Update, Dec 5: The hearing for a proposal for South Euclid Avenue has been canceled and will be rescheduled at a later date. 

Originally, Dec. 1: Three public hearings are scheduled to be held in front of the East Hampton Town Planning Board on Wednesday, starting at 7 p.m. The hearings are on properties in Montauk, Amagansett, and East Hampton.

One of the hearings concerns a new two-story building, with a 1,100-square- foot footprint on South Euclid Avenue in Montauk. The ground floor would be used for a business, while the second floor would have a two-bedroom apartment, allowed under the town’s affordable housing rules. 

The parcel is on the north side of the street, between the former Neptune Motel and the building that houses Pete’s Potting Shed and Pamela’s Nail Salon, owned by Peter Joyce. The undeveloped property was purchased by Home Team 668, a limited liability company, in 2014 for $190,000. The L.L.C.’s mailing address is in care of a law firm, Hartman & Winnicki of Ridgewood, N.J. The applicant has already obtained a variance from the town’s zoning board allowing one less parking space than required by the town code. The town built a parking lot across the street earlier this year.

The applicant in the second hearing Wednesday is the Peconic Land Trust. The trust owns the community supported agriculture entity known as Quail Hill Farm in Amagansett, which is bordered on three sides by Old Stone Highway, Side Hill Road, and Deep Lane. The trust wants to build a 2,800-square-foot equipment barn with an office and a restroom. The building would be along a dirt access road that begins on Deep Lane, in what is now a stand of cedar trees. According to a memo from Eric Schantz, a senior planner for the town, the barn would not be visible from Old Stone Highway and would be “partially obscured by a vegetated berm along Side Hill Road.” It would only be visible from Deep Lane. 

The final hearing is for a proposed 199-foot-tall AT&T cellphone monopole at the East Hampton Recycling Center on Springs Fireplace Road. The pole would hold 16 antennas, to be used by Sprint and T-Mobile as well as AT&T. The pole will eventually replace the 150-foot  tower now there. The proposal includes a 240-square-foot equipment compound and shed.

The applicable documents for the three site plan proposals are available at the office of the town’s planning board, 300 Pantigo Place, Suite 103.

East Hampton Town

Landlord and Tenant Rights

The respective rights of tenants and landlords will be discussed in a program at Town Hall on Monday at 6:30 p.m. put on by the town’s Latino Advisory Committee and Organizacion Latino-Americana of Eastern Long Island, along with the East Hampton Town Police. Topics presented in Spanish and English will include rental laws, eviction proceedings, the duties of renters and property owners alike, and advocacy options. East Hampton Town Police Chief Michael Sarlo will be a guest speaker. He will be joined by a Suffolk County deputy sheriff.

Background Checks for Cabbies

A fingerprinting and background check requirement for taxi drivers in East Hampton Town will go into effect in 2017. Revisions to town taxi regulations, which require taxi businesses, drivers, and cars to have town licenses, were presented to the town board for discussion on Tuesday by Nancylynn Thiele, a town attorney. One change would set the annual taxi permit period from March 1 to the end of February year to year. Town officials are working with the New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services to set up the fingerprinting program, ideally at a location within East Hampton, and current taxi license holders will be notified of the fingerprinting requirement. Background check information will be provided by the justice services division to the town attorney’s office, which will determine if an applicant with a record should be disqualified. While included in the town taxi regulations enacted several years ago, a requirement for fingerprinting and background checks was not until now enforced, as a county program on which the town intended to rely was never instituted. 

What to Do With 555?

The future of the town-owned Amagansett Farm, a 19-acre tract on Montauk Highway that was known as the 555 property for its street address, was discussed at a meeting of the Amagansett Citizens Advisory Committee on Monday, Supervisor Larry Cantwell reported to the town board this week. The community members, who reached no consensus on what they would like to see happen there, talked about leaving it fallow, as open space, having it used for agriculture, or using it for passive recreation, such as creating a walking path around its perimeter.  The town, for the second time, recently issued a request for proposals regarding the property — both for use of the land alone and for the land as well as the barn on site. A first round of proposals, solicited in 2014, which included establishing a horse farm, growing hydroponic crops, growing traditional crops, and using the site for golf, was rejected after questions were raised about the purchase of the site with community preservation fund money, because of the barn, and the district attorney was asked to look into it. No legal action followed. The new proposals are due in by the end of this month, but it appears the citizens committee may be given the deciding vote. Mr. Cantwell said Tuesday that he had asked the committee to come up with a specific recommendation, and that “the community can help decide what we should do with that property.” 

