Government

With the Republican Party winning the White House and both houses of Congress, local immigration attorneys and the nonprofit OLA of Eastern Long Island are preparing for major changes to immigration policy.

The town board tackled a quirky piece of legislation at last week’s work session, involving the temporary storage of prefabricated homes. The problem arises when trucks arrive with their oversize loads. They often sit idling, sometimes for hours, while they wait for a local builder to arrive to pick up the goods.

Construction work at a long-controversial nightclub on Three Mile Harbor Road was set to begin three months ago, at which point it became strikingly apparent that the building had no basement at all, as had been assumed during the planning process. Rather than being retained, it would have to be built. This created an issue: Is excavating a new basement an expansion of a nonconforming building?

A bill that would designate Plum Island as a national monument has been passed by the House Natural Resources Committee, paving the way for a congressional vote.

The westernmost grass field at the Stephen Hand’s Path Recreational Facility will be converted to a multiuse artificial turf field in January, with work to be completed possibly by Memorial Day, depending on weather. Councilman David Lys and Matt Jedlicka, an engineer at L.K. McLean Associates, gave a presentation on the project to the town board at a meeting on Tuesday.

Design work has yet to begin on a new lighting plan for downtown Amagansett, where large trees line Main Street and sometimes block light, but the East Hampton Town Board appeared happy Tuesday with a preliminary study by L.K. McLean Associates, the project engineers.

The East Hampton Town Board formally decided Tuesday that a proposed senior citizens center on a seven-acre parcel at 403 Abraham’s Path in Amagansett would have little environmental impact and did not need a lengthy environmental review.

With a large inflatable rat in tow, a group from the Laborers Local 66 union has been stationed this week outside the Montauk Playhouse Community Center, where new aquatic and cultural centers are under construction, with signs calling out the architects and general contractors on the project.

The restaurant Page at 63 Main Street on Tuesday presented the latest iteration of its expansion plan before the Sag Harbor Zoning Board of Appeals meeting. The restaurant’s management hopes to expand up to the second floor of the building, netting an extra 41 seats, bringing the total number of seats to 165 — a proposal that would see the second-floor zoning classification changed from residential use to commercial use.

Debate over the addition of an area for small dogs at the Springs Park continued this week as the park committee met to discuss recommended changes that also include removal of invasive species.

The East Hampton Town Board dropped a surprise into another lengthy discussion of proposed zoning code amendments in the wake of a well-attended public hearing on Nov. 7. The board agreed on most amendments as written; however, in a straw poll, four members voted against a measure that would include a portion of basements in the gross floor calculation of residences.

Piggybacking on a law passed in the spring, the East Hampton Village Board passed another on Friday prohibiting nightclubs, “or similar entertainment establishments,” in the historic preservation district. In so doing, the board updated the village’s zoning code to place nightclubs alongside “garbage disposal plants and junkyards” as the only specific business enterprises outlawed anywhere in the village.

East Hampton Town is urging Montauk residents facing difficulties obtaining medicines in the wake of the closing of White's Drug and Department Store to take advantage of its Senior Shopping Assistance Program. Through the town program, people 60 and up can have town employees from the Human Services Department pick up prescriptions from pharmacies and deliver them to their houses.

Part of a Further Lane house that an anonymous donor gifted to Project Most to be used in a hub for its children's programs on Three Mile Harbor Road in East Hampton has been demolished and discarded, having been exposed to weather conditions that allowed it to deteriorate. 

East Hampton has over 300 miles of roads, and his officers write about 5,000 traffic summonses a year, Town Police Chief Michael Sarlo told the town board this week as he once again urged its members to ask permission from New York State to lower speed limits in several places. “The enforcement is there, to the extent it can be without having officers sit on your road all day,” he said.

After a contentious two and a half years for the shuttered Springs General Store, an applicaiton to renovate the 1844 building and convert a storage shed into a small retail wine shop was finally deemed complete and will get an East Hampton Town Planning Board hearing on Dec. 4.

A little over a week out from a decisive national election, both the Democratic and Republican Parties are examining what the results say about where the country stands. Looking over the preliminary data from the New York State and Suffolk County Boards of Elections, as well as the archived data from past elections, one can see how Suffolk County has changed and what trends have emerged.

Work on a boardwalk to connect Windmill Beach and the John Steinbeck Waterfront Park in Sag Harbor has begun, and one clear sign of that was the removal last week of a large but invasive tree in its path.

Paid parking, a sore subject for many in Sag Harbor, was again on the table at a village board board meeting. Aidan Corish, a board member, reported that “the total paid parking take for the month of October was $4,332,” and proposed that October be removed from the paid-parking season. “The aggravation that it caused, versus the minimal income that it provided, doesn’t seem to be worth it,” he said.

Still unhappy with the pace at which new accessory dwelling units are being built in East Hampton Town, a committee charged with keeping tabs on them made four recommendations to the town board Tuesday that it hopes will spur some construction action.

Proposed changes to the East Hampton Town Zoning Code, which, among other things, would slash the allowable maximum house size from 20,000 to 10,000 square feet and require portions of basements and attached garages to be counted toward a structure’s gross floor area, were aired at a well-attended, nearly three-hour hearing.

Even with recently updated guidance from the federal Fish and Wildlife Service on the endangered northern long-eared bat, no change to the construction protocol for the East Hampton Town Senior Citizens Center is necessary, the town's acting planning director told the town board this week.

“In 1910, New York State Judge Blackmar ruled that the Montaukett Tribe no longer existed, yet the Montauketts remain resilient and continue to seek rightful recognition,” read the proclamation that East Hampton Town Supervisor Kathee Burke-Gonzalez offered to Chief Robert Pharaoh and Sandi Brewster-walker.

President-elect Donald Trump has named former First Congressional District Representative Lee Zeldin as his choice to head the Environmental Protection Agency, saying he "will ensure fair and swift deregulatory decisions that will be enacted in a way to unleash the power of American businesses, while at the same time maintaining the highest environmental standards, including the cleanest air and water on the planet."

Even though the East Hampton Town attorney said last month that the town could not entertain other offers on the 97-acre Wainscott property leased by the Maidstone Gun Club, a new suitor emerged on Saturday, this one with a proposal to develop a portion of the lot into privately owned affordable housing.

Both Proposition 1, the statewide Equal Rights Amendment, and Proposition 2, a small Suffolk County sales-tax increase to support the phasing out of pollution-producing cesspools, gained enough voter support to pass on Tuesday.

In a rare unanimous decision, the architectural review board has denied an application to build a 7,374-square-foot residence at 84 Wainscott Hollow Road in Wainscott. Renderings of the proposed nine-bedroom, 12-bathroom house have been on Zillow even ahead of the A.R.B. meetings, with a suggested value of over $23 million.

Incumbent Representative Nick LaLota, a Republican, easily defeated his Democratic challenger, John Avlon, to be re-elected for a second term in what many believed would be a close race. As it turned out, it was not: Mr. LaLota grabbed 55.7 percent of the vote in the First Congressional District, while Mr. Avlon got 44.2 percent.

In East Hampton Town, Councilman Ian Calder-Piedmonte won a special election to serve another year on the town board, and voters overwhelmingly approved a proposition that will allow the town to remove the property sometimes called the Sherrill Triangle from its list of nature preserves so that it can be used for future road improvements.

The last time East Hampton Village updated its comprehensive plan was in 2002. While a lot has changed, as they say, much has stayed the same, including many of the issues identified in the 2002 plan — traffic, teardowns, and loss of businesses that served the local population. On Dec. 6, the village will begin the process of engaging with the community about an updated vision for the future and how to get there.