Letters to the Editor: 04.28.16

Dumping on Doorstep

Sag Harbor

April 24, 2016

Dear David:

“Chapeau” to Larry Cantwell for being the town politician most responsive to managing dumping on Town Line Road. 

While it continues to be an ongoing problem, Larry has organized cleanup of the area within days of being notified of new dumping activity. Prior administrations took months, even years, to determine which department was responsible for removing damage, debris, and detritus. We are grateful to him for spearheading the frequent cleanups. 

Now we look forward to working with him, his team, and his colleagues in Southampton Town to develop a long-term solution to dumping on our very doorstep, in our beautiful woods, over our precious aquifer. 

SINEAD FITZGIBBON

Thanks, Earth Soldiers

East Hampton

April 25, 2016

Dear David,

 I just wanted to express my sincere thanks to all the wonderful groups and volunteers who came out to help in the third annual Shoreline Sweep and the Great Montauk Cleanup. 

I’m going to keep this nice and short, because it isn’t possible to express my thanks in words, nor could I thank each person individually without fear of missing just one person. Together we did something incredibly amazing, incredibly necessary, and incredibly beneficial to the place we call home. You all helped our community, each other, and even our beautiful wildlife and marine life. 

The beaches are at their most beautiful now, and the attention to the trash and litter issue spreads wider and wider, reaching more and more folks each year. I pray for continued positive momentum through education and awareness. Please, folks, we live in paradise — let us treat it that way and insist that others do the same. 

Thanks to all Hamptons earth soldiers. Mother Nature is certainly pleased. Please stay updated for cleanups throughout the spring and summer seasons at Facebook page Imagination Nature.

DELL CULLUM

‘Marriage Counselor’

Southampton

April 20, 2016

Dear Editor:

Thanks for printing the short story “The Marriage Counselor,” by Lona Rubenstein. I enjoyed it and found it to be clever and witty; I felt as though I was sitting in the counseling session with them. Lona can certainly paint pictures with her words.

JOAN FITZGERALD

It Rivaled Broadway

Springs

April 24, 2016

To the Editor:

Last week our friends invited us to join them at East Hampton High School to see their grandchildren sing and dance. Since we have always been happy to see our own grandchildren’s dance shows, we were eager to attend. What we saw was nothing like what we expected.

It was a pleasant surprise to see a fantastic presentation called “Best of Broadway” performed by members of the East End Young Arts Initiative (EEYA). The cast of this production, made up of students from grammar through high school, performed scenes from five popular Broadway plays. Each one of the 63 performers was exceptional and some of them could step right into the roles depicted in the different plays immediately. 

One person sitting near me said, “I just saw that play on Broadway, and this group did a better job than what I saw.” The singing, dancing, and acting talent I saw last week was very professional. It rivaled Broadway.

However, EEYA is more than talent. It is a group of very generous “volunteers who support the performing arts for young people in our community on the East End.” They “seek to enhance the quality and availability of student theatre and music within the East Hampton School District in creative ways.” The group consists of the young teacher who produced and choreographed the show, the student performers, the person who built the wonderful set, the people who sold the tickets and organized a Chinese auction, those who donated generous gifts to the cause, and all who support with time or money.

EEYA has granted scholarships and sponsored workshops by distinguished professionals. “Best of Broadway” was their third and biggest production. It was my first opportunity to view the work of this outstanding group. I am looking forward to experiencing their next spectacular production, and I think you should too.

AGNES HARRIS

Keep Your Pets Safe

East Hampton

April 24, 2016

To the Editor:

It’s the beginning of “the season.” More cars and taxis are on the roads and more construction and landscaper and delivery trucks are on the roads. More senseless people are texting and talking on their cellphones while driving. More folks are jogging, walking, and bicycling on the roads. More deer and raccoons and flocks of turkeys are crossing the roads. Vehicle accidents can happen too easily. 

And more dogs are loose wandering on the roads. 

Please, please, please, keep your pets safe. Keep your house fences and gates secure. Keep your unscreened windows and doors closed enough that your pooches cannot sneak out. Please, please, please put good collars and up-to-date identity tags with a local phone number with area code, the dog’s name, and your name attached to, or embroidered on, the collar. Get your furbaby microchipped and register it with an agency. Keep a good photo of your doggie on your phone.

Dogs jump over things, dig under things, break through things — they can be clever escape artists. We know that. It happens. If you’re on Facebook, join the groups East Hampton Pets, Bonac Pets, and Lost and Found Pets of East Hampton. If your precious pooch is lost, or you find one, call Animal Control (324-0085) after you’ve searched your neighborhood, and post on those Facebook pages with the dog’s photo (and dog’s name, if yours), where the dog was found or lost, and your best contact number. 