Anti-Bias Task Force Steps Up

East Hampton Town’s Anti-Bias Task Force is on hand to address instances of racism or discrimination, Councilwoman Sylvia Overby, the liaison to the group, reminded on Tuesday. In the wake of Donald Trump’s election as the next U.S. president, and a corresponding uptick across the nation of reports of bullying and the targeting of minorities, immigrants, and certain racial groups. Ms. Overby said that the task force provides somewhere to turn should those types of incidents occur here. Members of the group have been making presentations to the citizens advisory committees of the town’s various hamlets. 

Fueling Consolidation

East Hampton Town and the Village of East Hampton officially opened a new facility early this month that will provide gasoline and diesel fuel for both municipalities’ fleets. By consolidating three separate facilities — two fuel stations owned by the town and one in the village — that were in need of replacement at an estimated total cost of $1.5 million, the joint fuel station saved money for both entities. Its $750,000 construction cost was offset by a $400,000 grant from New York State to support consolidation of services. Town Supervisor Larry Cantwell, who was East Hampton Village’s administrator for many years, said that the consolidation of facilities and services, where possible, should continue, both to benefit taxpayers and to make local government more efficient.

Despite the nationwide rallies and candlelight vigils protesting the election of Donald Trump last week, those who voted for him on Nov. 8 remain steadfast. The president-elect won Suffolk County, though not the South Fork, yet his support here was still strong. 

“I see him as much more moderate than people think,” said Andy Sabin of Amagansett, the chairman of the Sabin Metal Corporation, a leading refiner of precious metals in the United States and the founder of the South Fork Natural History Museum in Bridgehampton. 

The front yard of Mr. Sabin’s seven-acre compound on Bluff Road was covered with anti-Clinton and pro-Trump signs and posters during the campaign. “I gave him a hundred grand,” Mr. Sabin said. “I spent a lot of money on this election. And it was well worth it. I think Trump is going to surprise you. You have to give him a chance. He is not a Washington insider. He is feeling his way.”

Mr. Sabin spoke highly of Reince Priebus, chairman of the Republican National Committee, whom Mr. Trump announced this week would be his chief of staff. He called him a good friend and “a wonderful guy.” 

Others said Mr. Trump was not their first choice, but that their vote for him was as much a vote against Hillary Clinton and a rejection of an extended Obama administration.

“For me, Trump was not my ideal candidate or my first choice,” said Tim Doran, a former marine who lives in Sag Harbor. He liked what he was hearing from the other Republican candidates, Carly Fiorina, Ben Carson, and John Kasich. “Once he won the Republican nomination, he was the only choice because it was impossible for me to vote for Hillary Clinton,” Mr. Doran said. His vote was about “the rejection of progressive Democrats and the corruption behind the Clinton machine.” 

While Mr. Sabin has been outspoken about Mrs. Clinton in the past — some of his signs said “Clinton for Prison” — he spoke little about her on Monday, calling her simply a flawed candidate. “ ‘Basket of deplorables’? She didn’t learn her lesson from the Romney mistake about the 47 percent,” he said.

“As a woman, I never felt Clinton made it on her own,” said Carole Campolo of Springs. “The fact that the Democratic party, mainstream media, and others, were all telling women that we had to vote for her . . . as a 65-year-old professional woman, was demeaning and patronizing to me.” She added, “We are independent, smart, and professional and we are not led around by our nose.” 

Ms. Campolo, a Ted Cruz supporter, took great umbrage at Mr. Trump’s “Lyin’ Ted” remarks and his insinuation that Mr. Cruz’s father had something to do with the Kennedy assassination, as well as his comments about Megyn Kelly, the Fox News journalist, during a CNN interview: “You could see there was blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her wherever.” 

It was “outrageous,” Ms. Campolo said, and she wrote a letter that was published in The New York Post calling his comments crass and undignified and saying that it was time for him to step aside. 

Mr. Doran did not like some of the things Mr. Trump did and said on the campaign trail. “People don’t always choose their words wisely,” he said, calling Mr. Trump an egotist who is thin-skinned, but speaks from the heart. “In some ways I kind of like that because I don’t like politicians who have that carefully measured answer.” He believes Mr. Trump cares about the country. “I think he’ll do less damage than Hillary in the long run.” 

