Substation Case Goes to Court
The fight over whether PSEG-Long Island, the utility that provides electric service here, should be subject to East Hampton Town’s zoning laws — particularly whether the company’s reconstruction of a substation on Old Stone Highway in Amagansett should have been reviewed by the town planning board — will continue in a Brooklyn courtroom on Monday.
The case goes back to 2014, when town officials issued a stop-work order after PSEG began revamping the substation without having submitted plans to the planning board for site-plan approval or obtained a building permit. Vegetation around the site, which borders the Long Island Rail Road tracks near the Montauk Highway, was cleared, a building erected, and a chain-link fence installed.
The substation upgrade was the culmination of a controversial project — the installation of a six-mile, high-voltage electric line from the Buell Lane, East Hampton, electric substation to the Amagansett site. Two-hundred sixty-seven replacement poles were installed and 23 and 33-kilovolt lines strung. Once the work at the substation was completed, the system was put on line.
The town argued that site plan approval and a building permit were needed, while PSEG claimed that the company, a service provider for the Long Island Power Authority, was exempt from those requirements. The stop-work order was overturned in April 2015 by State Supreme Court Justice Thomas F. Whelan, who agreed that LIPA and PSEG are exempt from local zoning and other laws. The town appealed.
According to Michael Sendlenski, the East Hampton Town attorney, oral arguments before the Appellate Division of State Supreme Court will begin on Monday.
The controversial high-voltage lines, which run along residential streets to the Amagansett substation on poles larger than those they replaced, caused an outcry from residents concerned about safety and aesthetics. They asked to have the lines installed underground.
PSEG had said the new lines were needed to upgrade service and help avoid outages. It refused, however, to carry the higher cost of underground installation. Subsequent discussions between the company and East End local and state officials about cost-sharing did not bear fruit.
Meanwhile, community groups prevailed on town officials to ask the utility to put plantings around the substation to soften its look, as well as a line of trees and shrubs. This was accomplished, but some Amagansett residents say the work falls short.