Villages

    In recent weeks the buzz around Montauk is that Gurney’s Inn has been sold. Ingrid Lemme, the inn’s marketing director and spokeswoman, denied this in a press release issued on March 25.

    “Gurney’s Inn has not been sold. Currently conversations are taking place between Gurney’s timeshare owners and a potential investor. At this point we are not at liberty to discuss those conversations. It is business as usual at Gurney’s. The hotel, seawater spa, and restaurant are waiting to welcome you,” the release said.

    Navy Seaman Recruit Cheryl D. Scarlato, a daughter of Diana A. Scarlato of this village, recently completed eight weeks of Navy basic training at Recruit Training Command in Great Lakes, Ill. Ms. Scarlato is a 1999 graduate of Pierson High School and a 2004 graduate of the University of Delaware.

    Her training included physical fitness, classroom study, and practical instruction on naval customs, first aid, firefighting, water safety and survival, and shipboard and aircraft safety.

The area in question is now a driveway that can be accessed from Division Street between Murf’s Backstreet Tavern and the village police headquarters.

An effort to resolve building permit issues and bring aspects of the Chabad House on Woods Lane into compliance with village code, brought representatives of the orthodox synagogue, and some unhappy neighbors, to the zoning board of appeals.

    For kids this weekend, the Easter basket runneth over, with holiday fun and egg hunts aplenty tomorrow, Saturday, and Sunday.

    The Easter Bunny will make a stop at Agawam Park in Southampton tomorrow at 10 a.m. for the Police Benevolent Association’s hunt. In case of rain, kids will assemble at the park on Saturday at the same time.

    Things really get hopping on Saturday. At 10 a.m. there are dueling Easter egg hunts, with the East Hampton Town Democratic Committee hosting one at Herrick Park on Newtown Lane and another at the Maidstone Gun Club in Wainscott.

Visitors can come for as long or as short as they like, but silence has been requested.

Frank Trentacoste, who was an equities strategist and director at Macro Risk Advisors and worked before that at two New York hedge funds, has established Bhumi Farm, an organic vegetable farm, on land he leased from the Peconic Land Trust.

    Some were wrapped in blankets and others in woolly hats and gloves, but the chilly weather on Sunday did nothing to keep an estimated crowd of some 25,000 to 30,000 people from attending the Montauk Friends of Erin’s 51st annual St. Patrick’s Day parade, with Jack Perna, the district superintendent of the Montauk School, leading the way as grand marshal.

    At an otherwise uneventful meeting of the East Hampton Village Board, a public hearing date on a proposed amendment to a local law concerning dogs on village beaches was set for April 19 at 11 a.m. at the Emergency Services Building.

    With Mayor Paul F. Rickenbach Jr., Larry Cantwell, the village administrator, and Richard Lawler, a trustee, all absent, Barbara Borsack, a trustee and the deputy mayor, presided.

    Since she first started seeing pediatric patients more than 30 years ago, Gail Schonfeld has bemoaned the dearth of mental health services for children and adolescents on the East End.

    With waiting lists stretching six months or more, not to mention the difficulty of transportation and the lack of clinicians who accept insurance, Dr. Schonfeld finally took matters into her own hands.

    Almost a year after Provisions Market’s application to expand first came before the Sag Harbor Village Planning Board, the market moved a step closer to its goal of taking over a neighboring space formerly occupied by Style Bar.

    The village zoning board of appeals approved an area variance that will allow Provisions to grow from 2,450 square feet to around 3,000 square feet. Some of the former spa’s square footage will be market space and some will be used for storage.

    Keri Ann Borowsky and Michael Peter DeLalio of Southampton have announced their engagement. A fall wedding is planned.

    Ms. Borowsky is a graduate of East Hampton High School and is a teacher at the John M. Marshall Elementary School in East Hampton. Mr. DeLalio, a Southampton High School graduate, is a personal trainer at Integrated Exercise Therapy in Bridgehampton.

    Ms. Borowsky is the daughter of Richard Byrne and Suzanne Byrne. Mr. DeLalio is the son of Gary DeLalio and Patricia Staker.

    Col. Frank Kestler and his wife, Chrystyna, the mother and stepfather of the late Lt. Joseph Theinert, a former resident of Sag Harbor and Shelter Island, are developing a property in the Magdalena Mountains of New Mexico that will become a rehabilitative ranch for veterans.

    The intent is that the facility will help veterans adapt to post-war injuries, both physical and otherwise. It is to be called Strongpoint Theinert in honor of their son, who was killed in action in Afghanistan in June of 2010.

    The East Hampton Village Zoning Board of Appeals is expected to approve a resolution next week allowing two affordable apartments to be built on the second-floor of a warehouse building on Lumber Lane.

    The waterfront building at 21 West Water Street in Sag Harbor, where construction has been at a standstill for almost four years, will become luxury condominiums with a rooftop pool by fall.

    After receiving site plan approval from the Sag Harbor Village Planning Board in 2006 and beginning construction not long after, the developer, East End Ventures, filed for bankruptcy. Now, the company is before the board again to modify its plans.

    “I don’t see that as much of a change,” said Jack Tagliasachi, a board member.

    The contentious issue of dogs on East Hampton Village beaches, and specifically their owners’ rights and responsibilities, will be among the issues addressed at the East Hampton Village Board work session today at 11 a.m.

