The East Hampton Town Board will address the situation at the airport — what has transpired to date and the town’s options after its latest legal setback — at its work session on Tuesday.
After having implemented a temporary restraining order in May preventing the town from closing East Hampton Airport and reopening it 33 hours later as a private facility with new restrictions on aircraft operations, New York State Supreme Court Justice Paul Baisley last month ruled that by planning to conduct an environmental impact statement after the airport’s closure and reopening, the town had acted beyond its legal abilities and in an arbitrary and capricious manner.
Before its public discussion on Tuesday, the town board will meet in executive session with its consultants on Monday to discuss the airport, which has been a continued source of frustration to many residents, particularly in Wainscott.
At the town board meeting last Thursday, an irate Wainscott resident complained about aircraft “coming in at a higher rate than ever” and conditions in the hamlet that he described as “unlivable” and “absolutely insane.”
The board had made a sincere attempt to address airport noise and volume, Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc told the caller, James Clark. “We were sued in the process of trying to do that by a number of litigants. . . . The State Supreme Court recently ruled that we cannot regulate the airport at this time.”
The judge issued the temporary restraining order in May one day before the airport’s scheduled temporary closure, following oral arguments in three parallel lawsuits challenging the plan. To date, the plaintiffs — Blade Air Mobility, East End Hangars, and the Coalition to Keep East Hampton Airport Open, along with several individuals — have been successful in preventing the airport’s closure and new restrictions on aircraft operations. The lawsuits have since been merged.
The board had planned to limit aircraft operators to one takeoff and one landing per day, impose other restrictions based on the size and noise of aircraft, and implement an 8 p.m. to 8 a.m. curfew Monday through Thursday and from 7 p.m. to 9 a.m. Friday through Sunday and on federal holidays. All of these were prohibited by Justice Baisley.
While overall air traffic is “down about a third” from the previous year, Supervisor Van Scoyoc said “there were more flights that occurred over Wainscott than the other hamlets,” echoing an observation frequently made by members of the hamlet’s citizens advisory committee. “Wainscott bore the brunt,” he said.
At that hamlet’s citizens advisory committee meeting on Saturday, the focus shifted from the big-picture future of the airport to a short-term emphasis on the flight routes that aircraft are using.
Of most concern to the committee at present is the “two-way traffic” of aircraft takeoffs and landings occurring within short time spans over the same flight paths, with members saying they hope to influence the routes by next summer.
“Any recommendation we make about the future of the airport is kind of a moot point right now” because of the ongoing litigation, Carolyn Logan Gluck, the C.A.C.’s chairwoman, said after the meeting. Flight routes are “something over which we can make recommendations, which we hope the town and the airport managers will hear.”
The committee will start by researching those flight routes and how they are delineated because “it’s not clear to us who, besides the airport manager, is involved in that decision-making,” she said.
Ms. Logan Gluck acknowledged that “any shift in the flight routes is going to have an impact on other members of the community,” so the committee will try to avoid making recommendations that shift the burden of air traffic to other hamlets or villages. “Our overwhelming concern is public safety,” she said.
During the meeting, Barry Raebeck, an outspoken critic of the airport, asserted that “you cannot solve the problem by changing the routes.”
The town was theoretically free to retake control of the airport with the expiration of federal grant assurances in September 2021. The town board, with input from consultants and residents, landed on a middle path between the status quo and closure of the airport with the set of restrictions it planned to impose. “Now, these lawsuits are currently preventing us” from imposing restrictions at the airport, Mr. Van Scoyoc told Mr. Clark last Thursday. “But we are intending to persevere until we gain control over our town-owned airport and can regulate in a way that the community supports.”
Mr. Clark was unmoved. “Do you not realize these people don’t care about regulating?” he asked. “They will do anything they possibly can to keep this airport . . . and you’re still willing to compromise over these things.” He recommended that the town close the airport.
“We’ve been told by a judge we can’t do that,” Mr. Van Scoyoc said.
