East Hampton Town Board Work Session - 08/19/25

001East Hampton Town Board, we are live. Thank you, LTV. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the East Hampton Town Board work session of Tuesday, August 19th, 2025. Carol, if you could please read the roll call. >> Council member Fle, >> present. >> Council member Lee, >> present. >> Council member Rogers, >> present. >> Council member Cedmont, >> present. Supervisor >> present. If we could all stand for the pledge of allegiance. >> I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. [Applause] >> Okay. So today we we uh start with public portion. We ask you to kindly keep your comments to three minutes and then we move into topics. We're going to be discussing

002bids. We're going to hear a project most update as well as a Phoenix house update and then a a grants update for 2025 followed by a discussion of the affordable multiple regist residence legislation. Then we'll go into liaison reports and resolutions. But before we start public comment, I just wanted to to read a statement. Uh, I want to update everyone on the steps the town of East Hampton is taking as Hurricane Eric passes off Aaron passes offshore. While the storm itself is forecast to remain several hundred miles from us, we will still feel its effects here, particularly in the ocean, the most significant impacts are expected Thursday and Friday with dangerous surf, rip currents, and the potential for dune erosion in some areas. Yesterday, I convened a meeting with our police department, town lifeguards, emergency

003management, marine patrol, highway department, parks and building maintenance, recreation, and council member David Lee. We reviewed preparations and set a coordinated plan in motion to protect our residents and our shoreline. As part of that work, our lifeguards responded immediately. Surf conditions were raised from green to yellow yesterday afternoon, meaning that rip currents have been observed and it's not safe for inexperienced swimmers. Forecasts are showing waves building to 15 to 20 ft. They began moving equipment today and are st pulling stands back to higher ground so they are not washed away. This morning at the direction of US Fish and Wildlife, our natural resources department is removing the piping clover nesting nesting fencing at Atlantic Avenue. We are taking the step now so that the fencing is not washed away by the incoming surf. We are

004also working to document and protect our shoreline. SuffK Aviation at our request is flying an aerial survey of the Southshore beaches today while town staff flew drones along our beaches yesterday. These flights will give us an important record of the condition of our beaches and dunes before the storm so that we can respond appropriately afterward if we see erosion or damage. Suffach County Fire Rescue and Emergency Services has advised that offshore seas can build to 12 to 15 feet or more, especially east of Maricia's inlet. Combined with high tides, these ocean conditions may bring dune erosion, localized flooding, and possible overwash Thursday evening into Friday morning. To our residents and visitors, I want to stress how important it is to swim at lifeguarded beaches and take direction from our lifeguards. If you see a red

005flag, only experienced swimmers are allowed in. and fins are required. If you see a red flag with a swimmer crossed out, this is a no swimming flag and you should not go in the water. These warnings are not here to keep you from enjoying the ocean. They are here to keep you safe. I want to assure you that the town is prepared. We are in close contact with Suffach County and our emergency service partners and our lifeguards and staff are working hard to make sure we are ready. I'm grateful for their dedication and for way this community works together to keep each other safe. So, we are going to be posting, keeping things going on social media and sending out text alerts as needed because uh I anticipate that we'll see changes throughout the next

006several days. Okay, so now we're going to go on to public portion. We have a few folks signed up. The first is Leonard Green. Welcome, Leonard. Hi. >> It's a beautiful morning in fact here in what the Nature Conservancy describes as one of the last great places. We are blessed to live here. If we want it to remain for our children and their children, we need to be responsible stewards. However, we take too much for granted, I'm afraid. Take our trees. A mature oak tree can transport over 40,000 gallons of water from soil to sky every year. A typical swimming pool contains around 20,000 gallons. So that gives you a sense of how much water we're talking about in one tree. Trees working with the soil biome help turn dirt into soil, which then acts

007as a sponge to hold water. Trees and soil den are vital parts of Earth's irrigation system. They help make fresh water readily available. Collectively, plants, soil, and water create the foundation for terrestrial life. And yet, as we treat um excuse me, we treat all of this as an afterthought, perhaps a wishful addendum to more practical, realistic businessinformed view of the world. Despite the fact that our surface and ground waters are threatened by our casual treatment of an essential natural resource resource, our soil and native vegetation complex, we still consider it as an afterthought. As you think about the goal, and it's an admiral goal, one that I support u of expanding affordable housing, please remember why we want to live here. make sure that we take this section of the proposed uh the proposal seriously

008which addresses uh the um landscaping and land care of affordable housing particularly um the site plan shall include adequate landscaping and screening as determined by the planning board. Landscaping and screening shall uh prioritize sustainable practices including the use of native drought tolerant species and minimizing the use of fertilizers and irrigation. I think from what I've said this is essential. It's not something that's nice that we could just add on the side. It's part of keeping and maintaining what is so valuable about living here and it's essential to the health of our community. It's essential to the health of our water. It's essential to um the future that we want to leave for our children. So, thank you for considering this. Um I think I've made it clear that landscaping is not something that's an afterthought.

009It's an essential part of this proposal. Thank you for your time. >> Thank you. Letter Nancy. >> Welcome Nancy. Hi, thank you. I'm Nancy Ber, Sammy Speech Road. Um, I want to say, yeah, I second everything that we just heard from the first speaker and we know how important it is to try to preserve the um, tree cover and the soil cover and what's under the soil for all of us. So, it's it's really good to keep up those standards and not have it as an afterthought. I just want to mention that I'm really excited to learn that New York State has enacted the All Electric Buildings Act and by December 31st, 2025, all new residences and commercial and industrial buildings up to 100,000 square feet, residences up to seven stories tall have to be

010decarbonized. That means they need to have um electric appliances like heat pumps um and um perhaps electric water heaters too. And I'm also excited to hear that there are some new affordable housing projects um on the agenda. And um I'd like to say that we really need to prepare for the future. We all know about extreme weather. We're living through it. It's very unpredictable. We have these hundred-year events coming seemingly every year. We're surrounded by wildfires. We see the flooding. We uh see the hottest summer ever in Europe and in parts of Asia and maybe here. Um we're looking at a hurricane coming that got big really fast and we're also unfortunately in a kind of a drought right here. So, I'd like to ask you to support solar panels um on these new affordable

011buildings, not just solar ready, but actual installation. It works. It helps. We need to do everything we can. Thank you. >> Thank you, Nancy. And I just want to thank both you and Len for the work that you do with Rew. Thank you. Okay. Next up is Kirby Mark Antonio. Excuse me. Good morning. >> Morning, Kirby. >> And thank you for the time today. I am Kirby Mark Antonio, and I've been working with the town for the past four years to advance workforce housing as a new subset of the affordable housing code. Along the way, changes have been made to make that possible. an increased from 8 to 12 units per acre and the ability to sell units to local businesses to house their workers. Last week's presentation on lowering the minimum lot size to

012half an acre to 3 acres for projects at four units per acre adds another tool for affordable housing. And though I have not seen the full code, I'm here to support it and also to launch a new advocacy program for affordable housing. The East End Housing Initiative is designed to advocate, promote, evaluate, and build more housing here. Given that, I believe the new code will definitely be helpful. It will not serve the solve the problem on its own, but it also should not scare the public. The number of projects will be small. They'll be well regulated and more likely than not scattered throughout the town and not concentrated in any one area. to start. Although lots of a half an acre to three acres will now be eligible, there are still a very limited number

013of vacant lots that size to use. And no matter how many vacant lots may be available, each will have to obtain an affordable housing overlay, special permit from the town board to proceed. Each then will be subject to the same scrutiny and qualifications as a full-blown affordable housing project. As far as I know, there are no shortcuts in this new code. However, the cost of land will determine what lots are suitable. A halfacre lot is half a million dollar and up. A full acre a million. A twoacre lot that much more. At four units to the acre, that means the average cost per unit will be $250,000 and up. That alone makes many smaller lots too expensive to use unless they are subsidized by the town or some other entity. Helpful as this new code

014may be, the overriding need for affordable housing of all kinds far exceeds however many units are created in sub3acre projects. With 600 applications for the Gardener Point project and 117 on a waiting list for Canwell Court, we would need dozens of projects at four acres, four units to the acre to be begin to even touch that means. That means larger projects like our 47 units at 350 Panago are absolutely essential to reach the critical mass this town needs to offer businesses and individuals a chance to work and live here. Luckily, there are a number of places where large projects could be built. That said, I want to commend the town board and the planning department on acknowledging the fact that we need to add tools like this new code to address what is the existential

015threat the lack of affordable housing presents for this community. As for me, my team and I are ready to get to work. Thank you very much. >> Thank you, Kirby. Next up, Jeff Bragman. Welcome, Jeff. >> Thank you, Jeff Bragman. I'm speaking for myself today. I have some comments on the the gun club uh which uh I've watched the litigation in Riverhead to some extent and u uh I think there's something of a misunderstanding that the case is about somehow the lease for the gun club, which it's not. It's really about safety and damages brought by neighbors uh who experienced uh bullets hitting their house. And uh in what's going on at this point is that the town appears to be using the lease as an effort to settle the case with some but not

016all of the neighbors. And uh along the way uh what's come to light is the extreme amount of soil contamination that exists uh at the site. And I think the board is probably well aware of the fact that there's no safe level of lead in our environment. None. Zero. And there are other more dangerous metals uh that uh the shooting ranges produce including arsenic, nickel, zinc, and antimony. But probably more serious than all of those are chemicals known as Pahes. They're polyylic aromatic hydrocarbons which have been banned in the European Union and they're in ski shooting and they're widely dispersed over shooting ranges for that reason and studies have indicated that shooting ranges in general uh uh uh are responsible for the largest second largest contribution of lead uh to our environment and cleanups around

017the country have been extraordinarily expensive and I think you only need to look at the airport to see what what the possibilities are. The town board seems to characterize or want to characterize this negotiation as a ministerial lease renewal. It is anything but that. Um and it ignores the significant changes, the substantive changes that you're making to the lease. Um this is not the renewal of an old lease that was in existence for 40 years. It's a completely new lease. And the startling uh thing about it is that the town is taking on a significant risk of liability in creating this new lease. They're stepping into the shoes um of that gun club in terms of liability. It's an extraordinary risk and you already have evidence that the gun club through uh negligence or uh

018poor design has been unable to contain the danger. This is an extraordinarily dangerous activity. outdoor ranges. Uh, and the outdoor range, as I understand it, would remain. There will be an outdoor range that the police will use. And I also understand that the police do practice with rifles at the range. You can correct me if I'm wrong on that. The town boards remained silent on this, and there seems to be a feeling that, oh, the judge is tied our hands and we have to do the renewal. um of of all the board members, Kathy, I think, should remember most clearly from our discussions over the Durier case that that is never the case. A judge cannot compel the town to settle a case. It's entirely up to the parties, and you can refuse to settle.

019My suggestion here is that we need more cander, we need more transparency, and we need to involve the community to examine the possibility of other uses on that site, including a solar uh uh field, which is possible, possible affordable housing, tremendous recreational opportunities. This, and I know that, you know, the papers and many people say this hearkens back to East Hampton's past. This decision that you're embarking on is not about East Hampton's past. It's about reinvisioning the future and facing the future and making the changes that benefit a vast majority of people instead of a tiny minority who are benefiting from a below market lease on property that in no way can be considered to be surplus property. So the time has come, I think, uh, to open discussion and decision making to all. >>

020Thank you, Jeff. Okay, that's everyone that signed up. Is there anyone? Kevin, >> welcome Kevin. >> Good morning. >> Good to see you all. >> You too. >> Thank you for allowing me to speak. I'm Kevin Scott, a member of the Freetown Neighborhood Coalition here on behalf of our organization. Uh, I'd like to present the board with uh some information I'd like to leave with you on work we've been doing on recognizing and putting into proper perspective the important historical archaeological findings that have been recently uncovered in our area specifically in areas adjacent to our uh residential community. We put together for your uh review later. I'll leave it with you. Uh four categories. cultural heritage, archaeological significance, preservation efforts, and relevance to social justice and equity. And I know in these politics, whatever yours

021may be, I have no opposition to anyone's politics, but social justice and equity and those kind of terms are kind of sensitive now, but I want to state them as a key point of some of these elements that we're going to talk about for just a moment. Uh we feel that it's important for the board to um consider these categories. We've worked closely over the last two years with local, regional, and now national uh preservation groups who have uh come to visit us. We've had a series of educational tours, walkabouts. Irwin Levy, who was uh he's now our new friend, and then a neighborhood member, was gracious enough to allow us to have the Eastampton Trails Preservation Society uh come and do a walkabout, which is what we call them, about two weeks ago. It's

022very well attended, over 30 people of all backgrounds. Some live in our community, some don't. Uh, but I have to say it was a fabulous success. Um, people got to say what they have to say. We don't always have to agree on a topic, but we can reach facts that relate to seeing where we live and what we're proposing. And so for those who think that we are anti- projectmost, for instance, that's not true. But we are pro-preservation of irreplaceable artifacts, archaeology, and the thread of history that has often been overlooked, erased, forgotten, unknown, whatever term you want to use. So, I'm going to leave you with this outline and then we'll be coming back to see you if we can sign up for an agenda item so that we can then present to you

023these materials uh in more detail and once again invite you prior to that time or after that time to come to our community and visually see this and its importance uh as well as what's been built uh in a collective diverse community, successful diverse community that reflects the American American dream. Thank you very much for time. Can I me to leave this with you >> with the clerk? Thank you. Would anyone else like to address the board? >> Gloria. [Music] Morning, Gloria. Good morning, town board. My favorite uh topic starts with a C. No, it's not compost. It is community. My name is Gloria Frzy and I'm proud to live here in the community of East Hampton on the ancestral territory of the Montakeet people. I care deeply about making sure our town remains livable,

024not just for tourists and wealthy businesses, but for the families who teach our kids, keep us safe, and care for our community and environment. The multiple affordable residence proposal up for discussion today is imperative for our town. I commend the board and most especially Ian for sparking and shephering the process. There's much work to be done to make East Hampton affordable for our community members. In the current iteration of this proposal, the loopholes allow resorts, restaurants, and developers to grab units for their seasonal staff. This means housing could go to people just passing through instead of the year-round families and neighbors who make East Hampton strong. And when that happens, we all lose. Teachers who show up every day for our kids won't be able to live here. EMTs and firefighters who answer calls at

0252 a.m. will be pushed even further away. Nurses, town staff, essential workers who already struggle with housing will be forced out entirely. our community becomes less stable and our environment suffers under the more short-term high turnover use. These are some simple changes that would make this code stronger, fairer, and more sustainable. One, define residents more carefully. Affordable housing should go to yearround workers and families, not just seasonal employees. Second, ban bulk or corporate leases. Businesses shouldn't be able to rent blocks of units and turn them into dorms. Housing must go directly to individual households. Three, require more familysized units, at least half with two or three bedrooms. Families need real homes, not one-bedroom bunk houses. Fourth, address the parking rule. One space per bedroom paves over land, encourages cramming, and eats up green space. One

026per unit plus shared guest parking is enough. Add EV ready wiring and secure bike storage to plan for the future. Fifth, protect indoor health and energy costs. Require ventilation with good filters, safe, low VOC materials, and designs that prevent mold and pests. Make every project all electric, meaning heat pumps, not inefficient traditional resistance heating. Solar ready and efficient, so families save money and breathe clean air. Sixth, and most critical for East Hampton, address septic pollution. High occupancy housing with conventional septic will overwhelm our aquifer and bays. We need to acquire low nitrogen innovative alternative systems. The town, county, and state already help fund them. They protect our water, our shellfish, and our children's health. Seven, last, build community, not just housing. A one acre site can and should include a central gu where families gather,

027raised garden beds to grow food together, a small play area for kids, maybe a community pavilion for barbecues and meetings, and native landscaping that everyone helps tend. These features create pride, belonging, and stewardship. They turn units into a neighborhood that people are proud to call home. I know one point of push back is always cost, but sustainability and community features are not luxuries. They are costs savers. Energy efficiency means lower utility bills for tenants, which is real affordability. Better ventilation and materials mean fewer repairs, less turnover, and healthier families. Low nitrogen septic protects our bays and largely covered by grants, not developers. And community gardens, pavilions, and green space reduce turnover and keeps residents invested in their homes, saving owners money in the long run. Cutting corners may look cheaper today, but it shifts huge

