist Union. Along with avoiding stress, the sessions are intended to help participants enjoy “as much of a meaningful experience as we can,” Ms. Norden said.

“We want to be where people are. For a while, we just consolidated here in one place because people like Sag Harbor, and that seemed to work for us. But now that our sangha” — the community of followers of Buddha’s teaching — “is a bit stronger and we have more people who are able to teach meditation, we’ve started to open more classes again like we have had in the past. . . . It’s nice to go where people are and make it easier for them.” 

Classes also cover patience and compassion, she said, “so that people have something they can bring with them, because a basic tenet of Buddhist thought and meditation is that happiness depends upon your mind. It can seem, to many of us, that our happiness is something that is found in a particular situation, or a person or thing. And similarly, that those people, situations, or things could take away our happiness if they change or they’re not the ones that we want.” 

Instead, she said, “happiness is an internal thing — it’s an inside job. So we need to do something every day to feed our mind, to nourish our mind, to develop and transform our mind so we have more happiness from within, more peace of mind, centeredness, and good qualities so that we can bring that with us into our day.” 

Weekday lunchtime sessions at the center, which typically draw up to a dozen participants who attend by donation, offer a calming interlude to a busy or stressful day. On Monday, Ms. Norden’s class focused on the breath as a means to draw in positive energy and dispel negative thoughts and emotions. On another day, Maddie James, a Colorado native who came East in 2009 to dance, led several participants in a 30-minute meditation on compassion. 

“The synergy between ballet and meditation was undeniable,” Ms. James said. Having first arrived on the South Fork representing a New York City fitness company, Ms. James said, “I started to get very involved at the center, volunteering and attending classes and retreats. It didn’t take long to see how my daily meditation practice was having a meaningful impact in my life.” 

“Maddie has made an amazing contribution to our community,” Ms. Norden said. “She’s an example of one of many people who are very sincere and recognize the benefits of meditation in their daily life, and Buddhist thought and practice. We’re very lucky to have her around.” 

The center’s Sunday morning class, “Practical Wisdom for a Peaceful and Positive Life,” has 20 to 30 participants, according to Ms. Norden. Fifteen or so attend its twice-weekly study class, which is called “Meditation on the Stages of the Path.” Both combine meditation and instruction on Buddhist thought. These classes are free for members; for nonmembers the cost is $15. 

On Sunday at 11 a.m., the Kadampa Center will hold a program called “Letting Go of the Past and Creating a Better Future — the Blessing Empowerment of Buddha Vajrasattva.” An empowerment, Ms. Norden said, “is a traditional Buddhist blessing ceremony,” a guided meditation in which one makes “a special connection with a particular Buddhist deity,” in this case the Buddha of Purification. The event costs $30.

Ms. Norden will also lead “Meditations for a Peaceful Mind at the Holidays” at the Tracy Anderson studio in East Hampton on Monday evening from 6:30 to 7:45, and again on Dec. 12. The same instruction will be given on Sunday and on Friday, Dec. 11, at Ananda Yoga in Southampton, as well as in Riverhead on Dec. 7 and 14 and in Greenport on Dec. 5 and 12.  

Meditation, Ms. Norden said, improves the quality of one’s mind and fosters love, compassion, tolerance, patience, and other emotions that are especially useful in stressful situations. “We can’t be happy whilst we’re too self-obsessed, or whilst we lack compassion,” she said, “because those minds that replace where compassion would be in our heart are minds like resentment, over-entitlement, deluded pride, anger, jealousy. Those are the bases of our suffering. That’s why we find life so unpleasant, dissatisfying, why we create so much trouble for ourselves and others. We need to love others more than we need to be loved by them, because that is an incredibly strong and powerful inner quality that benefits us as much as it does anybody else.”

“Prices are sky high,” said Stuart Heath, who was on the water in Sag Harbor yesterday, “so it’s still worth it if you get a bushel or two.” 

That may be the only consolation in the second consecutive bay scallop harvest in East Hampton Town and New York State waters that is widely seen as bleak. A daily harvest that started at two or two and a half bushels quickly declined to about half that, Mr. Heath said. 

State waters opened for scalloping on Nov. 7. This year, the town trustees set Sunday as the opening date for harvest in town waters. Francis Bock, the trustees’ clerk, told his colleagues last month that opening the waters on a Sunday, when use of a dredge or other powered device is prohibited, “will give everybody a chance to go out and get a few before dredges hit them on Monday.” 

