Airport Legal Fees, East Deck Top Agenda

Legal bills were on the town board’s agenda last Thursday night as the board resolved to hire outside lawyers as counsel in matters related to the East Hampton Airport.

The town is facing legal challenges to its airport use restrictions, including a nighttime curfew, instituted last spring as noise-reducing measures. An agreement with the firm of Kaplan, Kirsch & Rockwell, which has served as East Hampton’s counsel on aviation matters, was renewed for 2016, with an expenditure of up to $300,000 approved without further board review.

In addition, the board voted to extend its agreement with Kathleen M. Sullivan of Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan, who has been defending the town on airport matters in appellate court. Payment of up to $200,000 was approved. The legal fees will be paid by the airport fund.

The board also voted unanimously to appoint two new assistant town attorneys. NancyLynn Schurr Thiele will be paid an annual salary of $93,000, and Hope De Lauter will earn $75,000 a year.

A lawsuit over ownership and control of a stretch of oceanfront beach on Napeague has prompted the town to pursue an eminent domain procedure over the land, and the board also approved a $320,000 bond issue for that purpose. With another resolution, the board agreed to hire two firms, AKRF Inc. and Whiteman Osterman & Hanna, for a maximum of $165,000, to prepare a required environmental impact statement. The costs will be shared with the East Hampton Town Trustees, as will an $80,400 fee to have the Lawrence Indimine Consulting Corp. appraise the property in question.

Also at last Thursday’s meeting, the town board made a negative declaration under the State Environmental Quality Review Act, finding that the proposed rezoning of the former East Deck motel property in Montauk, from resort to residential zoning, would not have a significant environmental impact.

A limited liability company that purchased the site in 2013 is seeking to subdivide the 4.2 acres into four house lots, a plan that will be reviewed by the planning board should the zoning change be approved.

The negative declaration was conditioned on agreements with the L.L.C. that it would guarantee public access to the beach by filing legal covenants and restrictions, and that large-lot and scenic easements would be imposed. Although those provisions were not specifically outlined in the SEQRA declaration, they were implicit as part of the proposal by the L.L.C., Eric Schantz, a town planner, said this week.

Another condition raised in discussions with the property owners, that no revetments or other erosion-control structures would be built at the site, was brought up at the board meeting by Jeremy Samuelson, who as executive director of Concerned Citizens of Montauk, has been involved in the talks. That matter, said the lawyer for the L.L.C., Leonard Ackerman, would come under the planning board’s purview.

A prohibition on structures is included under the conservation easement to be enacted on the shore area, Mr. Schantz said Tuesday.

The town board did not vote on the zone change. The property owners had at first proposed turning the old motel into an elaborate private club, which did not sit well with the community. Town officials explored the possibility of purchasing the site with the community preservation fund, but found it impossible due to the asking price. The discussions with the landowners followed, resulting in the new residential subdivision plan, which is widely viewed as an acceptable use of the land.