“In the end, as I think you saw with a lot of Republicans, and I know a lot of Republicans here were supporting Ted Cruz, I think you saw us coalesce,” Mr. Doran said. 

“I voted for him because I see him a pragmatist,” Ms. Campolo said. “The presidency is the biggest management job on the planet. Say what you want about him, the guy is a manager.” So far, she is pleased with what’s she seen from him since the election. “If he keeps his campaign promises, I think he will be a spectacular president.” 

“I think our government is way too intrusive and way too big and way too unwieldy,” Mr. Doran said. “It ceased a long time ago to work in the best interest of the American people. I think the American people are looking for a change. I certainly am.” 

Ms. Campolo, Mr. Sabin, and Mr. Doran each mentioned illegal immigration as one of the issues they hope Mr. Trump will tackle first when he takes office. 

“I am not against immigrants,” Mr. Sabin said. But, “everybody who enters this country has to be checked out. If you can’t check them out, if you don’t know what has happened since they were born, don’t let them come in. If they are illegal here, and we find out you did something wrong —  out.”

Whether Mr. Trump builds a wall at the southern border of the United States as he has promised is not the issue, Ms. Campolo said. However, she believes something needs to be done to rectify what illegal immigration is doing to states and local communities. She also believes that the “unnecessary bureaucratic structure that has been built just for people to come here,” is something Mr. Trump can tackle well. 

Mr. Doran agrees with Mr. Trump that something needs to be done at the southern border. “I might disagree with some of the rhetoric,” he said, adding he understands the need to find a better life, but that the immigration system has to be fixed. “That doesn’t mean we can just let them come in by the millions either because we need to be able to care for them and ensure their success somehow. People are really treated poorly in the journey here and they don’t necessarily end up with the American dream.” 

Mr. Sabin’s foundation has donated $3.5 million to the Columbia Law School’s Center for Climate Change Law, which was renamed the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law in his honor. 

Mr. Trump has often referred to climate change and global warming as a hoax, and in a May 2016 speech on energy policy in North Dakota he vowed to “cancel the Paris climate agreement and stop all payments of U.S. tax dollars to U.N. global warming programs.” 

“Why not, instead of regulating people,” Mr. Sabin asked, offer incentives to achieve the goal of lower carbon emissions? “It’s called clean tax cuts, giving major tax cuts to companies willing to do R and D, and to put money into cleaning up a coal plant and putting in natural clean energy, but not regulate them, you’re going to save all this money.” 

Ms. Campolo wants to see the corporate tax structure redrawn to bring offshore money back to the United States. “I would like to see for six months to a year, zero tax on money being brought back,” and then have the corporate tax rate lowered.

As Mr. Trump solidifies his cabinet, Mr. Doran said people will have to “give the guy a little bit of time to get on the ground and get running.” He hopes the post-election divisiveness and anger coming from some on the left will subside. “My bigger hope is that Donald Trump offers them a reason to let it subside.”

At their meeting on Monday, the East Hampton Town Trustees basked in the Nov. 4 State Supreme Court decision dismissing private property owners’ claims to sections of the beach at Napeague, but they quickly turned their attention to the use of a mosquito larvicide called methoprene on the lands and waterways under their jurisdiction. 

Kevin McAllister, the founder of the advocacy group called Defend H2O and the former Peconic Baykeeper, told the trustees the time had come to renew calls to ban marshland application of the chemical, which he said is deadly to nontarget species and detrimental to wildlife habitat. 

This month and next, Mr. McAllister said, the Suffolk County Legislature will determine 2017 vector control plans. He asked the trustees to send letters to the Legislature, its health committee, and the Suffolk County Council on Environmental Quality. If past years are a guide, he said plans  “will presumably include methoprene,” which he called “an aerial assault on tidal marshes with a poison.” 

Though the county’s Department of Public Works maintains that methoprene is harmless to nontarget species, studies have asserted otherwise. A study  in the Journal of Crustacean Biology in 1999, for example, stated that methoprene causes structural and biochemical alterations in larval and adult blue crabs. The study suggested that exposure at minute concentrations reduced the number of successful hatchings and resulted in lethargic behavior in surviving larvae. 

