Inlet: Consider It Dredged

The inlet between Hog Creek and Gardiner’s Bay in East Hampton was dredged on March 30 and last Thursday, after the Army Corps of Engineers modified a permit to allow the work.

The Clearwater Beach Property Owners Association, representing more than 800 homeowners, performs the annual dredging. Late-winter storms that caused shoaling, however, made navigation difficult and impeded tidal exchange between the creek and bay, necessitating dredging outside the Sept. 30 to Jan. 15 timeframe that is in place to protect the spawning of winter flounder.

Jim Walker of Inter-Science Research Associates helped the property owners association to coordinate and explain the need for dredging to the Army Corps, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, and the East Hampton Town Trustees, who own and manage the waterway and bottomland on behalf of the public. Mr. Walker told the trustees at their March 14 meeting that the association was “caught between the federal dredging window” and that “the best time to do it is before boating season.” Federal, state, and town agencies approved the project.

East Hampton Town Supervisor Larry Cantwell said in a statement that the shoaling would have threatened Hog Creek’s water quality and boat access to the body’s two marinas. In the same statement, Gerry Giliberti, president of the property owners association, thanked Representative Lee Zeldin, Mr. Cantwell, and Mr. Walker, whom he said had been integral in securing the permit modification.