    Though the village’s trustees have invited a small number of people, including Diane McNally, an East Hampton Town trustee, to informally participate, today’s work session is not intended as a forum for residents to share opinions or air grievances.

    The Montauk Citizens Advisory Committee on Monday heard from two members of East Hampton Town’s coastal erosion committee on Monday. The committee has announced recommendations for shoring up the Montauk business district, although they have not yet been submitted to the town board.

    Much like Punxsutawney Phil, the Am O’Gansett St. Patrick’s Day parade, which kicks off on Saturday at 12:01 p.m., is for many residents a sure sign of spring. The fifth annual parade, which its organizers boldly claim to be the world’s shortest, will proceed west from Mary’s Marvelous to the Mobil gas station before returning to its place of origin.

    Bill Jones, a former Sag Harbor Village trustee who is now a Suffolk County legislator, will speak about the village’s police union contract negotiations at a public forum on Saturday morning.

Mayor Brian Gilbride has proposed to disband the force and have police services provided by another entity, or to eliminate several full-time positions in the department. In a recent press release, Mr. Jones said the “system is rigged in favor of police unions.”

The discussion will take place from 10 to noon in the Pierson High School auditorium.

    James Maitland O’Donnell, the son of William and Diane O’Donnell of East Hampton, was married on Feb. 23 to Stephanie Miranda. The Rev. Damian O’Connell performed the ceremony at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City, and a reception followed at the Russian Tea Room.

    “At last we have had winter,” Richard G. Hendrickson, the United States Cooperative weather observer, wrote in his February report from Bridgehampton. “No record-breaking snowfall, no extra-thick ice on the ponds, never a squall of record-breaking wind speed, just nice winter weather.”

    But it’s not over yet, he reminded people late last week. “Often with March there is a large snowstorm, with northwest 50-mile-per-hour winds.” By the time the paper hits the newsstand that may already have come to pass . . . or not.

    Changes in the permitted catch of cod from the Georges Bank, the stock that the local charter and party boat fleet depends upon during the winter months, are to take effect on May 1, but whether local fishermen will feel a pinch, and if so, what form the changes will take — whether minimum size limits, daily bag limits, closed seasons, or closed areas — has not been decided.

    Regulations now require cod to be at least 22 inches long. Private boaters may keep 10 per day. There is no bag limit for anglers fishing from licensed party and charter boats.

    The Sag Harbor Village Zoning Board of Appeals listened with apparent empathy on Feb. 19 to  neighbors who voiced opposition to plans for a historic house on Garden Street that they said would change the character of the neighborhood and exacerbate flooding, as well as to Dennis Downes, the attorney for the applicant, William Egan. “The neighbors have had a good time stalling this for five years,” Mr. Downes said.

    For the first time, Amagansett has a chamber of commerce.

    Lee Satinsky, owner of the Computer Shop, is spearheading the effort to organize the hamlet’s businesses. Twelve members had joined as of Friday, and a board meeting to plot the chamber’s initial activities is scheduled for today.

    Kirby Marcantonio, the publisher of the free weeklies Montauk Life and Hamptons Life, made a pitch at an East Hampton Town Board meeting in Montauk on Feb. 12 for free outdoor movies in Montauk this summer. Suggesting that the Hank Zebrowski Memorial Field on Edgemere Road, a public park, be used and that local organizations could sell refreshments to raise funds, he received a favorable response.

    A multicultural festival will celebrate diversity and the Sag Harbor community tomorrow night with an abundance of free homemade food, music, drumming, dance, and games.

    Building upon the success of last year’s event, Pierson High School will be filled with tastes of 28 countries from 5:30 to 9 p.m., with new contributions expected from El Salvador, Hungary, the Netherlands, and Sweden, according to Cheryl Bedini, an organizer.

    The Montauk Lake Club and Marina on East Lake Drive in Montauk and the club’s contractor, Seacoast Marine Construction of Sayville, have been fined $50,000 by the State Department of Environmental Conservation for exceeding the permitted limits of the dredging project earlier this year.

    The club and marina are owned and operated by a holding corporation called Star Development Realty. The D.E.C. permit for the project, issued in October 2011, allowed the boat basin there to be dredged to a depth of six feet and approximately 4,000 cubic yards of material to be removed.

    A free two-day holistic healing clinic organized by the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of the South Fork will take place this weekend, starting tomorrow from 4 to 6 p.m.

    On Saturday, between the hours of 9 a.m. and 1 p.m., various healing practitioners will offer their services free of charge on a first-come, first-served basis.

    Sag Harbor’s mayor, Brian Gilbride, and the village trustees Edward Gregory and Kevin Duchemin discussed a dilemma over repairs to the floating docks off Long Wharf that were damaged during Hurricane Sandy and the storm that followed.

    With time of the essence as the boating season approaches, Mayor Gilbride wondered at a special meeting on Friday if the village board should “bite the bullet” and accept the one bid received, in the amount of $201,000 from Keith Grimes, or readvertise in hopes of getting a lower bid.

    Richard Schneider, an East Hampton Village Police Department lieutenant and 35-year veteran of the force, has retired. The village board accepted his resignation on Friday, his last day on the job. The board also authorized a payment of $129,229.04 for accrued time.

    “Rich, we wish you the very best for whatever the future holds for you and your family,” Mayor Paul F. Rickenbach Jr. said. “Good health and longevity.” The lieutenant told the board that he was retiring with mixed emotions. “The Police Department is my family,” he said.