All East Hampton Town residents should be alarmed by the looming prospect of Wainscott’s being incorporated as a village. Efforts to call for an early Spring 2021 vote on incorporation are underway. Under New York law, only those who live in the would-be village will get to vote. Other town residents will be adversely affected by Wainscott’s secession, but they will not be heard at the polls. So, now is the time — before the vote — for East Hampton residents to speak out against the incorporation. There are good reasons to do so.
Incorporation is the brainchild of a group of Beach Lane, Wainscott, residents who want at all costs to stymie the South Fork Wind Project and its plan to land a transmission cable in their neighborhood. They call themselves Citizens for the Preservation of Wainscott, but the more apt moniker would be “Citizens for the Privatization of Wainscott.”
It is not at all clear that incorporation will block the cable, but it is clear it will have other, serious and adverse collateral consequences. For example, incorporated Wainscott would control its beaches. The proponents of incorporation have made clear that their new village will require nonresidents to purchase permits if they want to park at those beaches. They expect to reap $66,000 a year in sticker fees. Space is already limited, and there is no reason to be confident that the new, exclusive village would not eventually consider reducing parking space further. But reduce capacity or not, the incorporators plan in 2021 to take free beach access from 80 homeowners in the current hamlet of Wainscott as well as scores of families in Northwest and elsewhere in the town. The exclusion would put pressure on the Amagansett beaches and could easily lead to Amagansett residents’ thinking about how they might restrict beach access. Falling dominos. It’s bad enough that town residents cannot easily use East Hampton Village’s beautiful beaches, but just think of our town becoming one in which you cannot use the beach unless you live in an exclusive ocean-front village enclave.
Beach access is just one aspect of the Balkanization that Wainscott’s incorporation bodes. Wealth and high property values are concentrated along the ocean beachfront. Over time, an incorporated Wainscott could easily decide that the town’s services are inadequate and that Wainscott should build its own infrastructure or join with a rich neighbor such as East Hampton Village to develop a whiter-glove alternative to what East Hampton Town supplies. If that were to happen, Wainscott residents would see their tax bills rise, but much of the long-term cost would be borne by the rest of East Hampton which would inevitably see its tax base eroded, its shared infrastructure hollowed out, its north-south wealth division hardened.
Proponents of incorporation will likely sneer at such speculation, call it scare tactics, but if incorporation proceeds, a course will have been set, and there will be little that we as town residents will be able do to protect against such eventualities.
Town Supervisor Peter Van Scoyoc has a limited, but critical, role in the incorporation process. He is, by law, required to scrutinize the proponents’ petition to assure that it meets the strict requirements of the Village Law. I am sure he will do that, and I am equally sure that incorporation proponents will attack him for merely doing his job. East Hampton Town residents should stand up for Supervisor Van Scoyoc and let him know (PVScoyoc@ehamptonny.gov) that they fully support him and support keeping East Hampton together.
Wainscott United (wainscottunited.org) has been formed to oppose incorporation. One way to better assure the future of the town is to support its efforts. Residents should also write letters to The Star and to members of the town board, talk to their friends and neighbors to encourage a public outcry against secession, against fragmentation of the town.
Sincerely,
JOHN H. HALL
Wainscott, NY