Government

East Hampton Town

Balasses House Rezoning Hearing

       The East Hampton Town Board will hold a public hearing next Thursday on a request by the owners of the former Balasses House antiques shop, a building on Main Street in Amagansett, to rezone the half-acre site from residential, with a limited-business overlay, to a central business zone.

       The change would allow the building, now housing an art gallery, to be put to a wider variety of possible commercial uses. The hearing will begin at 6:30 p.m. at Town Hall.

Tax Receiver on Medical Leave

       The East Hampton Town Trustees determined on Tuesday night to write an official letter to the East Hampton Village Zoning Board of Appeals concerning the Maidstone Club’s application to expand and modernize its irrigation system. At issue is the proposed project’s potential impact on Hook Pond.

       Today was the final day for public comment. The consensus among the trustees was that the application would be approved, a determination that is expected at the zoning board’s Feb. 14 meeting.

       The East Hampton Town Trustees commenced their first meeting of 2014 on Tuesday night with a swearing-in ceremony and the introduction of the board’s two new members.

       Carole Brennan, the town clerk, presided over the swearing in of the board, which now includes Brian Byrnes and Bill Taylor. John Courtney, the trustees’ attorney, then led a call for nominations for clerk and assistant clerk. The board nominated and unanimously voted for Diane McNally and Stephanie Forsberg to remain in their respective roles.

       The East Hampton Town Republican Committee has elected Reg Cornelia, a longtime committee member, as its vice chairman. He will join Tom Knobel, who the committee elected last month to a two-year term as chairman.

       Mr. Cornelia, who, like Mr. Knobel, works at the Suffolk County Board of Elections, is a member of the Springs Citizens Advisory Committee and is a former Springs School Board member.

East Hampton Town

Affordable Housing Committee

       An East Hampton Community Housing Opportunity Fund committee is to be formed, comprising seven residents who will discuss ideas for the establishment of affordable housing — an item on the new East Hampton Town Board’s agenda.

       With a new year and a primary concern — the proposed 555 Amagansett senior citizens housing development — seemingly behind them, members of the Amagansett Citizens Advisory Committee spent the first meeting of 2014 briefing their new liaison to the East Hampton Town Board, Supervisor Larry Cantwell.

       Mr. Cantwell, an Amagansett native, has succeeded Sylvia Overby, who moved to East Hampton’s citizens committee. With a lighter attendance than at the last several meetings, the committee’s chairman and members brought Mr. Cantwell up to date on their hopes and concerns.

       A shift in party control in East Hampton Town Hall and the new appointees that come with it can create unique circumstances for the town’s appointed boards to wrestle with, as the zoning board of appeals discovered on Tuesday night.

       Suffolk County Legislator Jay Schneiderman of Montauk received a plum assignment in this, his sixth and final term in office, when he was elected deputy presiding officer on Jan. 2. Legislator DuWayne Gregory, a Democrat from Amityville and the legislature’s majority leader, was elected presiding officer.

       Mr. Gregory is the first African-American to assume the legislature’s top leadership position. Mr. Schneiderman is the first representative from the East End to be named to a leadership role since 1986, when Gregory Blass of Jamesport was elected presiding officer.

       Len Bernard, the East Hampton Town budget officer, presented the new town board at its very first work session on Tuesday with an issue that must be resolved quickly.

       The 2014 budget, adopted in November, relies for operation of the Sanitation Department on an increase in fees for use of the recycling and garbage transfer centers, and, he said, about $300,000 has to be raised to make the budget balance.

A public hearing by the East Hampton Town Zoning Board of Appeals on an application from the new owner of the East Deck Motel at Ditch Plain in Montauk to bring about 300 dump trucks of sand to the site

It was standing room only at East Hampton Town Hall during swearing-in ceremonies for newly elected town officials last Thursday morning

       Tomorrow is the East Hampton Town deadline for payment of the first half of 2013-14 property taxes. The second half is due by May 31.

       Taxes may be paid at the office of the town tax receiver at 300 Pantigo Place in East Hampton or by phone or online using a credit card at officialpayments.com and the jurisdiction code 4216.

Suffolk’s 2014 living wage, which applies to all county contractors and subcontractors, as well as companies benefiting from tax subsidies, grants, and other county assistance, is $13.37 an hour. The hourly minimum wage for those who receive health benefits from their employer is $11.74.

      A site plan that would legalize expansions at two of Morgan Neff’s seven cottages on Fort Pond Bay in Montauk is among the applications scheduled for hearings at the East Hampton Town Planning Board’s first meeting of the year on Wednesday at 7 p.m.

       The East Hampton Village Board approved a plan on Friday to bring in sharpshooters to reduce the deer herd, over the objections of many members of the audience and the announcement by a New York City attorney that he had filed suit against the village, the town, and the town trustees in an effort to prevent the plan from going forward.