028costs onto families, the town, and the taxpayers tomorrow. East Hampton is a special place because both its people and its environment are so precious. If we want a future where teachers can live, where first responders can afford to protect the people they serve, and where families can thrive in safe, sustainable homes with clean water and strong community ties, then we must lock in these protections now. Affordable housing should mean truly healthy, sustainable, and community building homes for our neighbors, our families, and our future. Thank you. >> Thank you, Gloria. Is there anyone else that would like to address the board? Jason, is there anyone on the line? >> Yes, we have callers on the line. And I'll unmute the first one right now. Okay. Hello. caller ending 6174. You are on the air. >> Hi,

029uh my name is Marjorie Spitz and I live in Montalk and I want to thank you for today's opportunity. I am also calling about the affordable multiple residence legislation you'll be discussing later and I applaud the board for bringing this opportunity to the forefront forefront. Um we all know year- round residents who have had to move due to housing costs. So this is so critical for our community and I want to yes end what some of the others have said on this for this meeting and highly encourage that sustainability be thoughtful and an integral part of this program. Uh the town board has declared the town to be a climate emergency and we need to take that seriously and that alone should dictate integral integrating sustainability a requirement and do the right thing um here

030as we have this opportunity to do so. Just like we are preparing for this hurricane approaching, this should be the lens through which we prepare for building affordable housing and other um community benefits for those to keep our environment and community safe and be a model town for others. So installing solar and heat pumps and having food scrap recycling and composting as part of the conversation upfront is so critical and I I really encourage the board to think about that. Yes, there may be an upfront cost, but I believe as Gloria said that ultimately that will lead to lower operating costs for owners and tenants as well as have a positive impact on the community and our beautiful environment which we all love so much. Period. You know, the the water, the nature, um, and

031making the earth a priority. So, so thank you and I I look forward to speaking about this further and and hopefully we can build this new opportunity for people to live here affordably in a sustainable way. >> Thank you, Marjorie. Jason, if you could put the next caller through, please. >> Caller ending 7563. You're on the air. >> Uh, good morning. Uh Teresa McCasky calling with the South Holetown Aircraft Noise Committee. Um thank you so much for taking my call and giving me the opportunity to speak here. Um uh but I kind of feel like a broken record regarding the East Hampton uh airport. Um this summer uh the sea planes are have been bombarding our beautiful North Fork many in a very repeated flight path and round trip. Uh and that would include even

032uh the uh Montalk airport as well. Um there's plenty of air space on the southshore route and G George class. why the aircraft are being generated back round trips to the North Fork. Um I I I just do not understand especially on very beautiful clear weather days such as today. This morning we had already a roundt tripper. Um P I we've also experienced the pilots that are exiting to the to the east. They're banging a sharp left to exit to the North Fork on even clear skies. That entire beachfront area is apparently seems to be protected from the aircraft noise from users that come to East Hampton. Um, this is very very unfair. Um, East Hampton owns this airport. Um and please do what you can um to help us not only you know Southhole

033uh Northville I want to bring to your attention these sea planes are flying some of them are flying over the oil storage tanks like the helicopters used to and should there be a tragedy I just want to remind everyone that we do not have any type of um forget the name of the the company um that would be able to help us. I believe it's like 45 minutes away for any type of dramatic situation like that. We do not have the um Coast Guard. We do not have any type of military should an aircraft go down. Um, I also have been filing complaints diligently for many, many, many, many years and um, I'm wondering, you know, if the noise complaints are even being analyzed. I understand that the North Fork is in G. George uh

034airspace, but to have roundtrip aircraft pushed back to the North Fork um for that that for people that are visiting the Southshore is very unfair. So I' I've made the phone calls. I've reached out to various individuals and companies and um so I'm here at with the town board again just bringing it to the public's attention into the town board's attention that um this is this is really a lot to take in. This summer has been a very noisy. So greatly would appreciate if you have any um suggestions. I'm I'm open for it, but please um take a look at the flights and the noise complaints and please um help us out here on the North Fork, South Hampton, and uh Riverhead. Thank you very much. Hope everyone will have a very safe and good

035holiday. Thank you. >> Thank you, Teresa. And we have one more caller. >> Okay, please put them through. >> Caller ending 4221. You're on the air. >> Good morning board. It's Jane Daring and I'm against it. I'm speaking as an individual uh citizen, not a member of any uh other board. Um I just uh want to reiterate my um appreciation and support for the affordable multiple residence use proposed code. Um I spoke last week I made some comments at public portion. I won't repeat the only thing I want to stress today um is that I would and thank you for all your discussion and the issues of sustainability and stuff. All I would like to ask is that rather than writing the code as solar ready that it be written as solar powered. Um this

036these are not being sold to other homeowners. um they they should be solar powered at the start because they're being rented um and leased out. So that's all I wanted to add to the dialogue today and um thank you for bringing this back promptly and I hope everyone has a wonderful end to the summer and stays safe in the water. Bye. >> Thanks Jane. >> So Jason, is that everyone? >> That's everyone. >> Okay, so we're gonna move on to topics. First up is Jeannie Corrosa in purchasing to discuss upcoming bids. Welcome, Jeie. Good morning. Thank you. Um the first bid is an acceptance of the sanitation garage drainage improvements. We had several biders for this totaling eight. Um the parent low bidder is Keith Grimes and the amount is $296,293.75. Next is the rejection

037of an RFP done for license to utilize agricultural land in Amagancet. Um and then several notices coming up. Um, first being Town Hall windows and facade restoration, the CDCH IIA Sanitary System, Montalk Police Substation IIA Sanitary System, the annual drainage contract A, B, and C, and lastly, the printing of sanitation permits and other forms. And that's it. Great. Any questions for Jeannie? I have a comment to if you don't mind and I know you heard me the other day at the Montto Playhouse which is probably one of the most complex and most costly projects the town ever has accomplished private partner private public partnership went through full transparency bids for primes. All this and a lot of this was through your office. You, Lisa, and others. I want to make sure the people in here

038that might not have been out there at that time recognize the effort and energy that you went through to assist the town and the Playhouse Foundation and the residents of Malk get to that point. Uh, a round of applause to you. It really was wonderful to work with you on this project. >> All right. Thank you very much. And it's beautiful. Anybody hasn't been there yet, go see it. Okay, great. Thanks. Thank you, Genie. Okay, next up is the update for on project most and we've got the executive director Rebecca Morgan Taylor here and Loretta Davis in development. So, and you've got a special guest running the PowerPoint. I didn't anticipate this this morning, but um this wonderful IT person, Natala, if I pronounced that right, Natalia. Um her daughter is in the middle picture

039right there and uh her name is Gabby and she is a shining star to walk into and see in the mornings um at our early learning program. So um so happy that she's here. Um anyway, thank you so much for allowing me to come and present to all of you today and to the community. Um it's it's really an honor to be here and to share our good work. Uh we're so proud of what we do. We work really hard um to make sure that uh our focus is always the children, the working families and the community and where the shifts and are happening and what the needs of those um kids and families need. So um again really happy to be here. Um what we do Thank you. Um we provide child care and

040learning activities for children ages 6 week infants to 13y olds. Um we do this to improve the lives of people in the community by allowing parents caregivers to work while their children are in a safe, supportive, inspiring and nurturing environment. We provide creative educational and social experiences for children and families. We do this to improve the lives of people in our community, exposing them to new experiences, new learning activities, um building healthy relationships to lead a happy, fulfilled life. And we promote our values of equity, tolerance, and well-being. Um, we do this to create community um that is kind and respectful, healthy and inclusive. And we do this through all of our really truly great programming. So after school programs, um, this is our largest program. It is also our longest program. It is how

041Project Most started over 20 years ago, maybe close to 25 years ago. Our after-school program started at the John John Marshall School serving about 80 students K through four. Um since then we grew to spring school and these programs now are serving um last year school year we served over we served over 300 children 335. Um the John Marshall school is prek through fifth grade. The spring school is prek through 8th grade. Um the hours of operation are 2 to 6. The prek students um are released or dismissed from school a little earlier, about an hour earlier than the um K through six. So we start from 2 to 6. And this this truly is a wonderful partnership with the school districts. Um I have to say it's one seamless day for those children. They're

042there at 8 in the morning and they can be there till 6:00 at night and they're in that building using that facility. Um, our partnerships allow us to use the whole entire school building which is wonderful. Um, we communicate regularly with our teachers that are there, with the administration that is there, and with the superintendent. Um so and more importantly we communicate with guidance counselors and social workers for any children and family needs. Um when the kids come to us um it's a seamless release from school staff to project most staff and uh we start off with a snack um take attendance and the kids go right into doing their homework and having some academic assistance. This is really important for the parents. Um, parents are really busy. They're working really hard. Many of their

043single parent homes. Um, getting that homework done, knowing that their child had support while doing it um is really important to them. Many of the families um some of the parents that are from immigrant families and um the parents may not be able to help them as much as my staff can at Project Most. So that's another reason why it's important that um that component is um is in this program. Um coming out of COVID, we realized that there was a delay in um some of the learning that the children experienced um mostly in ELA um reading and writing. So we developed a small group tutorial program um that was um designed with a private foundation grant and we have since continued it because um number one parents ask for it and and it's needed

044and valuable. Um so with that component of it focusing on reading and writing, we um parents sign up who want this extra assistance and they get pulled out of the afternoon with one of the teachers from the school or a TA from the school and they get reading and writing support 30 minutes um twice a week and the groups are we keep them kind of small um three to five kids in each group. Um so this is something that we've kept in the program since COVID and and it has been very beneficial. Um after the homework and the academic component is complete, we move into the really fun stuff. Um so um the kids, you know, we have them, let's let's teach them, let's give them experiences. So we range from doing activities of art,

045STEM, which is science, technology, and engineering and math. uh physical exercise, outdoor play, um wellness programs from cooking and gardening and mental health programs. Um many times parents will come to pick up at 4:30 thinking they're doing their child a favor by getting them early and they don't want to go home. So that's a really nice sign that we're doing something right. Um the other component of our afterchool and also in our summer program that we hire teenagers and college age students and we don't always talk about that as much um but what we hire about during the school year about 45 um high school students and college age students to work for us as counselors. So they are the ones that are hands-on with the kids that are in the thick of it do

046you know playing with them mentoring them and we look at that in a way as our second afterchool program because many times it's a first-time job for these um kids. So we're giving them life experience about how to read a paycheck and what taxes um you know are. Um we're giving them lots of training to work with kids. And then some of them um we're very proud to say that have gone on to be teachers themselves. So um thank you. Um our second largest program is our summer program which we call Igrow. Um this past summer we have had 170 students go through our summer program. It's been an 8-week summer program. um we are located at the spring school for seven weeks and then we need to be removed because they need to get

047ready for school. So now this week we're um half of them are at Mos Holy Trinity, the other half are at session house. So we're in two locations. Um what's really special about this program is that um you know what kid wants to be in school all summer long, right? but we're using the spring school and we're grateful to that for that. So when we first started to design this um we hired or we collaborated and partnered with East Hampton School District toi to provide a bus for us. So we have a school bus from 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. and and we take the kids out and about to learn about their community um to have really wonderful experiences. Um, today they are at the Long Island Museum and they're going to the Cradle

048of Aviation Museum and Martha would be here today with me, but that's where she is. So, we have about 50 students who left actually on a jity today to go up there. Um, and so just local field trips. Um, we have a really healthy relationship with Amber Waves. The kids are there twice a week learning about cooking and gardening. Um we another great healthy relationship for many years is Duck Creek. The kids are there doing artwork and um learning about the artwork that is displayed there. They've been doing family nights for us throughout the summer as well. um East Hampton Shellfish Hatchery, the Guild Hall, um Sofo, Seami. We did a really nice collaboration with Springs Library this summer where the artwork that the children did about the Springs um then was hung in the

049library and I believe it was the 50th anniversary for the library. So um it was kind of all to celebrate their 50 years there. Um, so that's um and we'll do more with the library as well. So our summer program um like I going back to working families, we always try to match working family hours. So our camp runs from 8:00 in the morning till 5 at night. Um many camps end at like 3:00 here and start at 9:00. Doesn't always match working family hours. So all of our programs were very thoughtful about about that and making sure these kids are engaged while their parents are working. Our third program, thank you. Um is the Montalk child care and MTOK prek um after school program. So this is our newest program and uh I was

050so happy to be a part of last Friday's event. It's beautiful. It was my first time seeing it. Um, and I'm very excited that um, I can maybe negotiate getting kids swimming lessons uh, since we have the daycare out there. Um, so um, anyway, we've been working or managing the daycare center um, for the past year. Um, we have 57 students out there this summer. Um, the hours of operation out there are 7:30 in the morning till 6 at night. So that really encompasses a large you know block of hours where parents can work who are working shifts shift works they have the time um for the at the daycare. Um, we what was happening before we took over there, the prek at the Montalk school got out at 2:00 and so parents would leave

051work at 2:00, pick up their children and bring them over to the daycare so that they could finish their day of work. So in the eyes of office of children and family services, we licensed the Monttok school building and worked with Josh Odum out there doing that so that now our staff goes to the school and watches those kids from 2 to 6 instead of parents having to leave. So it will be the same model that we have here for East Hampton and we have for spring school. Um, so I feel like that's been a real benefit to those families out there who are working and and as we are in Montalk, we'll communicate and we communicate more with the school and with Josh and we work on the um curriculum there to ensure that

052the children are ready for prek when they go to public school. Um, the child care center services six-w weekek old infants, which is very new to us, and it's very thrilling to walk in and see all these little babies there. Um, all the way to 5-year-olds. Um, we started to do some enrichment out there as well. We have music classes, movement classes. This summer, we we had a chess program where they start doing chess with kids in prek. So we had a chess program out there. We do STEM and we also do a language program. We have many bilingual staff out there. So we do reading with the children both in English and in Spanish. Um so our our other program is like school vacation andor community programs. And so this uh at this location,

053we're currently at the um Most Holy Trinity Catholic School um and hope to be at the neighborhood house location in the near future. So um we do school vacation. So not every parent goes away during February and April vacation. So what do we do? We offer programs during that time. So again, it matches working parent hours from 8 to 5. Um, this past school year, we had 135 students in those program and it's prek through 8th grade. You know, seventh and eighth grades are starting to outgrow a little bit of the program. So, we're shifting our thought and looking at the um counselor and training programs. And also we just um Martha wrote a grant and just received some fun funding to do a very specific middle school program. So this this coming school year,

054we're going to focus on that middle school group of kids who, you know, start to age out of things, but also need a lot of stuff to keep them occupied and busy and learning and engaged. Um, one of the programs we did at Most Holy Trinity last week was a stopotion animation program for 15, fifth grade and older kids. It was truly amazing. We hadn't done this before. It was a professional who came out and did it. These kids worked like hours creating little clay sculptures, creating sets, and they created a video. They had the content, uh, the story line. And on Friday, I unfortunately missed it cuz I was with you guys out at Montalk, but they had um a viewing of their videos to the parents and a little question and answer with

055the filmmakers. They were extremely proud of themselves and and those are the kinds of things that we hope that we can engage middle school kids with this year and what we'll try to focus during those school vacation. Other things that happen at this site is um this summer we have our early learning summer camp which Gabby attends. Um during the school year it was a 9 to3 program only because we cannot license that building for a full day for that age group of kids. And so Gabby also attended the 9 to3 program. Um so um other things are weekend programs. Uh we decided this year this summer to extend our Saturday program to 9 to 3. Um people work on the weekends, you know, landscapers, restaurants. I mean it's seasonal. So, um, that program is

056still growing, but that was our focus in designing it was to sort of, um, get the people who need to work on the weekends, um, and provide a place, safe place for their kids to be. Um, and again, all our programming really focuses on STEM, health and wellness, and physical education, and the arts. Um we also offer their private music lessons and small group tutoring too. Um so uh our funding just to touch on um one of our focuses when we talk about families in this community and as many people spoke about affordable housing today it it all relates you know so we're right there with u the whole affordable housing is trying to keep tuition for parents affordable so that they can work um and so that they can live out here and the

057community can continue to grow with young people and thrive and um so so we keep the affordable as tuition tuition as affordable as possible. Um and we give a lot of financial assistance away. We work on a sliding scale because people can pay something, you know, so we we really work on a sliding scale. um families that are truly in need. That's where the partnership between the guidance counselors and the social workers at the school districts really come in and are important because we'll work as a team to get any child what they need and any family what they need. But um but really we work on a sliding scale um financial assistance model and in 23 24 we gave away $180,000 in assistance. Um this year we're looking at more like 200 with the

058addition of MTalk and um and more need in the community and our funding structure that we really is finding um really a great model um is that it's it's a partnership and that's what we've always said. It's a partnership of parent tuition, government and school district funds, private foundations, and fundraising with individual and events. So, we have been in event mode this summer, which has been um fun and and great exposure, and we've had some great events and um but but it's a model that that works um and and parents do contribute, you know, close to 50% of that. So, um, you know, they, you know, they take pride in being able to, um, pay what they can. Um, and then lastly, these are our really great photographs of all the children. And again, we

