Even as the East Hampton Town Board approved a resolution on Tuesday to retain the services of H2M Architects and Engineers — its go-to firm in the ongoing Montauk sewage treatment plant saga — Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr. was throwing a wet blanket on the town’s proposal to repurpose 14 wooded acres of county parkland in Hither Woods for a wastewater treatment facility.
The proposal has drawn intense pushback, and last week Mr. Thiele added his voice in a response to a Feb. 6 letter from Michael Potter of the Southampton Trails Preservation Society to Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc. (Mr. Thiele was cc’d on the letter.)
Mr. Potter’s letter said that the sewage plant plan “is a band-aid to partially fix a problem of overdevelopment,” and “encourages the same commercial and residential development which will add to the very problems Montauk is trying to fix.”
“When the town, the county and the state purchased Hither Woods,” Mr. Potter added, “they committed to taxpayers to protect it forever.”
In response, Mr. Thiele wrote to Mr. Potter and said that he and State Senator Anthony Palumbo were “united regarding this matter,” and that they would “take no action regarding sponsorship of park alienation legislation” until the town has undertaken a full state environmental quality review act analysis.
Mr. Thiele added that “all reasonable alternatives must be considered in a full public and transparent manner.” After a full SEQRA record has been developed, he said, “we can all determine the best course of action.”
In other news related to the proposed sewage treatment plant, a phone meeting between the town supervisor and staff, representatives from H2M, and county park commissioners was reportedly in the offing for Tuesday morning.
“Yes, there is a call scheduled at the request of one of the commissioners,” said Joanne Pilgrim, executive assistant to Mr. Van Scoyoc, via email Monday morning. Activists opposed to a Hither Woods plant have called out the town for its lack of transparency and public engagement on the controversial sewage-plant proposal and pointed to that meeting as another example of their assertion.
The resolution passed on Tuesday authorizes the town to pay H2M up to $30,000 for “additional engineering and planning analyses associated with the evaluation of wastewater treatment alternatives that were not included in the original scope of the work.”
Mr. Van Scoyoc, who did not attend the Amagansett Citizens Advisory Committee meeting on Monday night or the board’s Tuesday work session meeting, did reference the sewage plant proposal at the board’s Feb. 7 work session following a meeting with the Montauk Wastewater Committee. “The public is not really aware of the work that’s been done to date,” he said, suggesting that a full reset was in order, in light of a growing chorus of opposition.
“Given the initial response of the public, the committee felt it was really important that we get out a lot more detailed information to address questions and concerns that have been raised by the public.”
“I think we have to get back to basics,” Mr. Van Scoyoc added, “even with the basic question of: Is there a need for centralized treatment; can this be done decentralized; is there even a need for treatment at all?”
That last question has been repeatedly raised by opponents of the plant.
Moving forward, Mr. Van Scoyoc called for a “fair and factual” discussion on the town’s proposal.
