Wrong Solution For Housing Crisis

East Hampton is in a crisis in which young adults, year-round workers, and ordinary residents struggle to find adequate housing they can afford. But the most recent town board discussion about housing involved temporary, portable units intended for Montauk’s seasonal, resort work force. Taking the proposal seriously is an unfortunate case of skewed priorities.

The median price for a house in East Hampton Town was a near-record $1.1 million in the first quarter of this year — four times the national average. That figure is the highest on the East End, and far beyond the means of most wage earners here. At the same time year-round rentals are few and expensive — with the supply being further limited by the astonishing growth of Airbnb and other online vacation accommodation services. 

For many, the lack of housing here leaves few choices. Those with jobs can stay with family or friends, find a reasonably priced illegal rental, travel daily to East Hampton from points west with commutes of up to an hour and a half when traffic is bad — or leave the area. Telecommuting is an option for some, but it is simply not viable as a long-term strategy, especially for those in the construction and service industries. Ask anyone who runs a business with midlevel, technically skilled, or management vacancies how hiring is going, and you will get a very discouraging picture. 

It is disappointing that the town board would spend its time on portable housing for seasonal workers, as it did on July 11. An owner of a trendy Montauk restaurant, the Grey Lady, took the concept to the board. Besides running the restaurant, Ryan Chadwick has a start-up that would provide modular, self-contained units on wheels that could be hauled away at the end of the season. There is sharp irony here — the tiny houses would go away just like the restaurant’s profits, its payments to food suppliers, and the lion’s share of the money paid to summertime staff. 

What makes Mr. Chadwick’s idea more troubling is that it would do nothing about unsafe and overcrowded low-end housing in Montauk unless there were an equal commitment on the town’s part to crack down on workers’ share houses and rundown motels occupied by the seasonal labor force. 

If anything, the town board should make housing for East Hampton’s existing residents and their young-adult children a priority. Officials should focus on our year-round commercial sector before responding to seasonal businesses of dubious local economic importance — many of which have brought problems upon themselves by expanding to require staff beyond those available locally.  In this, the town is complicit by failing to enforce effective limits on seating, in particular on bar and outdoor guest capacity. 

Real and lasting answers to East Hampton’s housing crisis are needed. Pop-up portable units for transitory laborers should not be even a small part of the solution.