The East Hampton Village Board, at its meeting on Friday, acknowledged issues with the way nonresident beach parking permits were sold this year. The permits, which went on sale at midnight on Feb. 1, sold out in only 11 hours, a record. This rankled many residents of East Hampton Town, who will be unable to park this summer at their favorite beaches.
“We have received numerous complaints from the public about how quickly they sold out,” said Mayor Jerry Larsen. “We will make some changes next year.”
Marcos Baladron, the village administrator, told board members that 1,000 nonresident permits were sold in the first hour of availability. “The biggest complaint that we got was from seniors,” he said, explaining that older people either had difficulty using the system or were asleep when the permits went on sale.
“We had absolutely no idea they were going to sell out so fast,” said Chris Minardi, the deputy mayor. “I think last year was a record year, and it was nine days. We did start at midnight last year with the same exact system. That system seemed to work very well . . . so we used the same system.”
There were a couple of changes, however. In 2021, nonresident permits could be bought through the mail, or with the use of a drop box behind Village Hall. This year, not only was there no mail or drop-box option, but there was a 6-percent processing fee for those applying online (up from the 3 percent charged in 2021). Without the mail or drop-box option, the fee was unavoidable.
A valid East Hampton Village parking permit is required for Main, Georgica, Egypt, Wiborg’s, and Two Mile Hollow beaches. Nonresidents do not receive a sticker permit; their parking is enforced using a license-plate reader. Their license plate is their “sticker.”
“A lot of local town residents have asked if we could offer the stickers to them first,” said Mr. Minardi. The village cannot, he said; according to Vincent Messina, the village attorney, that would amount to “area discrimination.”
“If you’re a nonresident of the village,” said Mr. Minardi, “you’re all the same, whether you live in New York City or in the Town of East Hampton . . . but we’re going to try to roll this out a little bit smoother next year.”
“Next year, we’re going to not start selling the permits until 9 a.m., “ Mayor Larsen clarified. In addition, he said, there will be a number to call for assistance with the purchase.
The board members acknowledged that this was, ultimately, a good problem to have. “We’ve got the best beaches in the world, and they’re in high demand,” said Mr. Minardi.
Tiger Graham, a board member, wanted to highlight another potential problem with the online system. “How many people bought multiple permits?” he asked.
“I can get those numbers for you, Tiger, if you want,” said Mr. Baladron. “There’s not that many. I think the majority are people buying for both cars, or three cars, if they can.”
Without giving an exact number, he said multiple people had bought more than one parking pass. An email to Mr. Baladron asking for the exact number has yet to be returned.
Mr. Graham suggested limiting the number of passes a single person could buy at one time. “You can only purchase one permit, for a certain period of time. So, if somebody comes in and they want to buy five permits, because they have five cars, I mean, that’s nice. But that’s taking four permits away from other households.”
“We thought about that, too,” said Mr. Baladron. “People are just going to use different emails and different names, and do it that way. While we can block one user from buying it, the credit card won’t get blocked, so we’ll — we can get 10 different users with the same credit card. We can’t stop that.”
Mayor Larsen was quick to point out that going to the beach remains free. It’s parking that costs money. “The bottom line is that we want to sell them all,” he said.
The village once thought of setting up a tiered system so that town residents could pay less, the mayor recounted. “Then the real nonresidents would pay a higher fee. But we ran that by the attorney and that wasn’t acceptable.”
About 90 percent of permits are sold to people who own property in the town, he said. “There’s only so much we can do. Village residents really lock us at 3,100 [permits]; that’s in the law.”
“I think this is going to be an ongoing problem,” Mr. Larsen concluded.
In other permit news, village residents can start buying beach permits, either by mail or in person, on March 1. Meanwhile, nonresidents who missed out on the full-season permit can buy monthly permits online, for $300 a month, starting at 9 a.m. on May 1.
After May 15, daily nonresident beach parking permits will be available for Main Beach Lot 2 and Two Mile Hollow Beach, for $50.