Early predictions have proven accurate. “Pretty bleak,” was the assessment yesterday from Barley Dunne, director of the town’s shellfish hatchery in Montauk. The hatchery seeds town waterways with larval shellfish each year, and last month Mr. Dunne offered the trustees an upbeat assessment of the 8 million clams and 1.5 million oysters that were seeded this year. 

“I saw a few boats in Three Mile Harbor,” Mr. Dunne said of scallopers. “Some of the stuff we seeded there made it pretty well, so I’m assuming they’re on that.” But of other harbors, “Napeague is dry. I saw a few boats in Northwest, two or three. It’s definitely looking bleak. I think our predictions are panning out. We have to hope for next year.” 

“There’s nothing around, really,” agreed Colin Mather, owner of the Seafood Shop in Wainscott, where the hotly anticipated delicacy was selling for $29.95 per pound yesterday. This, he said, is “a very bad season, much worse” than last year. 

Mr. Dunne pointed to several factors that he thought contributed to the disappointing crop, among them blooms of cochlodinium, or rust tide. While not injurious to humans, rust tide can be harmful to shellfish and finfish. “Predation is probably foremost, if not up there with rust tide,” he said, listing crabs and conch among scallops’ predators. 

Sparse habitat, such as eelgrass, is also hindering scallops’ survival by allowing greater predation, he said. “We have seen signs of them setting in our gear every year, but if they set on the bottom, the predators are cleaning them out.” He also pointed to unusually warm water temperatures as a possible culprit. 

Mr. Heath also cited an abundance of predators, and said that he has found a tiny crab inside about half of the scallops he has opened. “I notice the meat on those isn’t quite as plump as the ones that don’t” have a crab in them, he said. 

On a more positive note, Mr. Heath, Mr. Dunne, and Mr. Mather all noticed a wealth of bugs, or juvenile scallops. Whether or not they survive until next year’s harvest is another question. “It would be nice to think they’ll all survive,” Mr. Heath said, “but I’ve seen a lot of bugs before. Who knows?”

“I’m hearing there are a lot of bugs out there,” Mr. Mather said. “But we need to not have tides” — blooms of toxic organisms like cochlodinium — “in order for them to survive.” 

“We definitely want to focus on getting more scallops out next year,” Mr. Dunne said. “Next year, instead of trying to spread it around town, we’ll probably focus on one or two harbors, and see if we can get the numbers back up.”

At the Seafood Shop, said Mr. Mather, “We’re going to be turning toward Nantucket” to accommodate customer demand for scallops. “But I’m hearing that they don’t have very many as well. It’s an off year, for sure.”

The East Hampton Food Pantry collected about 1,200 pounds of food and raised close to $1,300 in cash donations during Saturday’s annual Harvest Food Drive at the East Hampton Middle School.

The event’s coordinators said the nice weather was a boon and that the help of local girl scouts, who staffed a table at the nearby Stop and Shop and encouraged shoppers there to donate by handing out shopping lists of needed items, was also key.

“It was a really successful food drive, which we desperately needed as we’re going into the winter months. We appreciated the community turnout to help us out,” Vicki Littman, one of the organizers, said Monday.

According to Ms. Littman, the East Hampton Food Pantry goes from feeding 100 to 150 families per week in the summer to more than 300 during the winter months.

Donations of nonperishable foods, money, and food-related gift cards are still needed, Ms. Littman said. Those who want to contribute can visit the organization’s website, easthamptonfoodpantry.org, for more information, or take food items to the pantry’s location at the Hampton Country Day Camp, 191 Buckskill Road, on Tuesdays between 8:30 a.m. and 6 p.m.

Philip O’Connell, the chairman of the East Hampton Village Planning Board, was welcomed as a member of the village board at a work session last Thursday, replacing Elbert Edwards, a longtime board member who died last month. 

Mr. O’Connell is a member of the village planning and zoning committee and the village liaison to the town’s community preservation fund advisory board. 

“We applaud the initiative and acceptance of this challenge by Mr. O’Connell,” Mayor Paul F. Rickenbach Jr. said after a swearing-in ceremony. 

  “I think he’ll bring a new breadth and dynamic to the board which will be beneficial to all the residents that we continue to serve.” 

Mr. O’Connell’s term expires on July 5 and he will stand for election. “My goal in becoming a trustee and in seeking election,” Mr. O’Connell said on Monday, “is that I love the village and want to make sure it’s run in a good fashion, which I believe the mayor and the trustees have done. I’m hoping to continue that tradition.

In his place the board named Mark Butler as chairman of the planning board and Obron Farber its vice chairwoman. They also appointed Arthur Graham and Karen Collins to the board. 

