Town Board, Trustees Unite On Napeague

East Hampton Town Board members and the town trustees have reached an agreement under which the two governing bodies will jointly pursue and finance the acquisition and condemnation of approximately 4,000 feet of the ocean beach on Napeague, the subject of two lawsuits brought by private property owners who object to driving and parking on the beach in front of their houses.

An agreement dated Tuesday details the town’s goals: to “preserve, ratify and confirm the rights of the town’s citizens to the use and enjoyment” of the beaches in question. These include not only the longstanding right to land fishing boats and spread nets on adjacent lands “as has been customary on the south shore of the town lying to the west,” but also to drive and park vehicles, fish, walk, ride horses, picnic, sunbathe, swim, surf, and “enjoy all other activities associated with a public beach, by way of eminent domain proceedings. . . .” 

The agreement emphasizes both governing parties’ understanding of the effort’s cost, which, beyond legal services, will involve environmental analysis, survey work, and appraisals. The terms are retroactive, to include the town’s expenses in preparation of eminent domain proceedings, and will continue until the matter is concluded or has been discontinued. 

The trustees have agreed to contribute up to half the cost of the condemnation efforts. The town will share information related to costs as well as an accounting of its expenditures. Important to the trustees, the agreement includes creation of a joint management plan, to manage the beaches “in a manner which best serves the interests of the town’s residents and assures the continued access by the public. . . .” 

Diane McNally, the trustees’ clerk, has signed the agreement, a copy of which was obtained by The Star yesterday. The document needs the signature of Supervisor Larry Cantwell to be made official. That signature is pending authorization of the town board, which Mr. Cantwell said yesterday could be discussed at the board’s Dec. 1 work session. The board, he said, must review the proposal before moving forward, “but the basic concept is something that was discussed with Diane.”

“We’re pleased to work with the trustees on this,” Mr. Cantwell said. “There’s a lot at stake for both trustees and the town.” Preservation of the pub ic’s right to use the beach in question, he said, “is a priority of the town board.” 

All eight of the nine trustees present at their Nov. 10 meeting voted to support the agreement, then in draft form. “The most we can do, going forward, is to ensure the public knows that this board did everything it could to ensure public access to that beach,” Ms. McNally said the next day. “It was not an easy decision to make. We agreed to condemnation months and months ago, but this is putting our money where our mouth is.” 

At their meeting on Tuesday, Ms. McNally said trustees would attend the town board’s Dec. 3 meeting, “where we will formally present and/or acknowledge that this agreement exists between the trustees and the town board.”

The trustees, co-defendants with the town in the suits brought by Seaview at Amagansett Ltd. et al. and White Sands Motel Holding Corp., have already spent at least $165,000 to defend public access to the beaches in question, Ms. McNally said. She acknowledged the $15,000 contributed by Citizens for Access Rights, a group that formed in response to the lawsuits. 

“We’re still moving forward on parallel lines,” Ms. McNally had said earlier. “We’re moving forward with the concept that this issue needs to go to trial, and then the condemnation.” In December 2014, the town hired Michael Rikon of the Manhattan law firm Goldstein, Rikon, Rikon & Houghton, to lead the effort to condemn the disputed oceanfront property.

Plaintiffs in the lawsuits complain of what they say is a huge increase in four-wheel-drive traffic on the beach, along with bonfires, barbecues, and fireworks, which they say present a hazard to residents, beachgoers, and upland properties. They also allege that trucks have been illegally parked on beach grass, which could destabilize dunes. 

The plaintiffs further assert that the trustees ceded 4,000 feet of the ocean beach between Napeague Lane and Napeague State Park to the east in an 1882 deed to Arthur W. Benson, who owned much of Montauk. Their claim that some of the property owners own the beach to the high-tide line was upheld in a June 2 decision by Suffolk Supreme Court Justice Jerry Garguilo, in which he denied a request by town lawyers to dismiss the case, in a reversal of his own September 2014 decision. 

The Benson deed contained language reserving the public’s right to use the beach to fish, and the trustees maintain that the right to use the beach freely was bestowed by the 1686 Dongan Patent, under which they manage the town’s beaches, waterways, and bottomlands. Public access, the defendants argue, was not meant to die with the Benson sale. 

The plaintiffs, however, challenge the continued existence of that agreement and also claim that the vehicular use of the beach for recreation exceeds that exemption. 

According to New York State law, municipalities may pursue ownership of private land, with just compensation, for a “public purpose.” The town, Mr. Rikon said in January, would pursue condemnation of the beachfront portions of all of the properties without regard for the outcome of the ongoing lawsuit. 

Also on Tuesday, a group calling itself Safe Access for Everyone announced its formation and a campaign to prohibit sport utility vehicles from the section of the ocean beach on Napeague that is often called Truck Beach. In a release, the group calls driving on that section of the beach “irrational.” The group, according to its release, “invites pedestrian use of the populated beach, and asks that S.U.V.s move to an uninhabited part of the same stretch of beach,” calling that “a free, simple solution that works for everyone.”