“We don’t see collateral damage,” Mr. McAllister said. “I think it occurs at a microscopic level. It’s a bad poison. With all the efforts to try to reverse water quality degradation, this is one that just continues to go on with no real justification.” 

The county maintains that aerial spraying is necessary to control mosquitos, which can infect humans with the West Nile virus. It has reported five cases of West Nile so far in 2016, in Brookhaven, Smithtown, and Islip. 

Mr. McAllister said he would attend a Legislature meeting to press the point and hoped to be accompanied by lobstermen from Connecticut, where a law banning both methoprene and resmethrin, an adulticide, in coastal areas went into effect in 2013. “They’ve been very active on this issue for a number of years. They have joined me in the past before the Legislature. They’re continuously calling me: ‘Why can’t Suffolk County get it?’ ” 

Brian Byrnes, a trustee, said that town residents he has spoken with are generally opposed to the use of methoprene, and asked if county policy could be superseded. Mr. McCallister said the State Department of Environmental Conservation bans the use of methoprene on state-managed wetlands, but a spokesman for the D.E.C. told The Star yesterday that there is no such ban although a permit is required. 

Application of chemicals for mosquito control is exempt under tidal wetlands regulations, and the county’s Public Works Department’s vector control division has an active permit to work on D.E.C. tidal wetlands in Region 1. The permit, he said, has a detailed protocol for the conditions in which methoprene can be applied. 

There has been no action on methoprene use by the Environmental Protection Agency, Ms. McAllister said. “Ultimately the E.P.A. is going to rely upon emerging science that comes out . . . but also you have the mosquito-pesticide industry generating science that says it’s perfectly fine.” 

Francis Bock, the trustees’ clerk, told Mr. McAllister that the trustees would register their opposition to methoprene with the Legislature. “Consider it done,” he said.

The team representing Marc Rowan — who wants to knock down four small cottages on Firestone Road in Montauk and replace them with three larger ones, each with its own small pool — failed to convince a majority of the East Hampton Town Zoning Board of Appeals to override a building inspector’s ruling that is holding up his plans. 

The property, a long rectangular piece of land fronting Fort Pond Bay immediately north of the Montauket, has what the building inspector determined to be a bluff crest running perpendicular to the coast. Mr. Rowan’s team appealed the determination, arguing that the geographical feature should not be classified as a bluff. If it is a bluff, variances would be needed to build the cottages in the planned location. Bluffs are protected features, and the zoning code requires construction to be set back a certain distance from them. 

His representatives came close to convincing the board, with two members voting to override the determination and two voting to uphold it. John Whelan, the board’s chairman, recused himself because he is a project manager for Mr. Rowan’s architectural team, Stelle Lomont Rouhani. Elizabeth Baldwin, the board’s attorney, informed it that a split vote in this case would be a denial, since it would take a majority of the board to overturn a building inspector’s finding.

There was considerable debate among board members. Roy Dalene and David Lys both agreed with the applicant that the feature in question was not a bluff but the product of glacier movement, which created a hollowed-out area. Cate Rogers and Theresa Berger disagreed. 

“I think the applicant was attempting to add language to the code,” Ms. Rogers said. 

“This is more of a hillside than a bluff,” Mr. Lys said. He also recalled a point made by the applicant that there was a lack of water action against what the town has deemed a bluff.

The decision means that Mr. Rowan’s team will be back before the board to seek the variances needed to complete his project.

The third time was a charm for Carter Burwell and his wife, Christine Sciulli, who finally won approval on Tuesday for the variances and permits they will need to build a 782-square-foot second-floor addition and a 597-square-foot studio on their Marine Boulevard property in Amagansett. 

Twice since they purchased their house in 2010 they had asked for variances and permits, but the board had rejected their previous plans as overly ambitious. On Tuesday, Mr. Dalene called the latest iteration a “brilliant redesign,” as the board voted 5-0 to approve their application. 

The board also approved Esther Rubin’s request to legalize a pool patio that had been built too close to the edge of her property, although they were skeptical of her explanation. Mr. Dalene said that it seemed, during the Nov. 1 hearing on the issue, that Ms. Rubin was “blaming everyone else.” 

“It is easier to ask for forgiveness than permission,” Mr. Lys said, while noting that the request was not detrimental to the neighborhood, before joining the rest of the board in the 5-0 vote to approve.