Bryan Staubitser, a son of Thomas and Marlene Staubitser of Montauk, and Miken Souza were married on Oct. 1 at the Hui No’eau Cultural Arts Center in Makawao, Maui. Rennette Pacheco Bishaw of Hilo, Hawaii, known as Aunti Rae, a kahu, or Hawaiian minister, officiated. 

The bride is a daughter of Kennethy and Mike Souza of Wailuku, Maui, in the Hawaiian Islands. 

Family and friends from Maui, Oahu, Molokai, and the Big Island, as well as New York, Maine, California, Minnesota, Florida, and Costa Rica, joined the couple for their celebration. 

The bride’s attendants included her sisters, Kaui Souza and Kennelly Souza of Maui, the groom’s sisters, Casey Staubitser and Jamesine Staubitser of Montauk, and Logan Bilderback of San Diego. Her niece, Payton, was the flower girl.

Mr. Staubitser’s best man was his brother, Thomas Staubitser of Montauk. His friends Grant Monahan, Roger Elliot, and Grady Levine of Montauk, Chris Zorbo of Oahu, and Andrew Kahalewai of Maui served as groomsmen. 

The bride’s mother created all the floral arrangements for the ceremony and reception, including handmade leis for everyone. The cocktail hour featured appetizers made by the Souzas’ family and friends. Kaui Souza and her daughter, Payton, performed a song they had written themselves.

The couple met while attending the University of Hawaii on Oahu. The bride is an emergency medical technician studying to become a paramedic. The groom, who grew up in Montauk, is a firefighter for the County of Maui. They live in Wailuku.

In a July 10 wedding held in the Lyons Farmette garden near Boulder, Colo., Perry Santanachote and Alistair Coy Wallace, a Manhattan couple who spend many weekends in East Hampton, were married.

Christina Knight, a friend of the bride’s, officiated at a ceremony that combined traditional vows and elements of her Thai heritage.

Two days before the ceremony, Ms. Santanachote and Mr. Wallace and their families went to a Thai Buddhist monastery to be blessed by the monks and participate in a ritual that included an offering of food prepared by the bride’s family. The monks blessed water to be used in the wedding itself and tied twine around the couple’s wrists as a symbol of their union, as well as of the incantations. The visit concluded with the two families having lunch after the monks partook of their offerings.

During the wedding, the guests poured the water that had been blessed by the monks and offered a prayer or good wish for the couple. Mr. Wallace’s 9-year-old son, John, was the best man, and Ms. Santanachote presented him with an inscribed silver circle on a chain bearing their names.

The bride wore a red lace strapless gown with a train designed by Anna Maier and carried a bouquet of white anthurium and amaryllis and green amaranth and monstera leaves. Mr. Wallace wore a white suit. Both wore garlands of jasmine blossoms, called pang malai in Thai, with white ropes tied around their heads to signify their new unity as a couple.

A reception with dinner and dancing followed in the garden. The couple spent five days in Colorado after the wedding and plan to take a longer trip later.

Ms. Santanachote is the daughter of Paul and Oranuch Santanachote of Denver. She is a recipe developer at the Barteca Restaurant Group in Stamford, Conn. She received an undergraduate degree from Metropolitan State University of Denver in Colorado.

Mr. Wallace’s parents are Jamie Coy Wallace of Mill Hill Lane in East Hampton and Edward B. Wallace Jr. of Kansas City. A 1999 New York University graduate, he is the assistant director of technology at the City University of New York’s School of Journalism, where the couple met while Ms. Santanachote was studying for a master’s degree.

The East Hampton Presbyterian Church welcomed the Rev. Scot McCachren as its 21st pastor in a service of ordination and installation on Sunday. 

“It was beautiful,” Mr. McCachren, who moved here last week from New Jersey, said of the church’s first ordination service since 1957, when David Mulford was ordained into ministry. “This congregation has exceeded any expectation that I could have possibly had for their hospitality, for their graciousness, and for the depth of faith that I’ve seen as Christians, as Presbyterians. It’s just been wonderful.” 

A newcomer to East Hampton, he is also new to this role, if not the Presbyterian Church itself. After an approximately 20-year career in training and education for the Chubb group of insurance companies, “I felt called to go to seminary and seek a call as a minister in the Presbyterian Church,” he said. He attended the Princeton Theological Seminary for three years, after which, he said, “I believe the Holy Spirit brought me together with the East Hampton Presbyterian Church.” 

