All Eyes on Montauk Woes
Montaukers’ unhappiness about the crowds, noisy parties, and illegal behavior overwashing their once-quiet hamlet this season has become prime summertime fodder for the metropolitan news media, including “CBS This Morning,” which aired a piece about the situation on Tuesday morning.
Two Facebook pages, Montauk Locals and Fighting for Montauk, have become forums for constructive discussion as well as venting, and a bumper sticker created by Keri Lamparter of Montauk, a public relations professional, is being distributed around town. “Bad behavior is NEVER in season,” it says. “RESPECT MONTAUK (or leave).”
In a statement presented Tuesday to the East Hampton Town Board, the Ditch Plains Association, a Montauk neighborhood group, said that the “lawlessness cannot continue.”
“A strong message must be sent to those who disrespect our community,” the group’s president, Laura Michaels, told the board. More enforcement officers are needed, she said, to stop the “abhorrent behavior.”
“We need to follow the example of Fort Lauderdale and Hampton Bays to stomp this cancer out immediately,” she said.
The group stressed the importance of enforcing current laws. Establishing a rental registry at this point, as the town board is discussing, would only produce more administrative work, they said, and dilute the real focus.
The association has also suggested increasing fines as well as prices for nonresident parking passes, tightening a recently passed law regarding new bars and restaurants at motels, establishing a taxi commission, and running a public or private bus service until 2 a.m.
Property taxes on commercial properties that have “enjoyed staggering growth” but in many cases “are the same ones that have caused a large increase in town expenses for sanitation and enforcement” should be reassessed, the group said.
Meanwhile, residents speaking against the behavior of patrons at places such as the Sloppy Tuna are getting a bit of blowback on social media and, in at least one case, in person. Frans Preidel, who lives next to the club, was on camera being interviewed by the CBS news crew when a man on the beach confronted him, suggesting that the townspeople should appreciate the tourist dollars.
And others, including the Sloppy Tuna itself, through its Facebook and Twitter accounts, have responded to people’s comments, challenging their views. Several days ago the bar posted a picture of the logo of the Montauket, a longtime Montauk bar and restaurant, depicting a Native American, with the hashtags “#SuckitFranz,” “#STOPRENTING IF YOU DON’T LIKE IT,” and “#stfu.”