Mr. Lys was the lone member to vote to approve an application for a house to be built at 22 Shore Road on Napeague, next to the White Sands motel. The 4-1 vote against the application marked the second time the applicant, a limited liability company with an Islandia address, has been turned away by the board this year.

The problem the applicant has is that the property is almost entirely on duneland. While the proposed 3,602-square-foot house, with 1,056 square feet of decking, porches, and a swimming pool, is somewhat smaller than what was previously proposed, the size of its footprint did not sit well with the four members who voted against the needed permits. “Is this design their best effort? Are there better alternatives to this?” Ms. Rogers asked. 

“There are alternative designs available,” Mr. Whelan said.

Finally, the board voted 5-0 to approve the application of Michel and Caroline Zaleski to replace a World War II-era house at 75 Dune Lane in the Beach Hampton section of Amagansett with a new 5,304-square-foot house with a pool.

In a decision that East Hampton Town Supervisor Larry Cantwell called "an enormous win for public access to our beaches," State Supreme Court Justice Ralph Gazzillo has ruled that a group of property owners do not own the 4,000-foot-long strip of ocean beach popularly known as Truck Beach, nor a nearby 1,500-foot stretch in front of the White Sands Motel, as they contended in lawsuits brought in 2009.

Justice Gazzillo's Nov. 4 decision stated that an 1882 deed in which the town trustees conveyed some 1,000 acres on Napeague to Arthur Benson "clearly reserved some rights 'to the inhabitants of East Hampton' and, arguably, the allowances for some public use."

"Perhaps more importantly," Justice Gazzillo wrote, "is what has not been proven." The plaintiffs, he wrote, did not persuade him of their ownership of the beach, the absence of which "severely undermines the support for the balance of their 'nuisance' claims."

In a June trial in Riverhead, the plaintiffs carried out a broad attack on activity on the beach between Napeague Lane and the western boundary of Napeague State Park, and in front of the White Sands Motel. They sought to portray a dangerous environment with trucks weaving through crowds and at play, and people and dogs urinating and defecating in the dunes, which they said threatened public health, degraded the environment, and put upland properties at increased risk of flooding.

The defense countered with testimony from longtime residents including Town Councilman Fred Overton and Ed Michels, the town's chief harbormaster, who recalled driving on the beach more than 50 years ago and dismissed suggestions that conditions have ever been hazardous.

Justice Gazzillo sided with the defendants, ruling that there was no proof or even reports of beach-related injuries or illnesses, nor was there any proof of significant violations of town code on the beach. Alleged damage or inconvenience posed by beach driving, he wrote, was unproven as well. He also suggested that in their testimony, some plaintiffs, including Bernard Kiembock, owner of the White Sands Motel, had undermined their own arguments, noting that Mr. Kiembock had acknowledged that his motel never has vacancies.

"We're very pleased with what appears to be a strong decision by the State Supreme Court, and we're ready to continue to strongly defend the public's right to use the beach at this location and throughout the Town of East Hampton," Mr. Cantwell said on Monday.

Diane McNally, a town trustee who was until this year its longtime clerk, called the plaintiffs' claim of danger to the public safety farcical. "You can't prove any of that," she said on Monday. "The beach has been used for all this time, and all the detrimental effects they were claiming weren't true. I'm glad the judge saw that."

Town officials were planning eminent domain proceedings had Justice Gazzillo sided with the plaintiffs, resolving to condemn a total of just over 22 acres of shorefront between the mean high water mark and the toe of sand dunes, comprising two separate parcels.

Now, said Mr. Cantwell, "We need to evaluate the decision and discuss the possibilities with our legal advisers. We had begun that [condemnation] process, but it's only begun. It's an expensive process that required a full environmental impact statement, appraisals, and legal fees. If we can avoid those costs based on this decision, that would benefit the town."

Changes in the East Hampton Town zoning code that would set limits on the size of houses in keeping with the properties they are on, and other construction details, will be the subject of a hearing before the East Hampton Town Board at Town Hall next Thursday at 6:30 p.m. A fact sheet on the proposal can be found on the town’s website.

The purpose of the law, according to town officials, is to reduce the number of houses that are out of scale with their lots and neighborhoods. The size of a residence may now be 12 percent of the lot area plus 1,600 square feet or a maximum of 20,000 square feet, whichever is less. If the proposal is approved, the limit would be 10 percent of the lot plus 1,600 square feet or a 20,000 square foot maximum, whichever is less. 