Let’s try to avoid broken hearts this season, and all year round, from wandering pets being injured or killed on our roads. 

TRINA SULLIVAN

Rental Registry Law

Springs

April 21, 2016

Dear Editor:

East Hampton’s new rental registry law forbids more than four unrelated people to rent my house (even if I have a 10-bedroom house, which I do not). I had to turn away a woman from New Jersey and her five women friends without even being allowed to vet them first (checking age, verifying employment, and calling two references each for all six women) to make sure my house would be well taken care of and that the East Hampton Town Board’s worst fear would not be realized — vomiting and urinating in the streets of Montauk. 

The town board knows that only 1 percent of the homes rented in East Hampton are problem homes. Yet, this ill-conceived and force-fed law (that was roundly rejected by a huge turnout of residents at a town meeting at the American Legion and on stoptherentalregistry.com last winter) was passed. 

So far, more than 1,100 rental registry applications have been received by the town. That’s over $100,000 in additional taxes, er, fees, levied against homeowners. Sounds great for the town coffers, and I am sure the town board is applauding itself for this “found” revenue, but they’ve got some explaining to do to their neighbors who will not be hired and will lose thousands of dollars if homes don’t rent. Because of the uncertainty in the rental market, my cleaning ladies, landscaper, and garbage man are not yet scheduled, and will not be if I am unable to rent my entire house, and must stay home all summer and try to rent two bedrooms (four people) to different people every weekend via Airbnb.

The town board will say that the season has just begun and I should not worry. However, I am worried. The people who help me maintain my house are worried. My phone is not ringing. Right now the rental registry law has cost me $4,800 in lost income and $100 in fees. 

LYNNE W. SCANLON

Way Too Much Money

Springs

April 24, 2016

Dear David,

Last week’s front-page article leads with a quote from the Springs School superintendent that is at best totally misleading and at worst a calculated cover-up.

Heads up, Springs taxpayers! Did you know that the Springs School Board has taxed you almost $2,100 a day of your hard-earned money to pay this superintendent’s salary? Catch this. For over $200,000 a year of your money, he only has to work 94 days out of the year! He has 84 days off. His salary of $2,200 a day with 16 weeks off and almost $300 dollars an hour of your money is unacceptable.

That is just not fair to our heavily taxed property owners in Springs with the fastest growing school population in East Hampton. What was the school board thinking?

Then Superintendent Finello has the audacity to tell our Springs taxpayers that he and the school board have “cut the budget to the bone.” If his Huntington mentality thinks that $2,100 a day salary is cut to the bone, then Bonac has a “bone” to pick with him. Our taxpayers are not a bunch of hicks. They are hard workers and seniors who live on small lots, with no broad tax base, and pay a tax rate that is six times more than our neighboring hamlets.

In his non-negotiated contract, he was given such a good deal from our present school board that he told his former UpIsland co-administrator to zip out here to take advantage of the Springs School Board’s unbelievably generous salary. The board offered his buddy $750 a day!

When questioned by me as to why this administrator was offered the highest salary of any other administrator in our nearby districts, without any other interviews by a committee of parents, community members, and staff, the board president, Liz Mendelman, told me there was not enough time because there were so many applicants. Not enough time!

Tell our hard-working residents who work two jobs six days a week about time! 

There is some good news. In four weeks, two positions open up on the five-member elected school board. One current board member actually wants you to elect him again to another three-year term! His name is Adam Wilson. His lack of financial understanding of the challenges for our Springs taxpayers should not be rewarded. It is time to send this out-of-touch school board a message.

Luckily, there are two other candidates who will be running to offer the community a choice. Amy Rivera and Tim Conlon both feel that so many highly paid administrators in just a one-building K-8 school are making way too much money for our community ofworking people and retired seniors to support.

I personally will vote for this budget, because the current school board’s sloppy disdain for our taxpayers’ ability to support these highly paid administrators should not be taken out on our students. As a former teacher at the school, I know the staff and students are terrific and work to the highest standards under very challenging conditions. Their programs should be supported.

However, Adam Wilson, the school board member running for re-election, and the board president, Liz Mendelman, should not be returned to their positions. Enough is enough!

DEBRA FOSTER

 The Middle East

East Hampton

April 24, 2016

To the Editor:

Nothing lays bare the deficiencies of our foreign policy more than our relationship to the Middle East. If one read Obama’s foreign policy interview (should be required reading for everyone) in The Atlantic, there is little question that all the weeks and months of rumination have provided little insight and courses of action into this unstable cauldron.