059have Gabby up in the corner looking through that uh, magnifying glass. Um, and um, all what we do at Project Most. And so, um, very quickly, Loretta Davis, who I am so thrilled to have on our team, came in on Feb in February as our development and outreach. Um, it's the first time that we've had a development director in a very long time. Um, so I invite Loretta to come up and say a few words. >> Thank you. Great presentation. Um, so it's an honor to present to all of you in a different capacity. you know, I was at the retreat for 10 years and I did some uh government work as a local town justice. So, I know that this is a labor of love that you have. So, I thank you for your

060service. I just want to put a different lens, a different perspective on Project Most from the retreat. Uh the shelter, which has 18 beds, is about 65% kids usually. And though that's how I learned about project most is that our kids went to the vacation camp because our families at the retreat they can't go and visit family when there's a vacation. It's not safe and they were able to get scholarships and Rebecca and Project most was always really open to that and inclusive. So um I think this you know what what they do there it's first of all there's always all these little kids around with little backpacks. It's very different than the work I was doing before, but it's a really great program. It's a diverse program and I think it does tie right

061in with the affordable housing. If you want to offer service of affordable child care to working families, this is what we do and uh it's really important. So, thank you. >> Lastly, I want I want to share a water bottle with each of you and say thank you. And when you're hydrating, think of all those wonderful that you are in this community >> that are engaged and they're learning and um they're excited to be in our program and and we're we're truly >> we love our work and we love going to work every day and and it's it's so great to come in and see faces like Gabby um and and just see them thrive. So So thank you for your support. the community. Thank the community for their support. Um, and uh, we really

062truly appreciate it. >> Okay, we may have questions or comments. So, >> I mean, I think you you hit the nail on the head here when you said that what you guys offer is entirely related to things like the affordable housing um, that we're looking at. Um, you know, it's changed out here. Every family that actually lives out here, unless they're extremely fortunate, both parents have to work. So there is no stay at home care. Um and you know your time on the school board too Kathy will emphasize you know this is a a miss potentially in the department of education's thing which is that preschool care for kids that there is no state kind of funding or program for it and so entities such as yourself have come in and filled that niche and

063very successfully. I'll say that, you know, when the EOC made that decision last year that they were going to close a facility at the Montalk Playhouse, that's the most emails I've ever received at a councilman, it was over 750 emails that came to me saying, "Please keep this facility open because the community fully understands that need and that miss and that importance um for them to live out here." And you know, we've talked about the gray wave, um, you know, the kind of the growing elderly population out here, but you know, the flip side of that is as a country, you'll look at the statistics and you'll see that the birth rates massively declined. And the importance for us as a community to offer programs such as this that help young people live here. The

064young people who, you know, like like Natana over there who's amazing for this town, they are the future of this town and we we need them to be able to live and work here. So for me, you know, as an entity, both yourself and the Eleanor Whitmore program, the the onus is on us, not just as a town board, but also as taxpayers. Like look, it's it's so important for our community to have entities like these and for us to support their funding in as many ways as we can for the future viability of this town. So I I I thank you. I think you guys do a phenomenal job. I know David and myself, both our kids went to that facility prior to Ring Project most and the importance of that for us to

065actually be able to do what we do out here is critical. So, um I I I hope you continue the good work out here and the support we can give you. I'm fully behind. >> Thank you. Thank you. [Applause] >> Yeah. So you know my enduring uh uh gratitude to project most. I do >> also and Elanar Whitmore and others uh as a as a a son of educators and to early childhood uh education intervention is extremely important for our community to flourish on there. You see it, you put it forward. Uh I appreciate everything your staff does. Uh from me I Roman all the way through. uh you know continue >> and we'll have one of your kids working for us soon. >> Uh just just continue continue working hard for the community. That's

066great. I look forward to what the future holds for project most and I really enjoy the collaboration that you've had with the town over the years. >> Thank you. Thank you. >> I'm in awe of what nonprofit organizations like you and your dedicated staff and volunteers do to create community. Gloria mentioned the idea of community and public portion and what that is and what you provide is a pillar of the community. Um we can't help people uh we talk about a lot about affordable affordable affordable but without affordable child care there people we we put them in structures but they're back in the same place again with not being able to afford the services that they need. So the the I you have my deepest appreciation for what you do. Thank you. Thank you. >>

067I agree with previous board members. Thank you so much for the service you provide. I think project most is is great and invaluable asset to the community and I know it takes a lot of work and as Tom pointed out when the change in M talk at the playhouse was a very big one. Um it was my early days on the board and you guys stepping up to take over there was um was huge and so just thank you for all that you do. >> Thank you. Yeah. Thank and the infant program. I mean, that that group of of need uh for parents with very young children, you know, maternity leaves are short and folks have to get back to work and knowing that there's a safe, secure, loving environment for infants is is incredible.

068I I hope maybe you could think about bringing it west a little bit as well. Not to add, but you know, to add. Well, it it's honestly um for infants, the only other place besides the playhouse is in Southampton. So, so if you're if you're a mother and you need to go back to work um and where you know it's either Southampton or MTOK um for for that is 6 weeks to 12 um 12 months so to a year. So, or you're hiring a private, you know, something, you know, somebody to come into your house or or taking them. And I'm a big believer in programs that are regulated um because OCFS has very strict guidelines that we must adhere to um to make sure the children are safe and and cared for correctly. >>

069Thank you. So, >> yeah. So, I just I think we had this conversation, Rebecca, at the building blocks uh party uh where you celebrated Cindy and Joel Ramoodle for all that they've contributed to Project Most over the years. But I I shared that I have a 20-year history with Project Most. So, I when I was on the spring school board in the mid 2000s, we had a benefactor come forward who wanted to donate a couple of hundred,000 to spring school. And the board's assignment was to go home and come up with a list of what we would do with that kind of money. And everybody came, you know, with their list and it was total consensus that we were going to start Project Most because it was already operating in John Marshall for a couple

070of years and here we had the hamlet of springs where we had a lot of working families and we didn't have that afterchool care. So, uh, Joe Oonnell actually was the was the, uh, go-between. He's the one that contacted the school board and said, "I've got this benefactor. He wants to be anonymous." But, um, and when we said to him, "We want to start Project Most." I mean, it was just a tremendous opportunity. And, you know, I got to see it grow over the nine years that I was on the school board. And >> absolutely, it still surprises me how how big and the growth that Project Mos has taken. And back then, who would have even, you know, who would have thought, you know, so it's it's truly amazing. And you're really everywhere working

071families need you. You know, the school breaks, the weekends, it's, you know, after school, starting your hours so early. You know, you're, you know, our working families are the backbone of this community and you're there to support them and and raise them up. So, thank you for the work you do. >> Thank you. So, thanks so much for this opportunity. It was truly great. >> Thank you. >> Thanks. >> Okay, so next up we're going to have an update on Phoenix House, uh, which runs two programs here in the town of East Hampton. And I'd like to welcome Dr. Robert Ibraham. So, welcome, Dr. Ibraham. We appreciate you being here today. Of >> course. Good afternoon, uh, Supervisor Burke Gonzalez and esteemed council members. My name is Robert Ibraham. I'm from Phoenix House. Um, My

072colleague Jenny Vice who oversees uh all of our residential units was unable to make it. Unfortunately, there was an emergency at one of our sites, so she had to step out. So, I will introduce you electronically um here. Uh okay, please. Thank you. So, part of my agenda today is going to be um introduction of myself and Jenny, a little bit about each of us, um a little bit about our Phoenix House programs, our approach, a review of everything we've done in East Hampton in 2025 to date, our local impact, our commitment to the East Hampton community, as well as our programs with the school. So, we'll talk about my favorite topic, me. Um my name is Robert Ibraham. I have a PhD in clinical psychology, masters in applied psychology, and also a doctorate in

073law. Um, prior to working with Phoenix House, which I only started in 2025, I worked for I started my career with Family Service League. All of my, um, work experience in behavioral health in psychology has been behavioral health and substance use counseling. Uh, at Family Service League, I started as an intern, worked my way up to a counselor, then a therapist, and then into a supervisory role. I then switched over to Samaritan Daytop Village where I oversaw a mental health clinic, a substance use counseling clinic, a methodone clinic, and a preparatory school. I was very passionate about the preparatory school. What we did was we accepted students that were ejected from their home districts for behavioral or substance use problems. They continued getting their academics from us so that this way they didn't fall back

074when they were dis expelled um while getting group and individual therapy and medicated assisted treatment as needed. And then we reintegrated them back into the school. And I highlight that because I it's I believe it's very important obviously addressing psychiatric and substance use symptoms as early as possible and I take that when I work with the East Hampton School District. Um I talked a little bit about my or I mentioned my law degree and I like that because it really gives me what I believe is a business approach to overcoming practical problems that often are overlooked or tried to be glossed over when working with social services. And we'll talk a little bit about those programs in a moment. Um well actually it addresses one of them now. Um one of the things that we

075did when working at Family Service League was I focused on we had a real problem getting staffing for nonforprof particularly non forprofits because they often don't pay as much as private practices. So what we did was we collaborated with all the schools in the district all in the area including Stonybrook, Farmingdale, John J, uh, Adelfi, Hopstra, Long Island University, and we offered a a formalized internship program. And it was really, I'd love to say it was benevolent in just giving back to the discipline, but really it was self- serving in that we and I don't say that out there, but it was we were breeding our next generation of clinicians. So what it did was allowed us to train them, have them come on board, and then we were hiring them and we were feeding

076all of our sites with that. And that's an approach that we're going to be utilizing at Phoenix House, particularly for East Hampton. We have a very difficult time getting staffing out here. Um, in addition, I'm a an adject professor at Adelfi University. I teach masters level psychology courses. I have my masters in uh my master counselor certificate as a K-Sack and I have a certification in gambling and I have a certification for working with uh batterers a batteries intervention program which we're seeing a very strong need across all of our sites and we're going to try and introduce those programs out here as well please. So this is Jenny Verice. She oversees our uh residential sites including our Wayne Scott one. I wanted to even though she couldn't attend, I wanted to keep the slide

077in here so you had a face to the program in case there was any issues that you needed addressed or something that you needed support with. She would be your point of contact for residential. Thank you. >> So, our mission, values, and core um values. So, we're passionate about healing individuals and families and communities challenged by substance use disorders and related mental health conditions. Our vision is a healthy, addiction-free world. if you can go to the next slide as well. So, we're going to talk a little bit about appreciation, compassion, excellent excellence, forward thinking, integrity, and respect. And I think if you had 10 other clinics coming and speaking in front of you, they would all use these buzzwords. But I'm going to show you how we integrate all these tenants into all of our

078philosophies, please. So one of the things that I believe and I try and instill in all of my staff members is we have to instill hope into the clients. Study after study shows that if there is hope is the single biggest factor in getting somebody to succeed any sort of goal. So if somebody told me I could never lose weight, I'd be eating chocolate donuts all day long. So if somebody thinks that they can't overcome their mental health challenges or their substance use challenges, they're not going to try. So hope is a big factor of what we do. All of our treatment plans and working with clients is person- centered. That's a big thing from Oasis and OMH. We have to have a person- centered approach. But with that, we try and we try and

079incorporate family involvement in the treatment goals. Um we know that the higher level of integration of family involvement, the higher the success rate. So it can't just be what's happening in the group room or in the session. It has to carry over into the home life. Um, I try and instill with all my clinicians a strength-based approach, positive psychology. We don't only want to try and identify what's wrong with you and how we're going to fix it, but rather we want to figure out what's working in your life and how can we leverage that to have a more fulfilling life. Um, we talked about person- centered early. When we're developing treatment plans with clients, what we do is we have them identify what's most important to them and we work on that. Unfortunately, it's not

080always absence. I want to stop drinking entirely. Maybe it's I want to go from drinking 12 beers a day to drinking eight beers a day. And we'll leverage that into trying to go from 8 to six and from six to four. So we try and utilize a person- centered approach. We know that substance use doesn't always rear its head in an isolated incident. There's always co-occurring mental health disorders across the board. 99% of the time there's depression, anxiety, or something else going on there. So we try and address both originally. You're going to hear me later on talking about Dr. uh Kenneth Minkoff who I attended a seminar with years ago. He's a psychiatrist and he's like considered the expert on co-occurring mental health and substance use disorders. And he talks about the history of

081trying to silo substance use and mental health. It used to be the paradigm used to be let's address your mental health and then we'll deal with your substance use or let's address your substance use and then we'll deal with your mental health. We know that that doesn't work. We have to deal with everything co-occurring and included in that is not only substance use and mental health but the social determinance of health. How can we expect anybody who has housing instability or food insecurity to focus on their mental health? Think of Maslo's theory of hierarchy. You know, if I don't have food in my stomach, I'm not trying to figure out how I'm going to stay abstinent. Or if I don't know where I'm going to sleep, I'm not going to be able to deal with

082my anxiety. So, our approach is to deal with everything simultaneously. Um, one of the things we're doing, and this ties into my earlier conversation, we'll talk about it further uh in this presentation, is we try and remove any barriers relating to getting the services. I'm going to give you a quick example. Um, we are introducing something called OMAD. So, if somebody wanted to come in for an opiate use disorder um, and we said to him, okay, today's Monday, we could see you on Wednesday. That might as well be a lifetime. Anything can happen in those two days, let alone and I'm giving two days as an example. If it's four days, it's that much worse. So, what we're doing is we're introducing that somebody can call today and be seen today and get medication for

083opioid use disorder today. And we even introducing that we will pay for the medication, medicated assistant treatment. So, they we're removing all barriers. They can be ask for help today and get help today. Um, so we talked about the complexity of having mental health and substance use disorders simultaneously. We try and identify that earlier. Try and get them psychiatric evaluations early on. So if there's any sort of psychotropics or medicated assisted treatment, we can do it from the onset, not 3 months into the treatment. So we talked about Jenny, she oversees our residential program. We have one here in Waynecott. Um it's a holistic approach as I discussed we try and do trauma-informed care. We talked about with every substance use disorder there is a mental health disorder. We know that trauma is so prevalent

084whatever it may be let it be a divorce of your parents or something more horrific. We try and address that immediately. We talked about engaging family for uh support particularly in the residential. People who are in residential program can have spouses, children come and visit them, have days with them. Um, it's not like it's isolated or anything of that nature. We try and bring that all to the table. For the outpatient services, which is all the clinics I oversee. Uh, we have our East Hampton clinic. We obviously do individual treatment plans. The the the approach of having a one-sizefitit all that used to be the the way it was is no longer uh adopted. Uh, we do group counseling. That's evidence-based practice for doing substance use counseling. Um, part of our groups include anger management,

085relapse prevention. um we do social recreational activities. So earlier I mentioned or I don't know if I actually mentioned it when I was at Samaritan we received a CCBHC grant and um it was very influential in shaping on how I approach clinical management. Um the CCBHC talked about again not having uh individualized treatment for substance use or mental health but having an integrated approach and using a multiddisciplinary approach. One of those things included having peer advocates. I'm not sure if everybody knows who a peer advocate is. It's another layer of support for somebody, but the individual offering support has lived experience. Quite often, people look at me and say to me, "What do you know about not having food in your stomach or injecting heroin?" And quite honestly, I can't relate to some of those

086things. So, to have somebody who has lived experience offers another level of support in a way that's much more relatable, and that's something that we try and bring there. Our peer advocate for East Hampton is actually starting today, which I'm very excited about. um because again that's a layer of support but they're going to also bring community activities for our clients. So one of the things that we adopted when we did the CCBHC at Samaritan was we offered these community events let it be a nature walk or a day at the zoo and it's offers community for these clients who sometimes feel so isolated even in a room filled with friends or family members. Um my goal long term is to bring on targeted case managers at family at um Phoenix House and that's going

087to be to address things like lack of insurance, food instability, food insecurity, housing instability. Currently we don't have the staffing for that. So what we're doing is we've partnered up with a number of different community partners who assist in case management. New Horizons, we do a lot of services with them where they can assist clients in these areas. um individualized counseling we talked about and we also spoke about medicated assistant treatment let it be for alcohol or heroin or anything else we can offer that through our network of um of prescribers flexible scheduling community integration eastampton is one of the areas that we have the biggest challenge with as far as um travel restrictions a lot of clients can't make it to our site we do offer a wide array of telealth services for both