Among the changes that would affect construction is the definition of gross floor area. Areas where ceilings are lower than five feet high would no longer be included in the calculation of the total area, but areas where ceiling heights are higher than 15 feet would be counted twice.

Another code change would affect the size of cellars. If passed, cellars would not be allowed to extend beyond the outside foundation walls of a building’s first floor by more than 10 percent of the gross floor area. Cellars would also be prohibited from being more than 12 feet high. 

The final zoning code change proposed would hone the definitions of building coverage and lot coverage. Buildings with the lowest floor raised above ground level would count toward coverage and cantilevered structures and overhangs larger than 24 inches would also be included in coverage calculations.

The Suffolk Department of Health Services apparently is the only local agency that can enforce an 11-year-old Environmental Protection Agency requirement that large-capacity cesspools are illegal and should be removed. 

The issue drew the attention of the East Hampton Town Planning Board on Nov. 2 as members reviewed a site plan for the Arbor restaurant property in Montauk. The restaurant is near three bodies of water: Fort Pond, Fort Pond Bay, and Tuthill Pond.

By a 4-to-3 vote, the applicant, Marc Rowan, who bought the property early this year, will not have to submit an engineer’s report certifying that the restaurant does not have illegal cesspools. Doing so was discussed at the board’s previous meeting, on Oct. 26, during which Kevin McAllister, who heads Defend H2O, an environmental organization, said the E.P.A. targets any business that has 20 or more customers a day who might flush toilets. 

The E.P.A. website reads: “A ban on existing large-capacity cesspools went into effect on April 5, 2005. If you have not yet closed your large-capacity cesspool, you must do so immediately. E.P.A. regulations require you to close your large-capacity cesspool in a way that ensures no contaminants could move from it to underground drinking water sources.” 

It was reported during that meeting that Norsic Sanitation Services, a Southampton company, had submitted a survey indicating multiple cesspools with a combined capacity of almost 17,000 gallons on the property. Tina Piette, representing Mr. Rowan, however, presented a second survey, this one from Hamptons Septic Services, that did not include cesspools. 

The planning board majority vote took its lead from the board’s attorney, John Jilnicki. As they began the discussion of the Arbor site plan, Reed Jones, the board’s chairman, asked Mr. Jilnicki for an opinion about cesspools. Mr. Jilnicki told the board that the Suffolk Health Department was the only agency that could act on illegal cesspools. He said the desire of some board members to learn and rule on what was actually at the site was “a good goal,” but, he said, “I frankly don’t think we have the authority.”

“How is this in the interest of good planning?” Kathleen Cunningham, one of the members, asked. “I don’t think we asked enough questions,” Job Potter said of the review that led to that moment. It became clear, as the discussion went around the table, that Mr. Potter and Ms. Cunningham, along with Patti Leber, were in the minority.

One member who voted with the majority expressed misgivings. “I defer to our counsel,” Ian Calder-Piedmonte said. Nevertheless, he expressed concern. “The E.P.A. clearly has a law against this,” he said, concluding that the town board should explore the possibility of allowing the planning board “to make sure there are no large-capacity cesspools.”

According to Kim Shaw, the town’s natural resources director, a survey of septic systems servicing businesses in the town had turned up at least 105 cesspools. 

As for the county department, it held a meeting with representatives of various local governments in Yaphank to discuss possible changes regarding septic systems on Oct. 25. East Hampton was not notified, according to the Planning Department. 

However, it was reported that the septic system at Rick’s Crabby Cowboy Café in Montauk was cited at the meeting in a discussion of grandfathering, or allowing outlawed systems to remain in place if they predated the regulations.

The Y.M.C.A. East Hampton RECenter will join hundreds of Y.M.C.A. facilities across the nation in providing free child care on Tuesday for people heading to the polls. The service will be available between 7 a.m. and 6 p.m. 

While children are in the care of the RECenter, the staff will lead activities in the arts, physical education, science, literacy, “and everyone’s favorite —  video game tournaments,” Glenn Vickers, the executive director of the East Hampton RECenter, said. He added that preregistration for the service, which requires parents or caretakers to fill out a simple form, would be appreciated.

USA Today reported on Saturday that the Y.M.C.A. 

initiative is meant to promote access to the polls and is part of a national campaign called Zoe’s Kids Day Out, which is aimed at empowering kids to become leaders.