Except for the War on Drugs we have rarely sustained a policy as cluelessly and pointlessly as our Middle East policy. Over 70 years of abject failure in every endeavor, we tried to bring some form of democracy to the region. (When Hillary Clinton talks about the work she’s done in the region, she is really tooting the horn of ineptitude.) From the disaster in Iran in the early ’50s to Syria, Iraq, and Libya today, we have a perfect record. We are batting zero.

The narrative for the U.S. was similar to our narratives with Latin America and Asia. These regions provided natural resources and cheap labor for U.S. industries and in exchange we provided protection for the ruling classes. The problem for the U.S. arose when we strayed from seeing the Middle East as a source of petroleum and began interfering in ways related to democratic principles. The conflicting duality made it impossible to protect dictators and monarchs (who were important suppliers to our economy) as well as the interests of the massive investments of U.S. companies, and advocate for democratic governance. Oil certainly trumped democracy — until it didn’t.

When the Arab Spring began, everyone looked toward the U.S. for support and guidance, but we were still stuck in the oil-first mentality and provided sparing and uncertain support. What we had mostly given to the Middle Eastern states was arms and more arms, and we were reluctant to provide arms for insurgents who we didn’t really know. In truth, we were unprepared for the entire process, and instead of taking advantage of positive regime changes in Egypt, Syria, and Libya, we lagged behind and sucked our thumbs.

After the total screwup in Iraq it was difficult to be aggressive, given our penchant for mess-making. Unintended consequences is our fallback position. Or, more correctly put, living with one’s head up one’s butt.

Widespread instability, Al Qaeda, Isis, refugees, and hundreds of thousands of deaths are the byproduct of our unintended consequences. We’ve figured out after 15 years in Afghanistan and 12 in Iraq that we don’t really know what to do. Even Obama, who is not inflicted with the great white American gene and Trump-like buffoonery, has no idea what to do. Imagine if Bush and Cheney were in power today. 

Moving forward, we will need to develop a new set of policies for the region. Each country has its own special issues that can’t be grouped together. In Egypt, the army controls the economy. Iraq has a government that can’t work by design. Iran has religious madness within and without. Saudi Arabia is almost a slave state. Israel is the only real ally and is threatened by its own religious lunacy. And, while our dependency on oil from the region has significantly diminished, Europe’s has not. No one knows what the long term will bring and we are still tethered to that nipple.

How we move forward begins with the acceptance of our cluelessness and a realistic assessment of what we want to accomplish. Drones killing indiscriminately, no matter how successful, make everyone, allies and enemies, fearful and distrustful of our intentions. We need to step back before we can move forward. Take it out of the hands of our military and the neocons. Think creatively, and try to understand that we are not the only people who exist in the world.

NEIL HAUSIG

Money and Power

Sag Harbor

April 25, 2016

To the Editor:

Some might call me a fool for still supporting Senator Bernie Sanders, because he may not win. Maybe we need to redefine failures and take a close look a winners. I’ve been a committed person all my life (now the great-grandfather of 12 children).

Most of the time, politics and religion join together. A few weeks ago even Sanders was invited to the Vatican, and in fact met the pope. There are a few things they share in common. On the other hand, the actor George Clooney had a big party to raise money for alleged president Hillary Clinton; in order to attend you had to pay $360,000 a couple. As you know, Clooney, a loony, got married recently. I apologize to all the women who love Clooney, but there are millions of young people and middle-aged people who love Sanders. In an interview Clooney said he also loved Sanders, “but.” That often-used “but” may be the problem that hurt Sanders the most. Seems like some would die for a party label. Money and power don’t mix. 

I’m a “Christian Catholic,” a term the pope used while in this country. That comes close to my faith, not being an institutional Catholic. Having said that, I would leave you with a more current-day Christian who touched me.

“Jesus is not there in order to stress once again in his own person the unified violence of the sacred; he is not there to ordain and govern like Moses; he is not there to unite people around him, to forge its unity in the crucible of rites and prohibitions, but on the contrary, to turn this long page of human history once and for all.” — Rene Girard, poet

Jesus’ cultural importance did not come from being a victim, but from being the victim. How many others? Forgive me — this may be a reach — but how many times have we heard Senator Sanders say, “This is not about me, it’s about you”?

The next generation will inherit the outcome. Can we hear their cry and ask why? More of the same? No, no.

For those without hope, this craziness we are experiencing could be the beginning of the process, not the end. No matter. What kind of a legacy are we leaving our children?

In peace and hope, 

LARRY DARCEY