But being a Presbyterian “has been a part of my life since I was born,” said the North Carolina native. His parents and other relatives are elders in the church. When he met his future wife, Linda, they started attending the Presbyterian church in Morristown, N.J., and were members for close to 30 years, he said. 

A midcareer transition to ministry is not uncommon, Mr. McCachren, who is 54, said. “In my particular case, about the time that I turned 50 I started thinking about where I was spending my time — in the corporate world, how that might align with my faith, what was important to me as a person,” he said. “More and more, I felt called toward something different.” On a mission trip with the associate pastor of his church, “We talked about it some, and at that time I really felt like I received a very specific call, that it was time for me to go.” 

“I think there’s a value to having experiences out in the corporate world and as a parent, and then bringing those experiences into ministry with you,” he said. “I think that I’ve got some skills that I wouldn’t have, had I not gone that path.” 

“We’re thrilled that he’s here,” said Hilary Osborn Malecki, an elder and member of the church’s pastor nominating committee. “Everyone we talk to says what an authentic and wonderful person he is, as well as his family. We just feel he’s a really good match for our church, for our community.” 

Ms. McCachren and their daughters, Emily and Julia, both students, attended Sunday’s service of ordination and installation. Ms. McCachren will continue to work in New Jersey until April, Mr. McCachren said, after which their house in Morristown will be sold, and the family, which includes two dogs and two cats, will reunite in East Hampton. 

With less than two weeks until Election Day, tensions are running high. Discourse over who should be the 45th president of the United States has reached such a fevered pitch that political debates in Southampton Hospital’s cardiopulmonary rehabilitation gym have been banned because of the stress they can cause patients.

Located in the Ed and Phyllis Davis Wellness Institute, the rehab center monitors, on an out-patient basis, people who have undergone heart surgeries or been diagnosed with heart disease through a comprehensive lifestyle modification program. In groups of as many as 20 patients exercise under the care of nurses certified in cardiovascular health, exercise physiologists, and respiratory therapists. Several televisions are usually tuned to CNN or Fox News as a distraction while people use a treadmill or lift weights. Political banter is not unusual.

However, discourse has reached new heights, according to Jessica R. Swiatocha, the manager of cardiopulmonary rehab and wellness services, who has been working there for 15 years. “We were getting a lot of complaints from patients who didn’t want to listen to the debates.” With her colleagues, she decided to post a “safety notice” outlawing spirited discussions. “Due to the fact that we have patients with heart conditions we cannot allow political debates in the gym,” it reads in all capital letters on hot-pink signs. 

People were raising their voices and making their opposing views known to the entire room filled with fellow patients who had no choice but to listen, Ms. Swiatocha said. She recalled how one woman walking on a treadmill between two older men was literally caught in the middle while a Trump supporter on one side and a Clinton supporter on the other were embroiled in a lively back-and-forth. 

Another time a Hillary Clinton supporter brought one of her books to a Trump supporter, faking Clinton’s signature in it as a joke. The book ended up on the floor and bystanders — who did not know that the two had been engaged in a friendly, ongoing banter — were disturbed. 

While amusing to recall, the tensions can also have some serious health ramifications, especially for those who have cardiac problems. Stress can elevate blood pressure and heart rates, increase cortisol level, which makes it harder to lose weight, and increase anxiety and depression, said Ms. Swiatocha, a nurse practitioner. “Stress can exacerbate chronic disease,” such as diabetes or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.     

The American Psychological Association reported that over half of American adults find the 2016 election a “very or somewhat significant source of stress.” The association recommended that those for whom the 24-hour news cycle is causing stress should limit media consumption and read only enough to stay informed. “Avoid getting into discussions about the election if you think they have the potential to escalate to conflict,” the association said. 

The wellness center preaches stress management, and teaches its cardiac rehab patients how to handle stress through meditation or relaxing breathing. Sometimes, the best thing someone can do is just walk away from a conversation if it is causing too much anxiety, Ms. Swiatocha said. In a class setting that is not always possible, so she felt it was best to urge people to avoid spirited debate altogether. Discussion of politics is fine, and the TVs are still set to news channels, but “it can’t get too heated,” she said.

The signs have been up for about a month, and there have been no incidents since. Ms. Swiatocha said some patients who were dismayed by all the political disagreements have even thanked her, telling her they were “so stressed out” before. 

Not everyone heeds the sign, of course. “I had to speak with a couple of people,” she said with a laugh. “Perhaps you missed my sign,” she would say to them. Some told her they thought it was a joke, so she has had to explain her reasoning. Ms. Swiatocha expects the signs to come down after Nov. 8, assuming political tensions are resolved on Election Day.