088individual ual and group therapy out of our East Hampton site for people in this area that can't get here get to our site. So our approach we try and catch it catch psychiatric symptoms early on the earlier we can deal with it and that's not just limited to psychiatric symptoms any sort of substance use counseling as well. If we can, I use the the school as an example. If we can identify a child who's struggling either with mental health issues or substance use, the earlier on we catch it, the better chance we have before those maladaptive behaviors take root in that individual. It's much harder to change later on in life. Uh psycho education, this says for parents, but it's really for all family members. The more that the family members know what the individual

089is going through, the easier it is for them to contend with at home. And we we try and encourage family sessions where we can have the patient speak to the family on how they feel misunderstood and the family speak to the patient on how they don't know what they're going through. Having that connection, that line of communication is essential to having the work that's done in the group room or the individual session carry over to home. We do again going to the school. We do age appropriate psycho education for them so they understand what they're going through. And you know, the children these days are much different than the children of my my age. The prevalence of marijuana, the the the easy access of alcohol, social media. Oh my god, I can't even imagine being

090a kid these these days. So, we try and kind of help them through all of that. I spoke earlier about positive psychology. Not only what's wrong with you and how we're going to fix it, but what's working for you and let's leverage it for you to have a more fulfilling life. Um, so that really talks about that. All right. So this year we did a out of East Hampton we did and this is year to date we've done 128 assessments. We did 939 individual sessions, 1,245 group sessions, 72 man uh medication management sessions, 18 psychiatric evaluations, eight family sessions, and 20 impaired driver sessions. The combination of all those have led to the following breakdown. 61% of the people we served had alcohol use disorder, 17 cannabis issues, 11 cocaine, nine opiates, um 1% hallucinogens,

091and 1% sedatives. Now, I want to bring to your attention that earlier I said that we have a staffing issue here in East Hampton. All this was done with just two clinicians. Since I've started earlier this year, we've doubled our staff, doubled, it makes it sound like so much more. uh to four people out of East Hampton, including our peer advocate, and we're currently marking for two more clinicians, including uh bilingual therapists to deal with the the Spanish speaking population. So, our approach is we provide a person- centered, culturally sensitive, trauma-informed uh therapy approach. Addiction is often seen as inevitable, like a train that's on a track and it can't be stopped. But research shows that addiction can be prevented. Addiction has a genetic component just like uh diabetes would be but there's other factors

092that we can modify the support at home the avoidance of isolation all these things play a role and that's what we work with with the clients um increased development and addiction we know that the co-occurring mental health and substance use disorders they feed off of one another so we try address both simultaneously recognizing psychiatric symptoms early on and addressing them and I and this is probably my personal belief I believe that contending with addiction and mental health. It's a scientific approach trying to get somebody who and I'm sure you can imagine many clients come to us and they say to us, I don't have a problem or I don't want to look at it. I don't want to deal with it. So when I drink at night, it's not a big deal. I work hard.

093I utilize or I talk I preach a lot to my clinicians the trans theoretical model. People come in and they say to me, I don't have a problem. And we provide psychoeducation until they say, "What did you say about drinking and heart disease?" That question represents a shift from a pre-contemplative stage to a contemplative stage. And shifting from contemplative to action is just as easy and it's just a matter of getting them to buy into the the discussion uh stages of change. We just love that. So Dr. Minkoff, who I mentioned earlier, talked about many clinicians in a study he did tried to move away from complex cases. If somebody had co-occurring mental health disorders, they were almost like, "Oh, geez, I don't want to deal with this client." But now the approach is we

094really have to embrace that. And it shouldn't be the exception, but it should be the expectation that everybody who's going to come in is going to have some sort of mental health issue and substance use issue. Um, hope we talked about instilling hope is so essential so that these people know that this is something that they can control. Self-efficacy is such a big part of of a successful treatment. case management. We talked about community partners as well as bringing in internally. We're going to remove barriers like the OMAD program that we discussed earlier. Immediate access to medication. So I mentioned that we do partnership with East Hampton School. Innovation is something we're trying to bring across all platforms. One of the things we did was we were dedicating one clinician per day per week over

095at the East Hampton School. That's good in theory and it sounds nice on paper, but what happens if the day after we're there, somebody's identified? They got to wait six days left until we're back on site. So, what we did is we just had a meeting with East Hampton School and we are committing to if they call us on a Monday, we'll be there on a Tuesday. If they call us on a Tuesday, we're going to be there on a Wednesday. We're going to have a dedicated staff to be at their beck and call when a student is identified as having a substance use disorder. So, how do we identify it? If we see that they're struggling with school work, if they have behavioral problems such as detention or suspension or social problems or isolation,

096all these things are indicative of mental health or substance use disorder. So, we're committed to the East Hampton community. We want to bring these community events there. We want to continue to offer mental health and substance use counseling. We want to expand our services and work with local uh referral sources. Um alignment with the public health and safety goals, making sure everything's al aligned. Um I want to thank you for the opportunity to speak in front of you and I'm happy to address any questions you may have. >> Can I ask a question? So it goes back to your collaboration and partnership with the high school. So you're going to be more like on call or are you still going to have a day that you go in and you and you have see students?

097>> So to answer your question after the our meeting, I don't know the answer to that question. Okay. >> Uh and why I say that is we've had days where we've had a clinician there for seven hours and didn't see anybody. The way the school has it and and you may know more on this than I do. I believe they have three social workers and two school psychologists there. If a child is identified as having an issue, they go to them first. It's only when it escalates to having a substance use disorder that they're brought into us. Okay? So, if they're identified as having some sort of issue, we're going to I think we're leaning towards being on call, but what we left off with the school is we're going to do anything that's necessary

098to support them. If that means continuing having somebody there one day and also being there on call, that's something we're going to commit to doing. >> Great. Thank you. So, I mean, one thing that's come up in um other conversations I've had around this issue is is the um the relative lack of um clinical psychologists for youth out here and how that's an immense challenge and Taylor Health has gone some way to addressing it, but it's it's not the perfect solution. Um you know, tech can do a lot of things, but in person is obviously better. um your organization, you know, I I think does a great job in, you know, when there's a problem and it's kind of identified, but the prevention side of thing, you know, actually ensuring that our youth have, you

099know, access to those mental health resources they require for it not to become problematic. Do you have any thoughts on, you know, how as a community we can better invest in that and kind of address that issue? >> I'm so happy you brought that because it's something I wanted to mention. So the meeting with the school led into a request from them for us to do quarterly prevention discussions with them where we actually have four topics on the table right now that we're going to probably do every other month with the school. They're going to designate a day that all health classes will be attending a seminar conducted by us. And believe it or not, I'm not going to be doing it because I don't think the students would relate to me. I have a

100very cool uh clinical social worker who's going to come in, you know, and she's going to talk about social media and how it may adversely impact your mental health. She's going to talk about the prevalence of marijuana and alcohol, particularly in the tragedy that happened last year with the the DWI. We're going to try and raise awareness of that. So, we are approaching that as well. Thank you. >> Any other questions? >> I'm just a com one quick comment. Um I'm I'm surprised that alcohol is still 61% of the cases that you see. I you hear so much about all the other crisis, the opioid crisis, um and I understand why. Um, but you you don't really hear much education about alcohol addiction and how that impacts lives and what it takes to be able

101to overcome that. So that that's a really interesting statistic to me. >> You know, I think that a big part of it, particularly in this area, I think that there's a lot of cultural factors that take place. You know what's interesting? You you mentioned heroin or opiates. Um, alcohol is so much more deadlier than opiates. >> Exactly. You know, it's it's it's really has we have to continue to work on that. We can't be like, "Oh, marijuana is the the drug of choice right now, so we're going to focus solely on that." We need to continue to raise awareness on alcohol. >> That's similar in EMS, Kate. Like I say, probably those these statistics when we see substance abuse issues, alcohol's definitively number one >> calls. Yeah. Yeah. >> And bzzoazipines, you know, things like

102Xanax and whatnot because those are the two that you can have a seizure from when you're coming down from. And that's why that's such a big concern. So, I feel like we all need education, you know, um and reminders of of the focus of of what you do and what your group does and and yes, I think prevention is is critical, but also not letting folks go um who were failed one way or another in the system or genetically have an issue. >> And you know, that was part of the conversation with the school. The fact that we talked about alcohol last month doesn't mean that we can't we shouldn't be talking about it again this month because it may be in their head and prevalent that moment, but it falls by the wayside as

103soon as it's not discussed. We need to continue to educate. >> Yeah. >> I I just also thank you for all that you do again and and it and this is the community that we talk about having here in East Hampton and we're very fortunate to have groups like yours that take on on all this responsibility to to make sure everyone is part of a community. Um really um the nonprofits here are unbelievable. Um and we're blessed to be able to give any help that we can. >> Just one other piece. I mean the the other issue we hear especially among youth is is vaping. There's a huge problem not kind of listed on there because obviously it has many forms that can kind of come in but you know do you have any perspective

104on you know what the town could do to better address that issue amongst youth. >> So earlier I said the the quarterly meetings we're going to be doing that's not the topic they asked me to talk about. So, we're going to be bringing statistics in there. And, uh, again, the young lady that I mentioned earlier, Jessica, she's a social worker. She's a KAC. Um, you know, she's got a nose ring. The students are going to connect to her directly, you know, much more than they would with me. So, I'm hoping that opening that door with somebody that's relatable is going to allow them to be open to the perspective. >> How much do you think social media actually is the trigger for all the other abuses as well? because there's probably nothing, you know, you

105said alcohol is still there, but is there really anything worse than the impacts of social media and bullying through social media? >> So, um, one of the first slides talked about my dissertation when I graduated with my PhD in clinical psychology. It focused on the increase uh of um relapses and substance use during the co pandemic. And a theme there and it's funny because my initial dissertation topic, my presentation was on social media and the detrimental effects on everybody, not just children. You know, I have a PhD in clinical psychology. I have a masters in applied psychology. And I'm swayed by social media. There's two factors that I always talk about and I just did a pres presentation with for the ConnectWat school district. It's um positive self-promotion and negative self-comparison. Positive self-promotion is look

106at what a great life I have. But you know on that slide there's a house fire and laundry waiting to be done and it's just terrible. And on the other end people are looking at being like my god why can't I have a life like Kate? Look at Ian's car. Why can't I have that? And that depletes people's self-esteem and that contributes to increased substance use and increased >> anxiety and depression. It's all interrelated. >> I hope one of the discussions or one of the quarterly meetings with the students will be uh bringing in residents from the your residential program because I know the health classes did it in the past. Um I particularly when my my kids were there and uh the it was the gentlemen at the time that they brought in were

107very open and honest and I think it really made an impre impression particularly when the health when the kids were in the younger grades for health class and like as a freshman sophomore you know um it was very impactful and in fact we've had the schools had um presentations where they invited students students and parents and had residents and they all told their story and it was really eye opening for folks. And then a couple years back, myself and now the superintendent, Adam Fine, had a show on LTV called Honest Conversations, and we did two segments interviewing one of the residents. And you know, he was a star lacrosse player and got injured and found himself in his grandparents' medicine cabinet. And then you know the went downhill from there and and it was just

108really um impressionable for for the students. >> The school mentioned that and uh that that is definitely something that's on the table finding the right individual to >> you know connect with them is it uh one of the other things that I did want to share with you um one of the things we are talking about is I'm not sure how many of you are sports people I know I'm not. Uh we had Michael Sweetney who was a former NBA player uh Bulls and Knicks come in and talk about how his depression derailed his career and um >> it's great because he's like so relatable and you look at this guy and he's a monster and he's a NBA star and he's been on TV and he talks about you know very openly and raising

109awareness and how he was able to overcome it and that's something that's very impactful and we want to bring that to the school as well. >> Great. Well, thank you for joining us today. We really appreciate >> you folks. I appreciate your time. Can I just reiterate the comments and say thanks for the the service you provide. I think it's uh you know hugely important the help you provide and the hope. I think that you know people need to realize that there is hope and it's easy when you're caught under your own the weight of whatever it is you're facing that you you don't have that and so you stepping in to to give people that hope is is really important and greatly appreciated. >> Thank you folks. >> Thank you. >> Okay, we've got

110another presentation here coming in with Samantha Klene. Welcome Sam. and she's going to give us an update on our 2025 grants. >> Thank you. >> Um, yep. So, I'm here to talk about the grants so far this year. Um, so I serve as the grants division for the town of East Hampton. Um, helping to pursue new applications to state, federal, and nonprofit agencies. Um, and assisting administration of grant-f funed projects. Uh so this work involves collaboration with town departments, community organizations, representatives from agencies in New York State as well as more uh regional organizations. Um grant programs are meant to alleviate challenges, offer opportunities, and provide public benefits. Um, it's up to the local government though to be an advocate for itself but also its constituents to seize these opportunities and try to bring in

111additional funding to pursue projects. Um, these funds can help to bridge gaps in total project costs, provide opportunities for innovation, and act as a catalyst to help advance an idea. All of this frees up uh town funds to be used for other purposes when we do receive grant funding. East Hampton has made significant strides in bringing in investments to our township from other agencies. There are currently at least 15 grant awards totaling to roughly 5.4 million. Um, six are grants awarded with a contract and the project is being administered. seven have received um some sort of notice that an award is pending and so there is ongoing collaboration with the grant agency to supply each other the necessary information to create a contract about that grant award. Um we also have two grants that have

112faced challenges a few years ago which caused project delays and since then we are now um working to reactivate those. We also have seven applications that are pending review. Um, I always appreciate the advice from the town supervisor that with pursuing grants, we're not going to get anything we don't ask for. So, we're asking for it. Um, we submitted uh seven applications and they total to about 8 and a half million altogether. Um, so this is a snapshot summary of all these grants. Kind of proof that I'm not making these numbers up. Uh so the town isn't given blanket grants to spend on anything the town wishes. All these uh grant amounts are tied to specific projects with terms um based on the application we submitted but also based on the contract with the grant

113agency. So their input as well. Um I do want to call attention to the range of project types listed. Um, so that broad range means that a lot of town departments are a part of these grants. So just going down the line here, it's police, police garage, highway, sanitation, planning, natural resources, capital projects, buildings and grounds, parks, aquaculture, housing authority, police, marine patrol. Um, in addition to those department leads, um, the finance team creates budget lines, helps to calculate match components. The attorney's office reviews and authorizes contracts. Um, purchasing department facilitates all the bids for these. Um, and every council person on the town board has really been an advocate for these projects and signing on to them and helping them go from really just an idea to actually getting the ball rolling and trying

114to advance these. So, it's just a really significant team effort. So, wanted to make sure to acknowledge all the moving police pieces here. Um, fortunately for us all, I will only talk about a third of these today. Um, so the ones I'm leaving out of this presentation, I think we'll just have more significant updates in a couple of months. So, I just figured it would be appropriate to wait until then when there's a little bit more uh concrete things to say about them. So, the most uh recent larger grant cycle that closed uh less than three weeks ago, the consolidated funding application or CFA we're used to calling it. Um and the regional economic development councils, they open an opportunity each year that includes 16 programs from eight agencies. Um all the programs are released

115under the same notice of funding in midMay with the same deadline of July 31st. There's a lot of opportunity there. So the town makes every effort to identify at least one application under the CFA. It is difficult to submit more than one application because they have that same window of opportunity and each of them could require over a 100 questions, dozens of documents um as well as letters of support, coordination with um partners and really uh defining a scope of work. Um this year we were able to mobilize two applications to move forward. the natural resources inventory and infrastructure related to the Route 114 new housing development project. Um, so the town applied to DC's climate smart communities grant program for 200,000 to develop a natural resources inventory. The town's previous work in climate actionoriented

116policies um gave us a bronze certification as a climate smart community. While that isn't required to apply to this, it automatically gave us more points in in this grant application. So, it's good to have this previous work that's um helping us pursue new work as well. The NRI will gather information pulled from multiple sources into one centralized report and GIS, updating GA and gathering new data as necessary. The NRI will be a planning tool uh to inform site plan reviews uh conservation policies uh management plans and land use decisions. To develop that application, we designed a work plan looking closely at tasks that align with the the types of NRIs that the climate smart community program wants to fund. So we included climate threat assessments to natural resources to advise climate actionoriented management plans. So

117that would be something like taking into consideration into consideration threats from invasive species and the type of management work that might be involved with that that's climate driven. Um environmental organizations will also be included in this project if we are awarded through a project advisory committee and a facilitation of stakeholder engagement with the public and land use uh professionals. Our application also identifies an administrative capacity plan of town staff members specifying their expertise and involvement with different tasks. Uh we describe local challenges, how this project alleviates those challenges, and um talk through establishing a process of continually updating the NRI so that way we're able to evolve our data and our plans and our decisions as our climate does. The other application uh submitted under the RECC um consolidated funding initiative is to Empire State

