During Friday's hearing on the new lighting law, statements from Island residents were overwhelmingly negative. The most positive encouraged the town “to educate, not legislate” but Barbara Allen-Lieblein labeled the law “senseless, totally subjective and obnoxious.” In addition to Dark Skies, new flood zone rules and two wetlands permits were opened to public comment at the July 31 Town Hall meeting.

Dark Skies hearing

Councilwoman Chris Lewis recounted the origins of the proposed law but emphasized that while she supports the concept of Dark Skies, “I don't have a dog in this fight. This is not my cause, not my law.” She said that as more new homes were being lit with outside floodlights on a 24-hour basis, with no lighting law on the books, the town could do nothing about it. As early as 2002, neighboring municipalities were looking into laws requiring shielding of most exterior lights in an effort to reduce light pollution and keep stars visible at night. Several other East End towns and villages have adopted some form of Dark Skies legislation. At an April 2008 work session, Susan Harder presented research in support of Dark Skies legislation — floodlighting does not deter crime and has negative impacts on wildlife, she explained; glare from excessive lighting creates hazards rather than increasing safety.

“We put Dark Skies on the list” of possible legislation, Ms. Lewis said. But major public works projects over the past three years kept it on the back burner. This year legislation was drafted and first put forward for public comment on June 19. Questions were raised at the first hearing but nearly all speakers offered support for some form of a Dark Skies law.

Not so at the July 31 hearing, when Ms. Lieblein and her husband Bill, Abby and Fred Dress, Gail and Tony Palminteri, and Richard Krause all spoke against the proposed law.

The law is not warranted because Island nights are dark, in places pitch dark, Mr. Lieblein of Hay Beach said. The law's provision requiring all outdoor lights to be shielded in four years from adoption is “very onerous,” Ms. Dress said, warning that the town should be prepared to create a fund to help homeowners buy new fixtures. The law's enforcement through adjacent neighbor complaints won't be effective and will only “pit neighbor against neighbor,” she added.

Decreasing problem lights is a good idea, Dr. Palminteri and others noted. But  “I'm violently opposed to shoving this down our throats at great cost,” Dr. Palminteri said.

“A house with lights on all night, I don't think there's a person in this room who wants that to happen,” Mr. Krause commented. He said that if one of his neighbors wanted “to stargaze at night I wouldn't think twice about accommodating them” and turning off his exterior lights. But he was concerned about having to replace existing lighting fixtures.

Ms. Lewis explained that enforcing the law would involve either shielding floodlights (placing a prefabricated metal box around the light to focus it downward) or using approved lighting when replacing fixtures.

The board did not act on the legislation Friday and during the Tuesday work session tabled it until after the budget season and another effort to educate the public on the issues involved.

Flood zone hearing

The town is required to adopt new flood plain maps promulgated by the Federal Emergency Management Association and the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation. But the presence of a new line on flood maps has Planning Board member Emory Breiner and some Town Board members concerned. “We're being asked to vote on something we can't see,” Councilman Glenn Waddington said.

Mr. Breiner said that after the new maps were presented at a public hearing in Southampton last fall, a new line was added — the LIMWA or Limit of Moderate Wave Action line. Depending on the placement of the line, which is not on the maps the town must adopt, some creekside properties may be subject to more stringent construction requirements, Mr. Breiner said. He suggested that the town could opt out of the LIMWA requirements when adopting the new flood rules.

Mary Wilson of the Building Department said, “We didn't see it as a terrible thing” because the properties affected are already in a flood zone. She noted that FEMA will be making all the flood requirements mandatory anyway.

The board decided to try and get more information on federal flood rules before adopting amendments to the town code. At Tuesday's work session, Ms. Wilson passed on information from Eric Star, a Regional Floodplain Management coordinator with the DEC — the town can adopt the maps and rules without reference to the LIMWA line by the September deadline and amend it later when maps are updated and it is clear which Island properties will be included.

Wetlands hearings

A wetlands permit application from Scott Pontone of 22 Merkel Lane does not have Conservation Advisory Council support. Mr. Pontone needs a wetlands permit for adding onto an existing single family residence and building a new swimming pool with patio and a detached garage with pool house on his 1-acre property.

During a public hearing on the permit, Town Supervisor Jim Dougherty reported that the CAC voted to deny the application as proposed, calling for decreasing the pool size or moving it out of the regulated area 75 to 100 feet from wetlands and moving the garage out of the regulated area. The committee also made a recommendation not currently allowed by town code, calling on the applicant to pave the driveway, rather than using gravel, to avoid the use of weed killers. Town code requires permeable driveways on all but the steepest properties in the near shore area to enhance recharge of rainwater. The Planning Board recommended approval of the application.

Engineer Matt Sherman responded to the CAC recommendations during his presentation. A plan to build upwards from the existing house, which encroaches into the wetlands vegetated buffer, will be mitigated by removing an existing paved driveway. “It's all about taking out that asphalt driveway,” he said.

Mr. Sherman said that the pool and garage could be decreased in size if requested by the board; on Tuesday Mr. Sherman presented a revised map with a smaller pool completely outside the regulated area. The owners are also willing to plant a 10-foot buffer of native vegetation along an existing bulkhead to reduce runoff into Smith Cove.

Rob Herrmann presented the second wetlands plan, that of Russell Ireland of East Brander Parkway to tear down an existing house and build a new one, further from the wetlands, with an attached garage, pool, patio and hot tub. The Planning Board and CAC recommended approval but with conditions. The CAC called for shrinking the swimming pool and moving the pool, a hot tub and deck outside of the regulated area. The Planning Board suggested moving the pool drywell out of the wetlands buffer.

Mr. Herrmann explained that the location of the  pool drywell is constrained by town code setbacks. Rebuilding the house an additional 50 feet from the wetlands is an environmental improvement, Mr. Herrmann indicated. The plan calls for part of a new pool patio to be placed 20 feet within the vegetative buffer (75 feet from the wetlands) but over 900 square feet of existing patio will be removed from that area. That “should be perceived as an offering of a tradeoff,” Mr. Herrmann said.

The overall encroachment into the vegetative buffer would decrease from 3,253 square feet to 662 square feet. He emphasized that the buffer is “historically cleared” turf and not a natural vegetated area.

The Town Board typically deliberates on wetlands permit applications during work sessions and acts on them three weeks after the hearing.

other Town Board actions

During the July 31 meeting, the Town Board also took the following actions:

• Authorized an agreement between the town and the Silver Beach Association to dredge the opening to Crab Creek. Costs will be shared by the SBA and the town through its waterways fund. Town Supervisor Jim Dougherty said that the creek will be tested before and after dredging “to make sure that the action is efficacious and necessary.” Councilman Peter Reich, whose family owns property on the creek, abstained from the vote.          

  • Approved an annual agreement with Cornell University to operate a shellfish hatchery for restocking town waters.

• Committed to paying approximately $314,000 of a total $1,583,000 cost to repair the Ram Island causeway. The federal government will pay for 80 percent of the project.

• Amended the zoning code to prohibit new and replacement cisterns in the Near Shore and Peninsular Overlay District for use in capturing runoff.

• Approved a wetlands permit for Eva Gayer to install an 8,000-gallon cistern on her property on Gardiners Bay.

• Approved two mooring permits and set hearings on two new mooring applications and a dock expansion application for August 21.

• Set a public hearing on amendments to town law on swimming pools to include gated fences that cross driveways as pool fences when additional safety features are installed.

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