A New Era

Don’t look now, but all five East End towns are poised to have new leadership in their top posts next year.

Jay Schneiderman will be term-limited out in Southampton Town in 2023, and the town supervisors in the four other towns — Yvette Aguiar in Riverhead, Peter Van Scoyoc in East Hampton, Gerry Siller on Shelter Island, and Scott Russell in Southold — have all announced that they’ve decided not to seek reelection this year.

It may be coincidental, but it’s still significant: Starting in 2024, a fleet of governmental vessels will sail into uncharted waters with new captains at the helm. A new era will begin, one way or the other.

Of course, most of the town board members in the five towns will remain, and the new supervisors likely will come from that pool, which blurs any clear line of demarcation. Yet there’s an opportunity for a reset — and, post-pandemic, the entire region could use a fresh start.

The challenges are legion, and the solutions, like the problems, are shared among the five towns in varying portions.

There is the state’s pressure on local communities to allow more housing, and more affordable options, coupled with the arrival of Community Housing Fund revenues in four of the towns; Riverhead, so far, has demurred, but it arguably has been carrying more than its share of the load for the entire region when it comes to affordable apartments, with even more going up soon.

Each of the towns has infrastructure issues, which both limit healthy development and lead to polluted waters. Commercial development is sporadic and rarely seems welcome, or truly part of a larger vision. The East End’s burgeoning population is maxing out the transportation system. And the international summer destination has a crisis of sorts when it comes to finding workers to serve the needs and desires of part-time homeowners and seasonal visitors.

None of the towns experiences this in a vacuum. There is a traditional framework to allow regional cooperation, through the East End Supervisors and Mayors Association, but it’s time to strengthen those bonds. There is infrastructure money flowing, and the region will be better positioned to address these problems together, rather than with scattershot individual applications. And most of the issues are regional — and, as stated earlier, so are the best, most effective solutions.

New leadership doesn’t necessarily mean a new course. But it’s time for the region to begin fixing things, and all five new supervisors should be given that mission: Work together and show us a clear vision for a promising future.