118Development's Proousing Community Supply Fund program um for $4,96,000. Uh the application requests funds towards the required infrastructure for the Route 114 new housing development project, which will create 50 new housing units to increase access to quality and affordable housing for members of the community. East Hampton was one of the first uh townships on Long Island to be certified proousing community recognized by New York State. Uh with the governor coming here herself to give us that designation. uh that really um you know, one shows the town's commitment to affordable housing, but it also opens doors for East Hampton to be eligible for these funding sources um by showing that we're already taking steps on our own to to work towards the affordable housing crisis experience very wide. There's strong ongoing collab collaboration between the town supervisor's

119office and our partners at other agencies to find solutions to these widespread challenges that have greater implications on economic activity and quality of life um that go beyond just our jurisdictional boundaries. Um from these ongoing channels of communication, Empire State Development's Long Island office was able to brainstorm with the town on what might be a fit. And so the route 114 and specifically the infrastructure related expenses to it um kind of rose to the top as something that we should really make an application for. Housing affordability is a challenge fel felt by many in the community and the town's efforts to address the affordable housing crisis include a very diverse portfolio of programs with housing projects and first-time home buyer um financial assistance to singles but also young families and the elderly. So, in this

120grant application, we discuss the h housing challenges and opportunities um as well as the project's readiness that the town has already made efforts to have the proper zoning in place, uh preliminary cost estimates, and we're in the process of hiring someone through an RFQ for the design and build. Um, and these awards are typically for CFA, they're typically announced in uh late November. And this was in conjunction we work, you worked handinhand with Katie Casey, the executive director of the East Tempting Housing Authority. And what I was going to, you know, bring up in my liaison report, uh, later is that, you know, on Friday when the governor was out here, not only did she cut the ribbon, announced the contract for the fuel management program for Nap Peak and Heather Hill State Parks, um,

121but I had an opportunity to sit with her for 15 minutes one-on-one. And uh I will tell you, Sam, I put in a plug for the $4.1 million for the housing supply and explain to her the project. And yeah, so >> no and um I mean Katie Casey is such an allstar to work with. Um so she's really great at all these initiatives and so working with her on this application just made it so strong and yeah. >> Um so grant funds can also assist innovative projects. um coming forward. So the town has been awarded $500,000 towards the 27 rest stop Georgia storm water abatement project. This is to install rain gardens, permeable pavers and other green infrastructure to divert, absorb and filter storm water before it enters Georgia pond uh which is a body

122of water that has experienced significant water quality concerns. grants awarded to the town by New York State elected officials um usually ends up being administered through the dormatory authority which is uh known as DSNY. We currently have three grants at them. So this project in particular, it's being managed by Melissa McCarron who's the town's principal environmental analyst. So she's overseeing the hired consultants that are developing the D design plans and working with the property owner, the department of transportation. Uh from the G grant end, I'm helping to work with Dazzy um on making sure that we have the documents that we need through the supervisor's office, the attorney's office, and occasionally working with the town project manager and the consultants um where that's necessary. So, currently the town is working with the Department of Transportation

123to help meet Dazzy's requirements, which is basically proof of site control. So, we're just working on the proper documentation and then once we have that, we'll be able to have a contract for those grant funds. The town received an award for um $600,000 for the sustainable planning in coastal communities project that was through a 2023 CFA application um under the environmental protection fund, LWRP. Um, this will be a three-year long planning effort to support year-round resilience in the community through developing options for building and zoning code updates that are data driven, feasible to implement, vetted with the community, assess for economic impacts, and are legally sustainable. Um, this might include exploring paths forward for property owners after a major storm event, expedited recovery, um, TDR programs, and rebuilding in a way to avoid repetitive loss.

124Um, the town with assistance from an ad hoc steering committee worked with the grant agency on the work plan, task items, and deliverables to be met through this project. Currently, the town is waiting for an executed contract from the Department of State. Um, we did have a first round draft that the town attorney's office reviewed. Um, the town supervisor signed. Uh, so now that's back over to the grant agency and we're just waiting for it. But the town did receive permission to issue an RFP and go through the process to hire a contractor. So our team is anticipating coming to the town board in September with a hire with a recommendation of who we think should be hired for that project. Um, I will say that we received excellent proposals, so I don't think that

125there's going to be a wrong choice, but we're hoping to come to you in September with that. In addition to long range planning grants to address the community's economic and ecological resilience, there are other resilience and habitat improvement grants like the living shorelines. The project is funded by $350,000 from National Fish and Wildlife Foundation. It's ongoing in the process for design plans and permitting. It's currently at the stage of biological assessments and surveys. Um, as demonstrated in the image here, that design can end up including a variety of components like oyster reefs, rocks, and vegetation that can start in the water, go through the title zone, and then go landward as well. Um, as the consultants get further along in these assessments, they will be brought to the town board and the public for feedback.

126We regularly submit reimbursement requests and reports to the grant agencies on the project's process being that it's um a longer range one that will take a few years. So for projects like the living shorelines design that have multiple reimbursements requests um I have an example of uh this is kind of behind the scenes um how we're tracking the expenses and reimbursement requests and the received process payments for grant funded projects. So on the b bottom half of this sheet are the town's payments to consultants and then on the top half we're just showing um what invoices are included on which reimbursement requests and then if those have been received by the town or not. Basically, the the point in this tracking is to have a financial summary all in one place, but also in case

127there's um any discrepancies, we're able to notice them right away of what did we request, where did it come from, and did we receive that amount? So other projects um like the Old Stone Highway Culvert replacement in Springs by the General Store um they might not require that level of tracking if the payment requisition is planned to be submitted all at once for the full grant amount. So this was partially funded by a $250,000 grant. It was awarded by Assemblyman The Office and administered by Dazznney. Um, culverts help with water flow management and they're a great example of balancing the needs of a natural and built environment with infrastructure that provides a connection for the natural waterways while also balancing the need for safe transportation above the waterway. The town secured a grant dispersement agree

128agreement for this and as of last week we submitted the project's first and only payment requisition for the full grant amount as the covert replacement portion of that project was uh just recently completed. The ditch plains dune restoration was an impressive grant awarded to the town by Governor Hokll's office for two and a half million to install a protective vegetated dune system at Ditch Plains Beach in Montalk. The town has been working with the dormatory authority and secured a grant dispersement agreement for these funds. Um, considering the significant dollar amount of this grant, the town might want to have a similar tracking process to the Living Shorelines grant where we submit multiple reimbursement requests as the project advances just because of the the sum of the money involved. Uh, the photo on the left is

129from a mock press conference that Councilwoman Kate Rogers ran for a group of teens who are practicing their journalism and reporting skills. Um, I just wanted to show the the point that the ditch plane dune restoration project is really just such a great example of inter agency partners coming together around these major issues and working towards resilience of long-term solutions for healthy beach ecosystems that are in addition to sand placement and creating a natural system that can better withstand weather events and provide resilience improvements to those in the surrounding neighborhood as well. by being this natural barrier that absorbs wave energy and water. Um there was a recent update at the last work session about this project. So I would definitely defer to that for all the details. Uh but the town recently received the

130permit from the DC. So that was that's a really big step forward. The town applied for and received notice of two new grant awards this year. The first, there are some additional steps before it's secured into a contract. The Westlake boat ramp stormwater abatement project was submitted to Suffach County's WQ QPRP program, and the review committee for that application um is recommending the town for $100,000 award. The next step to make this award official and secure is the Suffach County legislature has to review and hopefully adopt a resolution that would appropriate the funds for this particular purpose and then we would enter into an intermunicipal agreement. Um the purpose of the project is to implement green infrastructure which will include permeable pa p p p p p p p p p p p p p

131p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p pavers and bio retention are areas um to reduce and filter the amount of storm water running into Lake Muk. The town also received a grant award uh just last week to purchase a plaque acknowledging the Montalk Playhouse as a building recognized on the National Register of Historic Places. Uh this is valued at around $400. >> Yes. I know. I'm like, "Huh? How come like the grants have this weird like number?" And I'm like, "Oh, it's the plaque." Um, but so we're currently working with the company that makes the plaque and um delivery should be about 10 weeks. Uh, the plaque is going to say the Montalk Tennis Auditorium because

132that was um the original designation when it became uh recognized as historic places. Uh so that goes back to the original name in the Carl Fischer era before that building transferred hands a few time and eventually was donated to the town in the late 90s. Um now that we have a you know good understanding of the process to get these plaques um there an example is pictured on the right there. If there are any other historic buildings um that we would like one for now we know the grant opportunity and kind of how it works. So uh just let me know if that's me in contact was very supportive to um Springs Library and also the uh Amiganza Life saving station have the same >> also then to their bronze plaques and there's other historical

133uh recognitions that they might offer too. Just let us know. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. They do um roadside markers as well. So yeah um great agency to work with. Um okay so I'm going to wrap up here. Uh so the last presentation going over the status of various town grants was given in January of this year. In that presentation we talked about a look ahead a look ahead for 2025. So I thought it would be appropriate to bring up that information and kind of talk about how we're doing with that. So that included um applying lessons learned on the process for grant applications and specific projects. Um so we're kind of doing internal ongoing tweaks. Um, for example, creating a two-page grant submission debrief with some key highlights of basically a who, what, when, where,

134why, how. So that way the applications, you know, they can be maybe 50 pages long. So it's nice to have like a one to two pager that names all the letters of support we received, who they were from, how much we asked for, who the grant agency was. Um, so just basic information like that. Um and then every year we prepare for and apply for certain cyclical grant opportunities. So this year we did that for the household hazardous waste grant program which is a reimbursement for our stop days um as well as the clean vessel assistance program. So that's reimbursement um for our landbased pumpout facilities. So that's the partnership that we have with the trustees that they provide that service to recreational boers. um and the consolidated funding application which has those um 16

135programs that roll out. We know that that's going to have a ton of opportunity every year. So, we would try to make sure to be prepared when that window opens. Um and ultimately just pursuing additional funding opportunities that we aim for this to be a continuous and ongoing thing that we're um growing for the town of East Hampton. >> Right. where whereas you take the capital plan each year and you look at you know for certain projects you're looking for funding opportunities for us or >> and and vice versa right we get a email from one of the state agencies they're promoting a new project and then again you pull out your handydandy capital plan and >> compare it and we're really grateful for you know you've done a tremendous job in this role Sam

136really outstanding >> very appreciate appreciate it. Yeah, definitely a team effort with a lot of people involved. Thanks. >> Let me say just one. I think it even came from uh Sam, but also others. Ian McKe, I think you recognized the a playground uh grant. There a lot of grants that are out there. And you know, it's if it's something that works, great. Uh but you know, if you don't try, you're not going to get it. I think the wor when it comes to grants, the worst action is no action, right? >> You know, there's been a lot of benefits of it then, too. Uh, so I think it's appropriate and I I appreciate the supervisor's administration for moving ahead on on on grants and your role in the town too, Sam. >> Thank you.

137>> I kind of look at it bringing, you know, taxpayer dollars back to the community. Um, the when we say grants and we say state grants and all of that, I like to be mindful of who's funding that >> and uh your dedication to bringing those dollars back for our community is is really outstanding. And it it is competitive. I mean, that's a word I didn't hear yet, but these are very competitive grants and to be able to uh get them is challenging. Sometimes it's more than one cycle. Uh you'll fail in one cycle and then you're know what you need to do for the next cycle. So that kind of persistence also is is pays off uh in the long run. But a lot of the things that we do would be really burdensome

138or impossible to do without bringing some of that funding back to us. So grants are critical for everything that we do. Just like supporting nonprofit organizations, uh we give that money to support our community because it's the money that goes back from the community goes back to the community. So I think that's the most important thing uh for me of seeking these grants and then the work is just getting started. when you secure the grant, which I've learned, um then then it really holds you also to to produce what you've applied for and it keeps you going. As for me, I I know now I have to produce. I've gotten this grant. It's not just words, it's action. And that's always the best feeling. uh to be able to do that and have the deadlines

139and have the dates and have the structure that we create um and and get approved for really uh really gets to goals. >> Yeah, I would just like to say thank you, Sam. You know, we've worked together a little bit on grants and you're fantastic and it's it's hugely important uh to the town. You know, as Kate mentions, it's it's fiscally responsible. Not that grant money comes from no place. It's taxpayer dollars that's gone to different, you know, levels of government in all likelihood, but um, you know, doing what we can to fund our projects to keep our town beautiful and um, and thriving is great, and I think you've been, um, a huge part of that. So, thank you. >> I'll echo my colleague sentiments. I mean, I I I don't have the patience

140for what you do, truthfully, like, and I'm very grateful we have you in the role doing it because there's a huge benefit to the taxpayers here for us. Thank you. All right. Okay. Now, we've got the the last topic on for today is the draft affordable multiple residence legislation. Is is Eric going to be um >> He's virtual. >> Okay, great. Thank you, Jason. So, you want to kick us off, Ian? >> Sure. Yeah, we spoke about this last week. I think we had a good a good conversation. Um a long conversation because I rewatched it. Um, and you know, as everybody knows, I'm a huge supporter of this legislation. I do think the details are important, but I also think action's important. So, um, I'd like to thank Eric for all the work he

141put into it, as did last week, and I' I'd really like to thank Britney as well. I mean, Britney made a ton of changes based on our conversation. We went back and forth a lot and has just been immensely helpful. And I think um, we have a really good draft here. Hopefully, we can discuss the details and I look forward to moving it to public hearing. >> Great. So, how do you want to do this? Do you want to uh >> I guess I would just let I mean, if you want me just to go through it, I can. Um I don't know if Eric was going to um Eric, do you have anything you want to present or do you prefer if I just sort of >> um I mean, I don't have anything

142that uh that I was um prepared to present specifically. Uh I can give an overview of the changes if you'd like. >> Um Sure. And also share the uh draft document as amended. So um just to give you an overview uh since the last discussion um we went back and worked on some of the provisions um really four areas specifically one was changing the minimum lot size to 40,000 square ft. Um the other was unit standard so including um the minimum unit size. If you remember there was a really a typo in there saying 400 square ft would be the minimum size. We wanted to do 300 which conforms with the minimum size of a unit for an ADU. Um we also modified the lot density requirements. Um that was just to reflect that the

143starting uh minimum lot area would be 40,000 square ft. Doesn't change the uh overall permitted density of four units per acre. Um and then there was the question of sustainability standards um uh specifically solar and uh all electric requirements. Uh and you'll see I'll screen share in a second. Um we changed that to apply to new construction and substantial expansion. Um but what I will do is screen share so that the board can see the document and then I will leave you to uh have a conversation. So hopefully you can see the screen and the specific wording that's proposed right now. Um you'll see these uh highlighted are the changes since the last time the board reviewed the document. Um I will scroll down just for a sec to to show you all of them.

