Year-End Giving: Two Big Options

Two big — and very different — fund-raising efforts reach important junctures this month. In Sag Harbor, an $8 million goal that would enable a partnership to rebuild the burned movie house and turn it into a genuine arts hub is within reach. In Montauk, the Playhouse Foundation is within striking distance of its target, also $8 million, to add two indoor swimming pools, meeting rooms, and a theater — all very much needed in a hamlet where off-season diversions are limited.

The plan for rebuilding the Sag Harbor Cinema includes a main theater evoking the one badly damaged in a fire almost exactly a year ago. It also calls for a smaller screening room, suitable for classes. It is just as important that it would retain an iconic cultural fixture in a rapidly changing village and stave off the kind of commercial development that might be of little or no interest to residents.

Each is a worthwhile community undertaking that deserves consideration for year-end giving.