Government

No matter who emerges the winner when the Suffolk County Board of Elections releases its unofficial vote count on Tuesday night, East Hampton Town will have a new supervisor and she will be a woman. Councilwoman Kathee Burke-Gonzalez, who is the deputy supervisor, is running on the Democratic and Working Families Party lines to succeed Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc, who announced earlier this year that he would retire from town government. She faces Gretta Leon, the Republican and Conservative Party nominee and a political newcomer.

The Atlantic Ocean and the sky above it were dull shades of gray as a steady drizzle fell on Monday morning, but with nary a utility pole or wire in sight, spirits were bright among the dignitaries gathered to mark the completion of a project to bury utility lines and remove utility poles at the entrance to Montauk’s downtown.

With Southampton Town Supervisor Jay Schneiderman facing a term limit this year, two current trustees seeking a seat on the town board, and newcomers stepping up to challenge incumbents in multiple roles, Election Day in Southampton is shaping up to be a competitive one.

One incumbent and three newcomers are seeking two spots on the East Hampton Town Board. Councilman David Lys, running on the Democratic and Working Families Party lines, is joined on those ballot lines by Tom Flight, who is a first-time candidate. Opposing them are two other first-time candidates: Scott Smith and Michael Wootton on the Republican and Conservative Party lines.

The League of Women Voters of the Hamptons, Shelter Island, and the North Fork has announced that the League of Women Voters Education Fund’s online voters guide is live at vote411.org with nonpartisan information on Tuesday’s election.

New York State Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie, accompanied by Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr., last week announced a $1.75 million state award for the Montauk Playhouse Community Center, where ground was broken last summer for its new aquatic center.

In August, when Adam Potter submitted updated plans for a mixed-use development at Bridge and Rose Streets in Sag Harbor, he said he was committed to taking it through the village’s review boards. Last week, however, he filed yet another plan, which removes a significant component of the August submission: the performing arts center with office space.

The owner of a Springs property wants to demolish his 1,600-square-foot cottage, built before zoning laws were established in 1957, and build a 2,160-square-foot house with a terrace, covered porch, and new sanitary system. Besides the requested special permit, five variances are needed.

For those who find a sample ballot useful before they head to the polls, here is what the front and back of the ballot looks like in East Hampton Town. 

East Hampton Town Hall's meeting room was standing room only on Thursday afternoon, and despite intense community pressure that nearly brought the chairwoman of the town's architectural review board to tears, the board voted 3-to-1 to deny an application by Rowdy Hall to paint the façade of its new location on Amagansett's Main Street black.

Councilwoman Kathee Burke-Gonzalez, the Democratic and Working Families Party candidate, and a sitting town councilwoman, is facing Gretta Leon, the Republican and Conservative Party candidate and a newcomer to town politics, in the 2023 race for the East Hampton Town supervisor's seat.

Suffolk County officials have delayed a plan to introduce an on-demand bus service zone to replace two East Hampton-area buses, the 10B and 10C, because of a manufacturer’s recall of the buses themselves.

Elected officials, utility contractors, and other interested parties will gather to celebrate the completion of a project to bury utility lines and remove utility poles at the “Montauk Gateway,” in front of 589 Montauk Highway, on Monday at 10 a.m. The public has been invited to attend.

This winter, the East Hampton Village Department of Public Works plans to shift hedgerows and remove a chain-link fence that separates a parcel at 8 Muchmore Lane from the neighboring Herrick Park. When the work is complete, village officials said, it will have the effect of making the park appear larger, as the lot has been hidden from view and inaccessible.

Seven of the nine incumbent East Hampton Town Trustees, six of them Democrats and one a Republican with Democratic cross-endorsement, are seeking re-election on Nov. 7. Altogether, there are 12 people running for the nine seats, including three Republican challengers, one Democrat, and one other cross-endorsed candidate.