144Um so you'd see those first two relate to the minimum lot area. Um the minimum size of a unit being 300 square ft being the second one. The third issue um being again the maximum permitted density would still be four units per uh acre or 40,000 square ft. But clarifying that sort of the starting um size is 40,000 ft². I apologize. You can see there's clearly a typo in here where 10,000 square ft was written out twice. We will correct that. Um, and then the uh final topic was the energy sustainability requirements. So, I think I'll scroll up to the the first two and uh let the board begin that conversation. >> Yeah. So, Kathy, I don't know if you want to go through sort of point by point of the changes or if you

145prefer sort of >> Yeah, I mean that's we can. >> Sure. So, I mean, I guess I I would just start with the minimum lot size. We changed that from 20,000 square feet, just under half an acre to 40,000 square feet. As I said at the previous meeting, I'm I'm not in favor of that. Um I understand that we want to be cautious. Um and we don't want to, you know, have affordable housing in the wrong places and therefore jeopardize our our very goal of of more affordable housing. Um but I think if we don't allow what we're doing here is creating a use and that use would only be allowable within the affordable housing overlay district. There aren't many properties as we discussed last time that this would actually apply to currently. So any

146any property that wanted to take advantage of this use would need to go through two public hearings. One to put an AHO on their property to have the ability to propose a project and the second one would be a special permit before this the planning board which is a fairly high bar and they would need another public hearing. And so in my mind we want to build the flexibility. This is a big problem. Affordable housing is a is a huge crisis. I think all of all five board members or four board members and the supervisor all have acknowledged that. And I just think that we want to keep our options open. I envision a time at which a threequarter acre property or or something smaller than 40,000 square feet seems like the perfect place, but

147if we don't allow the flexibility, we wouldn't have the ability to um to put that designation in a in a in a useful way. On the other hand, if we're worried about um inappropriate places for this, we still have the power of zoning. And I think that there's always a concern of a future board maybe making the wrong choice, but frankly, I think that they could just change the code anyway. And so, I just don't want to um I I I want the lack of affordable housing and the urgency to really drive this and not our concern about um what might happen if if if and I just think it's the right thing to do to um allow for, you know, for for for smaller opport smaller properties to have the ability to request this

148use or for us to reszone them. And frankly, I think if we had a situation where there were two halfacre properties directly adjacent to each other and we put the AHO on, having two structures, one on each property with two apartments in each is not incredibly different than having a 1acre property with two structures on that one property with two units each. I think the the density implications are the same. Um, and again, I just think we I want to build in flexibility and roof barriers. So, that's my opinion, but I I think that I might be the minority. So, shall I go next? Sure. >> Um, so yeah, I I agree with the crisis. I agree with everything that you said except what I'm concerned with is again this is this isn't just open

149to nonprofit organizations. This is also open to forprofit um developers. And um when I'll look at the rental registry law, we had a lot of locals that wanted to that it's a necessity for them to rent out their houses to be able to afford uh living here year round. That's an acceptable use. That's all what we wanted. Um and now we saw what happened. We're we're trying to now going to try to come back and put a genie in a bottle back in a bottle with new regulations because that rental registry has been abused by um non-local platforms that are just interested in in um extracting all that they can out of the community. That's the model I don't want to see coming forward. And I can talk from my experience on the board of

150having to now come back and try to put something back that uh uh take away something that you've already given to people pre-existing non-conforming it. I don't think it's solid planning. And that's why um the minimum now we could always decrease it, but then trying to put it back up if we saw that that didn't work is a risk that I just don't think is smart planning. Um and so I still uh um maintain supporting the 40,000 square foot. We saw now when we developed the we we ma went through major changes on community housing recognizing the crisis that I think you'd have to really I don't know where you'd be to not understand what's going on in the community and the lack of workforce housing. Um, but I also think uh we we increased

151we went from, you know, so many in each school district. We raised that number. We created the ADU codes. We're doing this. We're doing this. I just think in in a 30,000 uh uh foot view of planning that we could see what happens and add um I think we have very dense areas in this town of half acres that it doesn't work for the folks that live there. They're not near transit hubs. They're they're not near um ease of walking. I think we have to think of the people that are going into these units also and how that affordability extends beyond just the structure, right? If they're if we designate areas that would be closer to transit hubs, closer to business districts, adjacent to business districts, and have those go down to 20,000 square foot,

152I'm in favor of that. but having a non, you know, a an international development company come in and build a for-profit housing up in the Northwest Woods where now the people that live there are stuck and unable to easily access all the other affordable needs that they have, child care, the things we talk about. Um, it doesn't work for me. So I'm still at 40,000 square foot >> initially except I could see areas adjacent to business districts and ease of transportation where we could go down. >> But if we if we don't I mean I I agree with you in terms of there's appropriate areas and inappropriate areas. But what we're creating is a use that would be allowed in a zone we would then have to apply to those areas we deemed appropriate. So

153I I agree wholeheartedly with everything you're saying. I just think this tool allows for all of that without restricting the use itself. The the overlay, I believe, you know, just like any kind of zoning, we would not put a commercial industrial zone in the middle of a residential area. We could it'd be a bad idea, and I think there'd be bad ideas or bad places for this to go, but I I I just don't think it's inconsistent with the um the allowance. >> Would anyone else like to comment? I I'm still comfortable at the 40,000 square feet. Uh I think it's it would be good to see how this log is rolled out. Who will the users might be and if we have to adjust at least of opportunities to adjust in the future? >>

154Um I I I follow insight on this one. I I I think 40,000 is too restrictive. I I think we've seen this elsewhere with the ADU code that you know we are facing a housing crisis but we are legislating for not addressing a housing crisis. I don't think that having the 40,000 foot requirement actually is going to deliver enough significant housing frankly. Um I I think this should be lower. Um you know I I appreciate that you know it it doesn't work for families always you know being not next to a transport hub but I don't think at this point in time with where housing is in the town we can afford to be this picky. I think we need to be very aggressive on this or we are not going to address this. And

155I think this has been a consistent theme. I mean, the housing crisis hasn't just arrived. It it's been building over time, and unless we actually take a step to, you know, seriously address it by allowing increased housing on these smaller lots, I I I don't see us actually truthfully addressing this problem. So, I would like to see this being a lower level. >> Okay. I I'm comfortable with the with the 40,000 square feet. And I think what we could do is, you know, have it on the agenda for July 1st of next year where we evaluate where we're at and we can reconsider at that point um reducing the square footage. >> One other thing, I guess, just about I'm sorry, Kate, about the um and I also agree with the the ability for, you

156know, abuse. We don't want this to be um for short-term rentals, but there is a year- round lease provision in that. And so um you know I understand we want to be cautious but I think that if you look at how the code is spelled out who is allowed to do this now enforcement is going to be very important what mechanisms we use 100%. Um but I don't think this is a situation where these could be rented out at all. In fact they can't. >> No. Yeah. I wasn't relating that somebody's going to come along and do short-term rentals. I'm just trying to make sure that that when the people live, the people who actually going into the housing are served by the other assets of the community that helps them. Not everybody who needs

157a workforce housing can afford a car. Not every So that for me is what I was really talking about. We created a use, a rental registry use. It's a use that we haven't had before. And now without trying to think of ways that because one of the reasons why we have an affordable housing crisis is the acknowledgement that that it the land here is so profitable for investors. It's incredibly profitable more than any place else I've ever lived or have ever seen. So I'm just trying to make sure that what we're doing and create by creating a new use isn't there are ways to find out how you can maximize profit but not really deliver a community for the people that we're placing in these structures. people that now say, "Okay, now I have to

158the the struggles don't end with just having a house, a roof over their heads, but if they could walk to work, if they could do this, if they could I think those are priority areas and and that's what I would like to see built in." We we spoke about it and that's where I could really see going down to 20,000 square foot now around adjacent uh commercial districts and transportation areas. But just to do a blanket across the town, were people going to be stuck miles away from those opportunities? I don't know if we're helping or hurting. And before we figure out that we're hurting, I'd like to see how it would work. >> But it wouldn't be blanket across the town. That's just my opinion. No, I No, I totally understand. I think and

159and by the way, I think this is a very healthy conversation and I think there's nuance to the stuff that we should have publicly. I don't think there's any wrong. Everybody here, I think, has good intentions, good ideas, so there's nothing wrong with with with disagreeing. Um, but it's not it's not a blanket across the town. It's an overlay district that would be specifically applied to particular places. And if and if you we thought the business districts were the appropriate place, and I happen to agree with that, then we'd want the tool to be able to apply it there. And what we're doing is cutting ourselves off from that. >> But we wouldn't be doing that if we allowed it to if we said 20,000 square foot near commercial districts within within a budding commercial

160districts. We can do that now. It's not one or the other. >> And I'm good with that. I'm good. And then one of the things the governor spoke about was, you know, MTA property, you know, stateowned property around, you know, train stations and things like that. She's open to looking at having those those properties be converted to affordable housing. So, I'm I'm good in in certain areas where I just don't think in Northwest Woods or in Springs, I'm ready to go to 20,000 square feet, but on on North Main Street where it's already called up for in the Hamlet study, I'm I would be open to u 20,000 square foot. So, I guess if there's, you know, maybe we need to take, you know, a scalpel to this and not, you know what I mean?

161because in certain areas I'm uh I'm concerned with making it right off the jump making it 20,000 square feet but if I'm you know near you know neighborhood business or whatever it makes more sense to me to have >> to drop it down there >> drop it down there so it's not like we're stopping it from going to 20,000 square foot I'm just asking it to be applied in certain areas >> but that's but we would apply the overall I mean I agree with you wholeheartedly with all >> it's much easier when you write it into the code than when you leave it up to interpretation. That's just being here long enough to see how everything gets interpreted in all kinds of different ways. >> Well, as proposed though, at 40,000, we wouldn't have the

162tool to to do the things that you're talking about supporting. So, I guess I would ask Britney or Eric if there's a way to sort of build in the um the where this would be appropriate in in language to to direct us where to put that overlay district. I think that just our ability to put the overlay district in those areas is enough. But if there's some other language to refer to in business districts or whatever, I'm open to that. I just think if we pass this, we won't have the ability, we won't have this tool in our in our tool belt to apply it to places that we're all saying we think is appropriate >> at the moment >> because we can always revisit >> and the moment's important. We're we're way late affordable

163housing, you know, solutions and we're all dedicated to it, but I just don't want to I don't want to slow roll it. I want to do it thoughtfully, but I think it's time. >> I I think the other piece here that's, you know, worth being really open and honest about is that look, when we talk about Springs and Northwest Woods, there are illegal multi-ousing units in those areas where people choose to live and and need to live because the quality of life they get there is significantly better than commuting in from Deer Park on a daily basis, etc. So I I think you know in terms of the wear I appreciate that you know it might not be desirable in certain elements you know impacts on school districts etc. But >> that's a consideration we

164haven't even really it is a consideration but >> to look at what the potential would be if everyone in springs could now take a half acre and double the density on it. We haven't seen anything about the impacts to school districts and that's our highest taxes out here for folks that live here who barely can afford to live here now. So, I just want to roll out something and and you know, we talk in theory and on paper, but then there's seems to be a difference when it gets out into the world. And I'm just wanting to make sure that we're not decreasing housing affordability for some and increasing it for other, especially when it's a for-profit model. Well, the for-profit nonprofit thing, I mean, I I don't know. I I don't know how deep

165we want to get into that, but to me, there's a there's a a profit limiting factor here, which is how much rent you can charge. And that's really important to me that that remains that people, and I think the planning board pointed this out, that who's going to do this? It's not going to make you enough money. And absolutely, it won't be the most profitable thing you can do. But in terms of who builds affordable housing, as long as it's serving the intended purpose, the intended goal, I I don't you know, afford nonprofit, for-profit, whatever, as long as it's it's it's helping us, you know, cover affordable housing. And frankly, part of this, I think, is to to give opportunities for more people to contribute to the affordable housing stock. >> And I think the

166other thing on the for-profit is is that listen, often the for-profit sector is a lot better at providing things than other sectors are as well. I don't think we can demonize the for-profit sector. I'm >> not demonizing for profit. I'm just saying it's there are there are ways to it's like saying everybody's a bad person that I'm not intending to say that. I don't think I have said that. I'm just I'm just looking to roll this out in a way that we don't have to scramble to create another solution on something that we've done with the best of intentions. Right? The rental registry was the best of intentions, but it opened a door that nobody foresaw. I just wanted to make sure that we're not opening doors that nobody foresaw when we're creating something a

167totally new use. >> And that that's just me. I mean, uh, you know, it's I'm >> that's how I feel. I want to make sure that we're doing the right thing when we live in an area where extracting the maximum amount of of financial gain out of every piece of property is in some people's minds. I can't ignore it. I can't pretend that it's not there, >> right? No, that that threat is always going to be there no matter what we do. I I think >> well, I want to do something about it. >> But for me, this comes down to how are we actually increasing the housing pool? And is this legislation going far enough in doing that? And at the 40,000, I I think, you know, when you look at the numbers and

168the number of lots, it's very restrictive. >> Well, it's but it's there's it's restrictive. Right now, it's at three acres. What we're suggesting right now is to drop it to to one acre, right? And more. So there is >> not a huge number of lots really fall into that category still. So it's kind of the the 20 versus the 40. I mean what will the market provide? Um you you know typically where these things come because they are rent restricted it's it's going to be cheaper building going up. I mean, because people irres whether they're building themselves or they're building for a for-profit organization with a rent restriction, people are going to try and minimize the cost of that build. I mean, that's just the nature of the market. And, you know, by saying you

169can only do on these lots, I I think it's restrictive. I think we we're limiting the number of the amount of housing we can actually offer, which >> it's not a permanent decision, though, right? It's not we're going to do it today and we can never revisit. We can never look back. We could never do anything. That's that's the idea that I feel like is being promoted, we either do it now or it can never happen in the future. The other thing is is that when we're sitting here talking about enforcement and registration and make you know people are going to have to do this people are we also then evaluating how much more staff we're going to have to do have to manage this and to make sure you know the the ordinance enforcement

170the building department. We just we just can't add new new uh tasks and new responsibilities for larger pro areas of town over larger things without anticipating that th that staffing is going to have to also be increased because enforcement as everyone across the town will say is always an issue. So that's why also again letting us build up staffing levels, not just dropping it in in one year in times where it's really tough to keep budgets going on um is important to me as well. Okay. >> So that we really are having enforcement. We really are not just saying words but we're doing them. >> No, I I I I agree with that. And I think like the the adequate funding and and you know staffing and and payment of employees and enforcement department to

171ensure that we have coverage there to enforce the laws we have is you know potentially problematic and you as you said we're seeing that with the short-term rentals you like people abusing that system and you know how do we have the mechanism and the operations in hand to do that. Um but I think you know conversely is that more of a problem than the absence of housing? If it's not enforced, we're not creating housing. >> And importantly, I think >> if we're creating housing that's abused, then no, we're not doing anything. >> I mean, even when we're looking at the short-term rentals, I mean, I I I think it's one thing to say, yes, there are people abusing it. But, you know, on the flip side of that coin, there's a lot of people, a

172lot of local families who, as as you kind of pointed out, that is a major source of their income and their survival means out here. And to, you know, so so people are >> we're being overrun, Tom, by short-term rental platforms that have people don't even live in this town because we didn't make that kind of residency requirement. So, we have people that live other places that are buying up houses left and right as an investment tool to make money through that. we could protect. Now we know right after we saw what happened that we need to come back and protect the local people who depend on this for to be able to pay their for their lives, desperately depend on this to make living here affordable with everything being so out of control across

173the board. But the that that's already happened and now we're going to try to pull it back. people already being hurt by the fact that there's investment companies out there telling you how to maximize. There's more than one. I've joined a number of them um that tell you how to maximize that extraction out of that property and are blowing away people being able to afford to live here. So for me, I just try to look at things holistically and not say, "Okay, we're going to solve this problem. Oh, wait, and then we'll go back and solve all the these other problems that crop up." That it's just my way of thinking. No, I listen I think the holistic approach is the right one to take this and I think you know when we talk about

174the problems we're facing as a town you know the what what people write to us about with complaints be it traffic um difficulty finding employees for your stores I mean these come back to housing like the the the holistic kind of piece that's there is the housing issue and that that's really where like look if if we wish to roll the dice in areas you know to address some of these issues Having a more aggressive approach on where and how we can build affordable housing for me >> is where I would potentially like to be aggressive. >> I get that. >> I agree and I agree with the holistic approach. I do think I want to go back to though if we approve this use, it would be a lot it would affect I think

175three or four properties which are very unlikely to be used for affordable housing as per Eric's original presentation. In order for anybody to take advantage of this, they would need an AHO which would require a public hearing. we would choose whether that was an appropriate area or not. And even in that case, they wouldn't be able to do this as of right. It's a special permit before the planning board, which is an incredibly high bar. I think arguably you could say that's too conservative that we should have it be as of right within that zone. We're not doing that because I fully appreciate the being careful and going slow. My concern is if we at this lot minimum lot area, we are just we're drawing the wrong line in the wrong place. And I know

176that we disagree and that's okay. >> So yeah. And then the categorization of this is aggressive, this is slow when we're dropping down from three uh three acres to one acre now with the possibility of going down revisiting in a year and looking at it. To me, that's not that that's really unfair to call that slow. I think those are characterizations and connotations that I I I don't I can't agree with. Um but, you know, I think best thing to do is to go to public hearing and let's hear what the community says. >> Yes. I mean, I'm all in favor of this going to public hearings. It's not just us who should be dictating >> from the community and whether they think 40,000 is the right number or they think 20,000 is the right

177number. Did >> you know I >> I just wonder if going from 40 to 20 after a public hearing would be substantial to require a new public hearing whereas going from 20 to 40 might not and I would defer to the attorneys on that. But yeah, absolutely. I'm I'm in favor of >> we need to hear from the community. >> I I agree. I think that's I mean just a note to the public and to the press on this. I mean, I think look, often with public hearing, and I'm being candid about this, it's often the same voices we're hearing. Um, and you know, this is such a critical issue that I think the more we hear from all of the public on this, um, and a wide spectrum of people, the better off we

178will be as a community. >> Great. So, we've already agreed to everybody was good last week with the 300 square feet. >> Yes. >> Yeah. I just want to think about that for one second. I'm sorry. I'm Cuz when you really think about how big 300 square foot is. So, how many bedrooms will go into 300 foot? >> One bedroom. >> Okay. All right. I'm okay with it. >> Okay. Next page. Um, where is we just it was just a correction. So, it's uh four units for for 40,000 square feet with one additional unit >> for the addition of 10,000 square feet. So, five units on 50, six units on 60,000 square feet. Everybody good with that? >> Yep. >> Okay. energy sustainability requirements. Okay, so this we we'll start with the landscaping piece and

179then we can talk about the all electric. >> Yeah, I mean I mean look again I think I was in the minority the consensus last time. I totally understand it and I I do want to thank Len and Nancy and Gloria for for their comments and the work that they do in town and their care for sustainability. I wholeheartedly agree. I know I risk making myself out to be a Disney villain to try to keep this, you know, part out of it and it's not that. I just uh I care about sustainability. I just think that this is not where we're going to make meaningful goals with respect to sustainability. Any sustainable this already has more shrinken standards having to go for a special permit. The planning board, you know, is is is harsh about

180this. So, what a regular homeowner for a, you know, wealthy mansion could do or a business is is more than what we're allowing for somebody trying to to construct affordable housing. Um, and I just have experience on the planning board. I was on the planning board for many years where you read code that was clearly well-intentioned, but the more regulations, the more rules you put in place, the more opportunity there is for that to be the hurdle. A previous speaker said today they're trying to remove barriers and and and I agree. So, it's not that I'm anti-sustainability. I hope that those standards, you know, are what people use. I just think that if it's going to be a rule for people constructing affordable housing, it should be a rule for people constructing, you know, mansions.

