Villages

A law that will require East Hampton Village residents to install low-nitrogen septic systems when conventional systems fail was passed by the village board at a meeting on Friday. The law will take effect in a few weeks, after being filed with New York's secretary of state.

With the price of housing on the South Fork exorbitant and affordable places to live sadly lacking, two grassroots organizations, Solidarity Sundays and East End Yimby, have joined together to take action. Their first order of business: busting the myths surrounding municipally managed and public-private housing partnerships, fears of which include more traffic, more crime, poor construction, negative environmental impact, higher taxes, and lower property values for neighbors.

A proposal that would permit two-bedroom accessory dwellings with kitchens on East Hampton Village properties of 40,000 square feet or more, for use by family, friends, or employees of the primary residents, received unanimous support at a village board meeting on Friday.

When Juliana Lester, a rising East Hampton High School senior, noticed that "a lot of the locals have been moving away and . . . our story is kind of slipping through our fingers," the 16-year-old decided to do her part to teach people about the village's history.

Sugar Loaf, a burial ground sacred to the Shinnecock Indian Nation, has been returned to the tribe. Late last month, the Shinnecock Nation Graves Protection Warrior Society announced that the 4.5-acre piece of land in Shinnecock Hills had been purchased for $5.6 million with the help of the Peconic Land Trust.

Rick Mosebach of Hicksville "didn't want to just walk in circles around my house," so he chose a destination, Montauk, and decided to get take his time covering the 90 miles on foot and learned a lot about the Island on the way.

After two months of nutrient-gobbling, the floating wetlands in Montauk's Fort Pond are healthy, if a little rattled by Tropical Storm Elsa earlier this month. The storm's strong winds flipped several of their corners and caused some of the 7,200 plants to fall from their plastic holders.

More than 16 months after the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic caused a surge in East End real estate sales, the boom is still going strong, but there are signs it is "entering a more stable, less reactive environment."

East Hampton Town has gotten a $5,600 grant from the Preservation League of New York State to fund a cultural resource survey of cemeteries. 

This photograph from the Amagansett Historical Association's Carleton Kelsey Collection shows Lodowick H. King (1844-1904), a native of Amagansett, seated for a portrait. He wears his Union Army Civil War uniform with his hat, which features his regiment number within a cross, set on a table next to him.

As the Delta variant of Covid-19 continues to spread in the United States, the Centers for Disease Control on Tuesday officially recommended that even people already vaccinated against Covid-19 once again wear masks in indoor public settings if they are in a region with "substantial" or "high" levels of community transmission.

After the Covid-19 pandemic halted the South Fork Commuter Connection — just as it was gaining significant momentum as a viable transportation option for local workers — state officials on Monday announced the service will return in the fall.