“Election Day is arguably one of the most important days in the U.S. this year — the ultimate opportunity for Americans to make their voices heard through the democratic process,” Kevin Washington, the president and chief executive officer of the national Y.M.C.A., said in a statement. “Unfortunately, many people who want to vote find it challenging because they have to take children with them. The Y’s hope is that the Zoe’s Kids Day Out initiative enables those parents and caregivers to exercise their right to vote, and ensures children can spend their time in a safe, nurturing environment.

In a decision Southampton Town Supervisor Jay Schneiderman called a “minor victory” for Alex Gregor, the town highway superintendent, a Supreme Court judge ruled that Mr. Gregor is a necessary component in union issues that affect highway workers. The question of whether Mr. Gregor had such authority was one Mr. Schneiderman said needed to be clarified.

In March, the supervisor agreed to the settlement that affected compensation and benefits, largely for supervisory and clerical roles. The town board, in a 3-2 vote, authorized him to sign the agreement, despite objections from the two Republicans on the board and Mr. Gregor. As the highway superintendent, he was asked to sign the stipulation and refused. 

Justice Joseph A. Santorelli ruled on Oct. 17 that Mr. Gregor is “a necessary party to any stipulation or agreement relating to his employees.” The justice said his signature was necessary on the stipulation to the extent that it affects only the highway department workers. There are 298 employees in the Civil Service Employees Association’s bargaining unit, 59 of which are highway department workers. 

In a statement issued last Thursday, Mr. Gregor said the town supervisor had “made a back room deal” with the president of the C.S.E.A. “As I have stated in the past, I agree that the hard-working town employees deserve to share in the financial prosperity of the town, but the process that occurred in this situation without the participation of the C.S.E.A. membership was wrong,” Mr. Gregor said.

The settlement stemmed from a complaint filed with the Public Employees Relations Board late last year over the current contract’s exclusion of certain employee titles. The settlement would add 34 administrative titles, approve raises for six titles, accelerated pay raises, and more overtime for emergencies, and called for a reduction to employee contributions for family health insurance plans, but not for individual plans. 

Councilwoman Christina Scalera, at the time the agreement was announced, called it a one-sided deal that she calculated could cost the town a half-million dollars in the first year alone. Mr. Schneiderman countered that it was well within the town’s financial capabilities and that it corrected “a lot of longstanding inequities” after the recession. He allowed for the increases in his proposed 2017 budget and even still yielded a two percent reduction in the tax rate. 

Mr. Gregor called for formal renegotiation of the contract to address the issues, many of which he agreed needed to be righted. Still, he refused to sign. 

In May, the Civil Service Employees Association filed a grievance with the town to try to force the town to uphold the contract agreement. The supervisor denied the grievance, noting that the collective bargaining agreement is a three-party contract that may require the highway superintendent’s signature. 

“This is an anomaly,” Mr. Schneiderman said, adding it is a “mistake made 30 years ago and carried over.” Municipal law does not give the town highway superintendent the power to set compensation or benefits for town employees, but reserves that role for the town board. However, the current contract between the collective bargaining unit and the town calls Mr. Gregor a joint employer. “That, in essence, is the problem,” Mr. Schneiderman said. “How can one individual veto the town board?” 

With the judge’s decision that Mr. Gregor is a necessary party to a settlement that affects the 59 highway workers — about 20 percent of the total workforce — Mr. Schneiderman said the town is faced with an interesting issue. 

The town is filing a notice of appeal. In the meantime, the supervisor said the changes in the contract that affect the 80 percent of the workforce not in the highway department can move forward based on the judge’s decision. That means some have pay raises coming to them, though he said the union may not want the money to be released until it is for all of its members. “They don’t want to leave some of the workers behind and create a division,” he said. However, he said he does not feel the town can withhold it. “My position is that we can no longer withhold those benefits, that we have to release them. The money belongs to them.”

The current contract expires at the end of 2017. Mr. Schneiderman said it is possible that there will be a move to end the contract and start a new one early, which could yield a faster result than waiting for an appeal.

Mr. Gregor suggested instead that all parties come together now without further litigating the matter. “I hope that we can now move forward in the spirit of cooperation toward a legal solution that benefits the taxpayers of Southampton and the employees that serve them,” Mr. Gregor said. 

Laura Smith, the president of the Southampton C.S.E.A., did not return a call for comment.