Trustees Open Three Mile Harbor to Scalloping Through April

 In response to requests from baymen, the East Hampton Town Trustees voted on Friday to extend the season for harvesting scallops for one month. The extension, which expires on April 30, applies solely to Three Mile Harbor.

With five of the nine trustees present at a specially called meeting at the Donald Lamb Building in Amagansett, a resolution to extend the season in Three Mile Harbor passed with little discussion. The move followed the State Department of Environmental Conservation's announcement one week earlier of an extension of the scallop season in state waters. That extension will also expire on April 30.

The town code allows the trustees, who oversee most of the town's beaches, waterways, and bottomlands on behalf of the public, to adjust seasons, harvest methods, equipment, and sizes and quantities of shellfish.

Scalloping will only be allowed with hand tools, such as look-boxes, nets, and rakes. The trustees reserved the right to revoke the resolution should violations or any unforeseen negative effects on bottomlands, waters, aquatic vegetation, or other marine species occur, according to the resolution.

The trustees' decision mirrored the state D.E.C.'s rationale that harsh winter conditions had affected commercial fishermen's income. Trustee Nat Miller, who is a bayman, referred to several of his colleagues on the water "that have been going down for the last month . . . getting a bushel, half-bushel."

"If we can offer something to a few baymen," said Diane McNally, the trustees' clerk, "that would be great."

The trustees have determined, according to the resolution, that the extension of the season in Three Mile Harbor "should not be detrimental to the availability of this resource" when the scallop season reopens in November.

Restricting the scallop harvest to one water body, Ms. McNally said, would not overwhelm enforcement efforts.