The Montauk Crisis

The tone was cordial, though the message from the massive crowd of citizens at Tuesday’s East Hampton Town Board meeting  at the Montauk Firehouse was unmistakable: Do something and do it fast.

From among the hundreds who spilled out of the firehouse’s huge truck bays one after another speaker stood to implore the town board to do whatever it could to save Montauk from overcrowding and a nearly 24-hour alcohol and drug-fueled party scene, which has left residents frustrated and distraught, and reaching for their earplugs. By extension, as venues catering to the summer scenesters expand, notably to Napeague’s Cyril’s Fish House and now, nearly in the shadow of Town Hall, to Moby’s in East Hampton, there is a sense that the entire town is at risk.

That is, of course, outside of the more-restrictive villages, including Sagaponack and Sag Harbor as well as East Hampton. Imagine just for fun how long it would last if, say, the Palm, at Main Street and Huntting Lane, decided to put some beer taps and a D.J. on the back parking lot. The difference isn’t in the respective local governments’ laws; such things are impermissible in all these jurisdictions. However, in Montauk, the Memory Motel, for example, has been unofficially allowed to expand its guest service area into its parking lot because no one in authority gave a hoot, and it has been allowed to continue, we suspect, because current officials are overstressed and, frankly, afraid to pick yet another fight what with the airport battle on their hands. Other examples are numerous of how town government has for years failed to protect the interests of many of its residents while cutting too much slack for those who profit by pushing beyond the limits of the law.

Supervisor Larry Cantwell and the other members of the town board may talk a good game, but it is regrettable that it took what amounted to a citizens’ uprising to draw serious attention to the ongoing — and growing — crisis.