181So, so I'm happy to bring that forward. If you support sustainability across the town, if that's what you're saying, that for you it's that it's unfair that it's on a certain group and not a blanket group, well, you understand it. That's what I'm hearing you say. I'm happy to sponsor that legislation. And the reason is because, you know, we we we are in a climate crisis. And and again, to to now say, well, it applies to everybody, but we're just going to make we're going to cut out these people, these people, these people. when in actuality it is cheaper for the people that are going to live in those places to be a to maintain places when you're not adding irrigation when you're not fertilizing every 5 minutes when you're not doing all these things

182that we know are also harmful to the neighborhood harmful to water harmful to us as a planet. And we the town board passed a a a climate crisis declaration and it says resolve that by declaring this emergency. The town board is committing to make climate mitigation and the elimination of greenhouse gas emissions as a guiding principle and objective in all of municipal operations, all policy and purchasing decisions, all planning and zoning decisions, all aspects of town business for the foreseeable future. So, we declared that, we said that, and now I think we have to live up to our words and not just make words and declarations. And we know there's a correlation between all of these things and what's happening with the climate crisis. And I don't know why it how it's an impediment. It's

183it's less expensive for people to to have electric bills. We know this. These aren't madeup things. We see it in the field. And I just don't understand how we can say, "Well, this is an impediment." And and I don't understand what it is. I really don't. It's cheaper than doing ornamental landscaping. It's cheaper than using fossil fuels for the people that live there. And and I think that the way this is drafted, landscaping and screening shall prioritize sustainable practices and we're looking to minimize the use of fertilizers and irrigation. I mean, I would think that that's language we could all agree on. >> Sure. I mean, that's the minimum can This isn't the biggest point, but I do think it's important to note that I'm not advocating for an exception where they can be the

184standards are less stringent for affordable housing, just equal, not more. You know, >> I'm happy to bring it back across town if you're saying you support that. Um, >> I think that's exactly where I'd like to to go. >> Now, you're saying it's a separate conver I I I think that's exactly my my point on this, which is like, look, I don't think that this should in any way be restrictive for affordable housing. It's not restrictive. How is it restrictive? by definition regulation. It's a new it's a requirement. >> That's a very strange idea. Say required. It says shall prioritize. >> It's a very strange idea that protecting our planet and our community and our water. I'm sorry Ian. It's connected. But I think it's dictating what that building should be just just for this

185level of building. And I think the point here is is that like look that shouldn't be just for this building. That should be a discussion we have for all building in the town. And if that then applies to this, that's okay. But it should be for all building that not just the affordable building. >> But again, we have the opport we're creating a use and when you create something not to stick to the principles that you've already stated is not sticking to those principles that you've already stated. It it's not an impediment. It doesn't add some kind of thing other than a regulation to protect our water, our planet, everything. And I can go with those kinds of regulations. >> It's a fair point and the language the language I think is good, but I

186I just, you know, to to that point. >> Can I can we just go down the line? The way it's written, do folks agree with the way that it's drafted right now shall prioritize minimize the use. >> I would not include it, but I'm comfortable. >> I would not include it. would pull the paragraph inside. >> Okay. >> I just think they should follow the same sustainability standards that everybody else does. This is going to be a very small impact if all we do for sustainability is on affordable housing projects. >> So, let me ask you, >> would we require it on on daycare centers, sustainable landscaping or substance abuse facilities? I I just think it's a new if it's a new application, I think it should be. Yes. I mean, let's talk about hurricane

187>> climate emergency declaration. Let's talk about hurricane windows. when we realized there was a need to protect people better because the intensification of hurricanes one that we're facing right now fours and fives categories they they may even change the scale when we're building dunes because we already have such the type of erosion that it's impacting flooding in neighborhoods when we have fire threats that we're having to address with the southern pine beetle and then we're saying oh those aren't really related to what we do we're ignoring proven years long science. And so we've made a declaration. It doesn't impede people. It's cheaper for the people that live there. I'm happy to do it townwide. You're saying that's now a separate conversation, but why not? If we're creating something new, why not go with the new

188standards? If you build a house in Florida now, what you can put in windows and the type of of sheathing you can put in is not the same as what they used to do before. So the football field and the lighting, but we're putting it at Steven Town's path. It's astroturf. It's not grass. And the lighting is is going to impact the night skies. Is that a benefit to the community overall? >> No. Well, first of all, playing fields, as I've stated before publicly, are not the same as the grass in your backyard. They have to be more maintained, more irrigated, more than to me, they're not really a a regular grass playing field. So astroturf on these properties would be better. >> It's better than if you tried to put >> then absolutely fert

189fertilizing irrigating constantly. This is not your backyard that you can let go. >> And this is uh you know it's kind of apples and oranges to begin with Tom. I think it's a false choice because you have couple of playing fields versus properties across the town. But yeah, my opinion was, and it wasn't a popular opinion, that is the the fertilizer, the lime, the irrigation that you constantly have to do to put those in uh fields in actual playable uh ability, it it's not really that more sustainable. Also, you're really then saying to our kids for affordability who may the only way they get to college could be through a sports scholarship and can't play on the fields as much as all the kids up west. Too bad for you. And that's the opposite of

190what I'm trying to do here. I'm trying to keep the affordable section of our town, people in our town in the same idea as as what would be the best practices for people on >> I listen I and I I the concept of it having and all properties having sustainable growth is good and look if this is something we as a town board support not only do I think we should have legislation for it I think we should put our money where our mouth is on this and we should fund that on properties as a town we should we should find grant funding and we should, you know, implement that funding to do this. But I think having this uniquely in something that's trying to address housing is not the right approach. >> It's the

191next it's the future. So if we never make changes on anything we do in the future, all we're condemning people to do and us is to repeat the mistakes of the past. And when I'm talking about future planning, it's a clean slate. It has nothing to do with restrictions. And I don't again I I'm confused with the word restrictions and protecting the environment and the people that live in it from disaster. I I'm confused with that that calling that a restriction. >> So where we're at is Ian and Tom would like to strike that. Kate wants it in. I want it in. >> I'd like to see the difference between the word shall to must or or should prioritize. As I stated last time, I don't think it should be uh uh it should be

192determined by the the site the site plan and through the planning board to use what their prioritize and their emphasis is within the town code. As I said, there might be situations that they need screening trees >> that aren't going to be native uh that are going to be potentially needed to be watered initially and and that should be have a little flexibility in it that we're now actually decreasing the zoning here by adding more units. And that's where I'm coming from this. I understand. >> I just don't see it in here, David, where it says it has to be native plantings, >> the use of native grout. It's it's prioritizing the use, but it's not saying you can't use anything else. It's just prioriti. It's a priority to try to use >> this where

193you can. >> This is the example I'm talking about, though, because that language that is interpreted by the planning department and the planning board and to develop a landscaping plan. And so that language is going to lead them to use more natives. And that's the goal, I understand, but there there will be real impacts for that. What Dave is saying is that maybe in some cases other things are appropriate. Right. Well, that's why I thought shall prioritize means that that gives a lane if natives doesn't work in you know I I just feel like >> I mean Britney is that what it's intended shall prioritize does that give the planning board when they're looking at an application the ability to say yeah you can have those you know arborvites as your screening because that's what

194you need. uh but um they're looking at you to use other you know native plants maybe surrounding the foundation, >> right? So being able to prioritize it gives you an avenue should it not be practicable to do it otherwise. >> So the word shall and prioritize gives flexibility. >> Yes, that's how I read it. >> That's how I read it. >> So where are you at, David? I want to make sure there's flexibility whatever the language is and if you know if the other board members think there's another some more some more language that needs to I want to have flexibility in there. I don't think it should be um a must. >> Yeah, there is flexibility here in the the case of the planning board. We're not giving the flexibility to the applicants themselves.

195So, I think that this that's established and I'm I'm comfortable moving forward a public hearing with that language. I just would prefer not. >> All right. So then that's the last piece. All buildings shall be solar ready and all electric in appliance with applicable energy efficiency standards. Ian, you sent an email around this morning. >> Yeah. So I again I I I really can't thank Britney enough for how how on top of this she was with helping, you know, make these changes. And one of the last things is uh Jake and Eric had a conversation about state building code. So Britney came back with maybe a different some different language here. >> Um which >> which is the planning board as part of site plan review shall evaluate opportunities to evaluate energy efficient designs including

196solar ready sighting and all electric building systems consistent with New York state uniform building code. That's what you're looking to insert where B is. So yeah, the concern here is that under New York law, the state building codes and energy regulations establish a uniform standard that municipalities have to adhere to. So the and the town has also adopted those provisions with respect um to building construction. So the town can't mandate features beyond what the state law requires. And if this town were to try and um adopt something that's more restrictive, it would need to be approved and filed with the appropriate state agencies. So the the best way to go about it to make sure that it we can avoid a legal challenge and also have it be enforceable is to add that provision making

197reference back to the un the state uniform building code and um energy code. >> So we have to adhere to that. Correct. >> Correct. >> Right. So if they pass something, do we have the opportunity to say no, we're not going to have all electric in our community? >> No. >> But nobody nobody on the board saying that though. But it's passed. The legislation has already passed. It comes into the electric language. >> So the >> Yeah, that's a good question. >> We would be building in language that would refer back to that state code. The problem is that if we don't have that language, well, while the town may currently have authority to adopt energy efficient standards, even if they're not preempted, let's say today, um there's a risk that any future state legislation

198or updating of building codes could conflict. and then preempt our local legislation. >> It's kind of a safeguard with that. >> Okay. >> There's also an aspect of that then if if there's applicants that might come in sooner than the state law goes in effect then too they'd be maybe would actually be >> grandfather. >> No, not well they I don't like using the word grandfather. Pre-existing. If you wanted to say they would actually be in line to be able to use what the old code was. We'd actually don't put it in here. Personally, I know we had one caller said talked about being solar powered. I don't think that's correct either because we do have a CCA and there could be other electric avenues, you know, out there said solar powered. I still am

199very comfortable being solar ready, but not necessarily all electric on there. And that just goes into a construction protocol that in the end it might actually be cheaper for the applicant or or the the builder. Also, >> my view on this is similar to to Ali like Logan. These are two things that I I overall support, but I don't think we should have that language specific to this part of the code. >> I I agree wholeheartedly. I I prefer Britney's amended language, but I just don't think we should be adding a more stringent requirement on affordable housing than we do for anybody else. And one other thing about solar ready, I mean, look, I I have a um I own 125KW solar facility. It's one of the larger private facilities in town probably. So, I'm

200not anti-solar, but in the process of doing that, I looked at putting solar in my house, and the solar company said it was a bad place for it because it's in the shade. So, you know, at a certain point the the words matter and I this is what I'm concerned about that at some point there's a nice place in the woods and they got to clear the pines to make the solar work or they put solar on that can never function. And that's where I think overregulation can become a problem. And if we're already saying the state is going to do it or we then what what's the point here? And if we don't do something either through the state or through the town as a whole and the only benefit we get on all

201electric is through these affordable housing projects but not everywhere else. I just think it's a minimal impact and you know not productive. >> You actually just made a very good point to me. You're right because I looked at the solar mine also and I thought I was going to get a lot more out of it than I actually could at the time. I'm pretty clear on there. So you're correct. So if we're talking about either decre not not decreasing trees but at the same time you can't actually use solar on top of yours you're forcing them into it but it's but it's got to be solar ready but you well you have to look at me that way because you're still caramel >> yeah and I and I will say >> I might be your

202gaston down here my Disney villain but uh yeah >> uh you know but but that's that's a that's a that's a very good point. I wasn't looking in that way. Um give me a second. >> Yeah. Well, you and it's funny because we looked at it as well too and with the way with our sighting, it wasn't going to cover all of our electric. Um, but I guess because East Hampton Housing Authority, all of their recent projects have all been all electric and solar ready, but I'm now you bring it up that they can be solar ready because they're building the the project and they're putting parking so it's cleared and there's, you know, they have the ability they don't have to clear. So, I I get that. Um, so I'm I'm willing to, you

203know, I get the solar ready piece that that's not going to work for everybody. >> Can we reread what Sorry. Sorry. >> So it said the planning board as part of site plan review shall evaluate opportunities to evaluate energy efficient designs including solar ready sighting and all electric building systems consistent with New York State uniform building code. >> Yeah, I'm good with that. the uh most important part is consistent with New York State building code which is going to have people build all electric to begin with. So we're kind of saying we don't want to do it but it's already being done >> and I'm good with that. >> Okay. So that it will be what it is what what people will have to do whether we do it or not. >> Right. >> Okay.

204>> Do we want to leave in that solar ready language? >> No. We want to pick up we want to pick up what >> I can take solar already out as long as we have the other language in >> she still refers to solar and and because that's what we were asked has asked for. So it's still in there >> but it's asking them the shall evaluate opportunities to evaluate energy efficient designs. So when they get to the planning board, the planning board's going to say, "Okay, so we're speak to me about your energy efficient designs. You know, is this an all electric building? Is this um, you know, is it solar ready?" And you may say, "Well, it's not solar ready because I don't have the right I'm in the middle of the woods.