The four candidates vying for two seats on the East Hampton Town Board agreed on some issues and differed on others in an Oct. 18 debate hosted by the League of Women Voters of the Hamptons, Shelter Island, and North Fork.

The East Hampton Town Trustees heard recommendations from a subcommittee Monday confirming their understanding that there are noncompliant structures in trustee waters that will have to be brought into compliance or removed, and that in some instances previously issued permits could be revoked.

Experts say food waste typically accounts for around 30 percent of a garbage truck’s load. That's changing in East Hampton Town, where some 2,782 pounds of food scraps were diverted from landfills or incinerators, eliminating the equivalent of 1,310 pounds of coal burned or 3,025 miles driven, through a pilot composting program launched over the summer.

East Hampton Town’s new senior citizens center “really is shaping up to be something we can all be proud of,” Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc said at the conclusion of a presentation by its project team on Tuesday.

The hamlet's historic district guidelines, which were drawn up in 2000, was one topic of discussion at Monday's meeting of the Amagansett Citizens Advisory Committee. The Reform Club, an event and wellness venue on Windmill Lane, was another.

Wastewater management, renewable energy, housing, traffic, and migrants were among the topics addressed in Monday’s debate between candidates for the Suffolk County Legislature’s Second District, hosted by the League of Women Voters of the Hamptons, Shelter Island, and the North Fork. Manny Vilar of Springs, the chairman of the East Hampton Town Republican Committee and a retired state parks police officer, is the Republican candidate. His Democratic opponent is Ann Welker, a Southampton Town trustee.

The East Hampton Town Justice race to replace Lisa R. Rana, who, after 20 years on the bench, is retiring, pits David Filer, running as a Democrat, against Brian Lester on the Republican ticket. Both men are fathers, both boast of family ties tracing back to East Hampton’s earliest settlers, and both have had long careers in the law.

In the race for Suffolk County executive, voters will choose between an experienced politician, Ed Romaine, a Republican and the current Brookhaven Town supervisor, and a newcomer to politics, Dave Calone, an entrepreneur and former prosecutor who is a Democrat. Steve Bellone, a Democrat who has served as county executive since 2012, is term-limited and could not run for re-election.

“Oysters do a fantastic job of filtering our water,” Bob Tymann of South Fork Sea Farmers explained to the Sag Harbor Village Board last week while displaying a slide showing algae, nitrogen, and other contaminants entering an oyster and coming out clean. The bivalves are like mini wastewater treatment plants, each adult filters 50 gallons a day. 

The extension of the residential dock moratorium, first enacted in 2021 and now effective through Dec. 31, will “give the public a chance to weigh in on the points that we’re bringing up,” said John Aldred, an East Hampton Town trustee, during Friday's meeting.

A traffic roundabout at the intersection of Stephen Hand’s Path, Long Lane, and Two Holes of Water Road in East Hampton could see “substantial completion” by summer, a consultant told the board on Tuesday.

A wintertime pipe burst at the Springs General Store, which has been shuttered for a year, spurred changes to plans to redevelop and reopen the store. Its owners have obtained liquor licenses for on and off-premise consumption, which seemed to pique the anxieties of the East Hampton Town Planning Board last week.

Nancy Goroff, the Democratic Party’s 2020 nominee to represent New York’s First Congressional District, has announced a second bid for the party’s nomination, three years after losing the election to then-Representative Lee Zeldin.

This month will see candidates debates for East Hampton Town and Southampton Town supervisor and board, and for the Suffolk County Legislature’s Second District, hosted by the League of Women Voters of the Hamptons, Shelter Island, and the North Fork.

“Today, we are topping the building with a final piece of steel," Dr. Fredric Weinbaum, Stony Brook Southampton Hospital’s chief medical officer and chief operating officer, told the East Hampton Town Board on Tuesday. Completing the 23,000-square-foot structure itself is one hurdle and staffing it will be another, he said, but the freestanding emergency room under construction could be open this winter.