       Larry Cantwell, the East Hampton Town supervisor-elect, has announced that he will appoint three new members of the town attorney’s staff after taking office in the new year.

       Elizabeth Vail will replace John Jilnicki as town attorney. Mr. Jilnicki, a graduate of St. John’s University School of Law, has served for 20 years as both East Hampton town attorney and assistant town attorney. He will stay on as an assistant town attorney.

Members of one of East Hampton’s founding families made emotional pleas last week to the town board, seeking to have the zoning changed and agricultural protections removed on their 19 acres of farmland so that it could be subdivided into more house lots than currently allowed

       An application to split a 15-acre property on the west side of Town Lane in Amagansett into two lots will be the focus of a Jan. 8 public hearing before the East Hampton Town Planning Board. The owner, Randy Lerner, has agreed, in accordance with town code,that over half the land be held in reserve, never to be developed.

Opponents to the proposed 555 development plan in Amagansett received an early Christmas present on Dec. 11 when East Hampton Town Planning Board’s chairman, Reed Jones, announced that the application had been withdrawn

       A hearing on an application to install 12 AT&T antennas on the face of a 180,000-gallon oil tank at P.C. Schenck and Sons at 60 Newtown Lane drew alarm from neighboring property owners after a lengthy presentation at Friday’s meeting of the East Hampton Zoning Board of Appeals.

       The East Hampton Town Democratic Committee feted its own during a holiday party at the Palm restaurant in East Hampton on Friday, honoring retiring Justice Catherine A. Cahill for her 20 years of service to the town and saluting a number of committee members for their work on this year’s campaign.

       Among the crowd of 95 guests were Supervisor-elect Larry Cantwell, Councilwoman-elect Kathee Burke-Gonzalez, and Steven Tekulsky, who was elected to take Ms. Cahill’s place on the bench.

East Hampton Town

Hunting Deadline Tomorrow

    Applications to hunt deer on East Hampton Town lands are due in the town clerk’s office on Pantigo Road by 4 p.m. tomorrow. Permits for individual hunters will be awarded in a lottery-type drawing. The 2014 deer-hunting season will open on Jan. 6 and last for the month, excluding Saturdays and Sundays. Guidelines are available from the clerk’s office.

New York State

D.E.C. Website Blackout

       The Sag Harbor Village Zoning Board of Appeals, which has spent the better part of the past three years reviewing an application to expand the Harbor Heights gas station on Route 114, announced at a work session on Monday that it needs a little more time before making a decision.

       The East Hampton Town Republican Committee looked to a familiar face for its new leader when it elected Tom Knobel as its chairman on Dec. 11.

       Mr. Knobel, a former town councilman and trustee, was the committee’s vice chairman. He will replace Kurt Kappel, who stepped down after a two-year term. Mr. Knobel previously served eight years as the G.O.P. chairman before giving up the post in 2005.

       The committee will elect a vice chairman in the coming weeks, Mr. Knobel said.

Beginning next Thursday, the New York State website through which hunting and fishing licenses are bought and big-game and turkey kills recorded will be unavailable while the system is overhauled.

Joe Martens, the commissioner of the Department of Environmental Conservation, said in a release that the move is part of a statewide effort to consolidate licensing operations. The changeover is expected to last one to two weeks.

       If all goes according to plan, solar panels could be cropping up next year on a number of vacant parcels owned by East Hampton Town.

       On Tuesday, the town board, acting at the request of Councilman Dominick Stanzione, agreed to seek bids from solar contractors to lease as many as 14  town-owned parcels, from Wainscott to Montauk. Mr. Stanzione said the project was the first step toward realizing a far-reaching objective adopted last summer by the town’s energy sustainability advisory committee, to which he is the liaison.

       It will soon be harder for business owners to park their commercial vehicles overnight on the streets and in the driveways of residential neighborhoods.

       On Tuesday, the East Hampton Town Board agreed to adopt a resolution banning the parking of big work trucks and other heavy equipment from residential streets between the hours of midnight and 6 a.m.

Four East Hampton Town Board hearings next Thursday on requests for changes to the town zoning code are expected to draw a crowd. Petitions have been circulating against all of the proposals.

    Health insurance costs for East Hampton Town employees will rise next year under the New York State Health Insurance Program much less than town officials had feared, just 1.8 percent.

    East Hampton Town property tax bills for 2013-14 will be mailed tomorrow, with the first half  due on Jan. 10. The second half will be due by the end of May.

    Property owners who wish to pay their taxes before receiving the bill may do so by visiting the office of the town tax receiver at 300 Pantigo Place, or by calling that office. Payments may also be made by phone or online using a credit card.  The address is officialpayments.com and the phone number is 800-487-4567. Those doing so will be asked to enter a jurisdiction code, which is 4216.