205I don't have the right orientation." Um, and New York, as we said, New York State code at the end of the year is going to all electric, which is really quite soon. It's August, so it's four months. So B gets replaced with the language you sent around this morning, Ian? >> Yep. >> And David, you're comfortable with shall prioritize because it gives us the gives the flexibility that you're looking for. >> I'm looking for the flexibility. That's the language I'm >> All right. Okay. >> So, this then could be ready to go to uh notice for public hearing on Thursday, right? >> Yep. >> All right. Does anybody else have any other comments about this before we move on to liaison reports? >> No, just I do I do want to thank the the people

206who commented in public here. You know, again, I'm I'm sort of not taking all of their advice or not agreeing with it all, but I think it's great that that that Len and and Nancy and Gloria spoke. Um I agree with all of their goals and I hope the type of affordable housing developments they envision are what happen. Um I just am with Tom on this and that we got to remove barriers and try to get more affordable housing. That's the big problem. >> Yeah. And I think you know we all agree right because you know earlier you said we all acknowledge the affordable housing crisis but really we've all we've all as a board have taken action we have for years >> and also I want to acknowledge one more time that I I

207greatly appreciate this type of conversation at the board level and I know that we're disagreeing and it's you know I wouldn't say heated but we're disagreeing. Um and I think it's I think it's really constructive and I think it's good that you know I might change my mind based on what you guys say. We changed ours. Thank you for >> Thank you for participating. >> Openmindedness is a very healthy in this >> how you grow. >> Absolutely. >> Okay. Thank you. Um I'm advisory committee. Um just want to highlight um one of the the amazing event last week at the playhouse. Um but one of the announcements there was the 2.2 million that the governor is going to be bringing forward for NEP. Um thank you to madam supervisor for coordinating with the governor's office

208for that. Um it's going to be areas proximal to homes and to provide fire access which I know has been a major concern. Um it obviously we're in budget review this year. Um it was fascinating actually in that meeting just to hear some of the accomplishments that that departments achieved this year. Um open gov has been you know hugely successful in you know adjusting workloads in some departments. Um it's something I do hope we continue to invest in both in terms of people software and hardware. Um, human services, the director is back from vacation. Um, I will be at the senior center tomorrow. Um, I I know there's been people reaching out um, with regards to some of the the cameras there. Uh, I have reached back out to those people directly. Um, just to

209be very clear on this, the cameras there are located only in the entry vestibule area. Um, they are not sound. Um, the other thing about that, the reason for putting them, they are in most of the town properties. We're going to have a work session on this later. This is a security issue. We've had people trying to break into that facility to sleep there. Um, and it's something we we we kind of need to ensure the safety of our buildings. Um, Fort Hill Cemetery. David, thank you. You reached out with regards to benches. I just want to remind the public that um, should anyone wish to have a bench up at the Fort Hill Cemetery, uh, they can contact Elise Predo, who is the chair of that committee, um, it can go through my office,

210too, and I will pass it on to her. Um, but that is the correct procedure for the request for benches in that location. Um we have uh had legislation on today regarding Star Tree Consultancy. Uh this is regards to hiring in a consultancy group to help assess um fuel management plans um on town properties where we've seen the the um pitch pine um be decimated by the beetle. So um it's it's something we are continuing to address with regards to potential fire risk there. Um Eastampton Youth Task Force. Um you two things here. one, I know a lot of kids are going back to college and some parents are celebrating, some are sad. Um, but firstly, I want to thank a lot of them. Um, you know, they are critical to a lot of our

211operations to town, be in the lifeguarding department. Um, you know, but as you go back, you know, just, um, be be your best self. Uh, you represent this town when you're out there. Um, and, you know, keep learning, keep doing what you do. Um uh the other thing I want to kind of mention uh that came out of the playhouse meeting last week and just to kind of reiterate there's going to be the cell phone ban in schools um uh coming up this school year. Um two things with regards to that. Um one it it is critical. Um you know I there was a surgeon general's warning last year that the impact of social media on our youth is one of the biggest threats we face. Um, but two, and this is kind of interesting,

212this is coming back from some of the teachers, you know, I've was just spoken to, is that this is as much a ban for parents as it is for students. It's not just the students being on their phone. It's also the parents constantly tell, what are you doing? Like, we we need to give our children space in that realm. And I think this is going to be a good thing. And I and the teachers I've spoken to in my realm, I think, are exceptionally excited by this. Um, uh, antibbias task force. This was a request that came back a while ago and I know we did this recently with one of our press releases, but um I would love to gauge board support for as we do press releases going forward to have them out

213going out bilingually in both Spanish and English. You know, we know that 40% of our population out here is Latino Hispanic and I think it would be best practice we move forward certainly with press releases if we could do that, but I'm I'm open to have that discussion in a different format if necessary. um wildlife management advisory. Jason, if you could just bring up the image I sent over this morning. Um the reason I bring this up, this is the first time it's kind of happened to me, but I kind of I walked onto my um property the other day and like my mother-in-law who lives with me kind of pointed out, is that a spotted lantern fly? And it was the first one I've seen on my property. Um they are here, folks. And

214you know, look, typically I'm I'm someone who really wants to save nature, but the the DEC guidance, the New York State guidance on this is if you see them, kill them. Uh they they decimate um the vegetation out here. Certainly in the farming industry, I know it's problematic. Um but just, you know, people be aware. The other reason I'm pulling up this image as well is that at the top is the different lives stages of the spotted lantern fly, but below are insects that look comparable that we do not want people to be killing. So, um, just if you have the time, uh, do please look at this. It's also on the New York State DEC web page. Um, but yeah, it's it's a it's a growing problem, potentially comparable to the, um, uh, the

215pine beetle. So, please be cognizant about addressing it as and where you see it and follow DC guidelines on that. Um, emergency preparedness, obviously, Hurricane Erin, um, firstly, we're incredibly fortunate that it's it's not close than it is, but it's a very good reminder um, in terms of what we need to do be prepared to be prepared. Um, I encourage people to sign up for the East Hampton Emergency Alerts. Um, if you go to the town web page, e-hamptony.gov, and you scroll to the very bottom, uh, there is a a link there that you can sign up for the town alerts. um you know other ways to kind of find out the information on the town homepage. We'll post things uh the town um social media and the police department social media um as well.

216Just please ensure that you know you do stay up to date with any guidelines we're offering to ensure your safety um both in terms of you know evacuation um and also preparedness in terms of what you should have in your home um contact list, cell phones, chargers, batteries, medications etc. And and finally on that point, if you are someone who is in a special needs group in any way, please do reach out to our human services department um to ensure you get on that list uh should you need any additional help or advanced help um you know that's how we would get that to you. Thank you. >> Thanks, Tom. David, >> on this Wednesday, we're going to be having a meeting uh premeating uh about the impending Westlake commercial dock restoration efforts and to

217any of the fishermen that might have slip spaces on that dock. The meeting's at 1:30 at the Malk Firehouse. They can also contact my office if they have any other questions. Uh, Malk Lake dredging again next week. We will be they will be opening the bids concurrently for the scheduled uh Malta dredging. I'll have more information probably in September on that and maybe we even plan a work session just to alert people what's going on. There's going to be a lot of construction activity going on down the docks which is all good. Um, recently as we start getting ready for school, Tom just mentioned kids are off to school, but a lot of kids are still here. Uh, and we have our our schools opening shortly, we probably will have we'll have a work session

218just before school begins on the second school out here. I believe it opens on the 3rd, but uh we have instructed our buildings and grounds department to go over and highway to be looking at all our our crossing lights and our crosswalks that they need to be repainted or any type of fixes that need to be done there. What also thing that a lot of high schoolers might see in their parents as they're driving toward to school, particularly the high school on the corner of Ghoul Street and Cedar Street, there's new curb work that has gone in there. Please be attentive to that as it will probably decrease your speed around the curb, which is the intentions. Um, in recreation, there is soccer program signups for the fall. Please contact the town's recreation department if

219you're interested or go online. Also part of our recreation is that we are fortunate to have that all our beaches will still be open uh storm and you know storm determined of course uh through Labor Day. Uh and for two weeks after that we will be starting to gear down on our locations the two weekends past Labor Day. Please look at our town's website for our conditions and what our openings will be past Labor Day. Foundation was discussed. Um the Montalk Citizens Advisory Committee has been moved from September 1st because it's a holiday to September 8th. So please everyone please be aware of that. Then too, uh lastly, I know all of us were there, but again, this is another way we could say a big thank you to the community for all the work

220that everyone had done and put in uh to the uh to the Montalk Playhouse um to get it to the point where we are now and it'll be opening the doors very very shortly. Again, the funding for that was uh uh a public private partnership on there. Much of the funding was actually uh uh privately raised through the Mont Playhouse Foundation and the town did put in money and it was uh completely put out uh through um town procurement with our four primes open bid project on there. I want to thank the purchasing department and the financing department for this also then too. I think it's going to be a very successful use, a milestone use for the town and I thank all the board members here for your support over the years and all

221the town departments that are out there and any of the residents are listening. Thank you again. >> Yeah, and it was nice to see Larry and Peter and uh Fred Theel there. As I said to Larry, it was in his first administration where he put $3 million into the capital plan for the Mont Playhouse. >> Okay, Kate. Yes, I have a brief report. uh the uh we had a very successful, as we've heard, uh roll out for the uh compost uh composter sale program. So, we're uh now going to have a fall sale as well. So, join the East Hampton backyard compass compost crew, east hampton.compostersale.com. Order by Thursday, September 25th. The pickup will be Saturday uh um between 2:00 and 5 uh here at town hall on September 27th. Um you can go to

222the Rew Wildcompost hotline and you can go to rewl long island.org uh forwardcompost. This is in collaboration with the town obviously and rew um so um we are continuing the composter uh uh sale and water barrel sale. We'll have the September pickups. You can order online and uh I thank the community for uh you know taking advantage of the opportunity to get uh food waste out of the uh waist stream. >> Thank you, Kate. Ian, >> uh the spring CAC meeting originally scheduled for this evening has been postponed until the 26th, next Tuesday. Um that will either be at Ashbog Hall or at a private residence for sort of a community uh gathering. If uh that's not determined yet. If anybody has any questions, you can reach out to me, my office, or Loren Bulier,

223the chair chairperson there. Uh, property management committee will meet tomorrow at 4:30 p.m. in this room. Um, on the agenda are the Parsons Dodge homestead, which we've been discussing, and the Osborne Homestead, which uh is a management plan we're looking to uh move along. The Parson's Blacksmith Shop um near the heart of Springs, the Springs Triangle there will be open on Saturday, this Saturday the 23rd from 9:30 to 1:30. It coincides with the farmers market. Uh James Deartis, a blacksmith and artist and all around good guy will be there with the forge going. I encourage everybody to check it out. It's a beautiful, beautiful building and an interesting process and um encourage everybody to go. Uh community housing advisory board will meet next Wednesday at 5:00 pm at the planning department conference room at 300

224Panigo Place. Uh and that is all I have. >> Great. Thank you, Ian. Uh East Hampton Town Police Department's weekend activity. This is from Friday uh through 6:00 a.m. on Monday. There were 241 calls for service. There were three arrests, one DWI, one aggravated unlicensed, and one felony criminal mischief, criminal trespass. There were seven motor vehicle accidents, 28ed cases, 28 residential noise complaints, and two commercial noise complaints. Both both noise meter readings were under the decibel level, and there were 21 traffic citations issued. Uh, everybody touched on the Montalk Playhouse ribbon cutting. Uh, that was the first part of Governor Hokll's visit. We also talked about the uh the forest management contract, the 2.2 million, three-year contract, which I know speaking to uh some of the folks in the fire uh volunteer fire community. We're

225very happy to hear and we're grateful that she that governor sees how critical this work is to protect our nearby communities, safeguard our natural resources, and ensure public safety. Um, I did mention that I had the opportunity for a one-on-one meeting with the governor. Um, she gave me 15 minutes of her of her time. I have to say uh talking to my colleagues uh in other communities, not everyone gets such an opportunity to have that kind of time with this governor. We ex uh what I did is I explained the the growth that we've seen uh over the years with our year-round community and the need for increased investment in infrastructure such as roads and and sidewalks and public safety. We spoke at length about the need for more investment in affordable housing. I shared

226with her that we had applied for the $4.1 million grant for Route 114 and we also talked about a new initiative that the state has launched with housing community renewal. It's a program that David and I saw and heard about at the East End Village and Mayors Association lunchon two weeks ago. And this is a new manufactured home initiative for single family homes. And and I'm waiting to get more information, but this shows a great deal of promise and could potentially work here. Uh I also reinforced something that the the later group uh did as well, the business leaders, is that we need more investment, increased investment in the MTA. We need uh specifically additional sightings for the Long Island Railroad. I explained to her the importance of the South Fork Community Connection to our

227community to be able to staff um you know municipal jobs and and uh you know in the private sector our schools and how dependent we are on that and uh so it was is a great conversation. Um, right after that, my 15 minutes with the governor, the Montalk Chamber had a business roundt and uh, this was with local business leaders facilitated by Leo Dant, the Montalk Chamber of Commerce president. They discussed the housing and business needs of the Montalk community as well as building economic and environmental resilience being key to the future of Montalk and looking to make Montalk a real year-round community. Um, and then just like uh David, my East Hampton Sag Harbor CAC will uh move our meeting from Monday, September 1st to Monday, September 8th. Our location though is DBD because

228this room will be used for the trustees meeting. So, if the weather's nice, we're going to be outside at the picnic tables. If the weather isn't, we'll be doing it via Zoom. So, it's we're going to be calling that day of. So, um, but I'll make sure that it's on the website with the agenda where the location is for folks that want to attend. And that's all I have. So, we can now move on to resolutions. And Tom, you've got the first one. >> Thank you. First resolution is 2025 11103. Uh, this is for Star Tree Prescribed Fire LLC professional services. Uh be it resolved that the sorry whereas Sery Preserved Fire LLC is an expert in this field and can perform its professional service and provide a proposal dated August 13, 2025 at a

229cost of the town not to exceed $1,500. >> Second. >> All in favor? And I could just say that this is the same company that the the state used correct to to develop their plan and this was uh recommended by the local fire departments chiefs to you know use this company. They're highly regarded and we're grateful that they're going to be able to make it out this month to to take a look at the areas that are have been decimated by southern pine beetle and then get back to us with a proposal. >> Uh as far as resolution 2025 1064, I'd like to make a motion to untable it and then >> second. All in favor? I. >> And I'd like to make a motion for resolution 2025 1064 to withdraw it. Second. All in

230favor? I >> I have resolution 1104s to appoint temporary justice court clerk to the justice court. This is for Jennifer Saledo. Uh resolve that Jennifer is hereby appointed to temporary position of justice court. Uh justice court clerk in the court with an hourly rate of $2812 um to be paid bi-weekly. And this is retroactive to August 18th, 2025 through November 16th, 2025. >> Second. >> All in favor? I >> resolution 1105. This is to increase hours for full-time employee Christine Chanel to a 35h hour work week for an annual salary of 109,782.40. >> Second. >> All in favor? I. Resolution 1106 is to accept deed of reserved area for Glen Valley Associates Ltd. And this is the uh this is Glen Valley at Molford Avenue LLC. Um this location is at 87 Northwest Road in

231East Hampton and um the reviewing agency is the planning board. >> Second. >> All in favor. Resolution 1107 is to accept a road wide widening easement in urban renewal parcel 83 and EH2B. And uh this is the uh submission of easements by certain property owners for the town for the purpose of widening and other improvements to specific roads in a subdivision. Uh resolve that the grtor is returned a conformed copy of said easement to the town clerk and that the town board accepts and approves the easements. The grand tour is Eric Lubert at 56 Barnes Avenue, East Hampton. Um the location is 56 Barnes Avenue, East Hampton. And again, this is a road widening easement. >> Second. >> All in favor? I >> I resolution 1108 is to authorize payment to Coastal Science and Engineering.

232Resolve that payment is hereby authorized for invoice 2603 number two. uh o the 2nd of October. I imagine that says from coastal engineering and science and engineering in the amount of $6,163.96 cents. >> Second. >> All in favor? I >> I resolution 1109. This is for notice for 2026 section 8 administrative plan public hearings to be held on October 2nd, 2025 at 6 p.m. >> Second. >> All in favor? I. Resolution 2025 11110. This is a bond for $1.5 million for the town's dispatch center. If it looks familiar, uh it's because we we did this earlier, but apparently it was incorrectly noticed in the paper. Second. Can I get a roll call, please? I >> I >> 2025 11-11 is promote seasonal lifeguards in the recreational department for August 2025. Um names, positions, pay rates,

233dates, retroactive dates below. >> Second. All in favor? >> I. Uh 1112 is appoint seasonal lifeguard to the recreational department satch and luft hourly rate of $22.88 retroactive to August 17 2025. >> Second all in favor. >> 1113 is appoint seasonal lifeguard to the recreational department Eli Dickinson hourly rate of $26 retroactive to June 14th 2025. >> Second all in favor. 1114 has approved supplemental grant funding for the long house reserve IIA whereas additional funding of the installation costs for $8,77 were reviewed and submitted to the water quality technical advisory committee for the review and that is what is being recommended. >> Second. All in favor? I >> 11:15 is a separate donation of a memorial bench, the gift of Wendy Tarlo, where Wendy Tarlo would like to donate a memorial bench as a gift

234to the town of East Hampton in memory of her wife Claudia Patino Tarlo to be placed in front of the below the blue which is 41 Carl Fischer Plaza Montalk. Now therefore be it the resolve that the town board hereby gratefully accepts the donation of Wendy Tarlo to the town of Eastampton. >> Second. All in favor? >> I have resolution 1116. I'm going to make an uh some amendments to this resolution. This is for approval of various special events August 2025. Resolve that the special event permits are hereby approved with condition agreed to by the reviewing committee committee. I'd like to delete the uh MTalk Historical Society event that was already approved. And I'd like to delete the Sirius XM event. So this resolution, >> sorry. Sure. >> Mia Cert Mto Historic Society, >> Mark

235Ztoo, SiriusXM, we approved that on 85. So, this resolution pertains to Elliot Fischer, Hampton's Lifeguard Association for the third annual Atlantic Digs Charity Volleyball Tournament, which is going to be held on uh August 24th and August 25th. >> Second. >> All in favor as amended. Right. >> As second as amended. >> Great. Okay, that's our resolutions for today. Do I have a motion to go into exec session? Yes. I'd like to make a motion to go into executive session for CPF, personnel, contracts, litigation, and public safety. >> Second. >> All in favor? >> I. Thank you everyone and thank you LTV.