Peconic Bay Community Preservation Fund revenues were up 8 percent throughout the East End in the first quarter of 2014.
This year $21.85 million was collected, compared to $20.23 million in the first quarter of 2013.
First-quarter revenues for Southampton Town were up nearly 16 percent, while East Hampton’s dipped a little more than 9 percent. Across the five towns participating in the CPF, overall March revenues this year totaled $7.25 million, compared to $4.19 million in March 2013.
Last year’s CPF total revenue was the second-highest in the history of the fund, which derives from a transfer tax on most real estate transactions and is used to preserve open space.
State Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr. noted that although revenues were up in the first three months of this year, the number of transactions was down, from 2,164 to 1,716. “I do think the weather had an effect,” he said Friday, recalling a winter some may prefer to forget.
The top year for CPF revenues was 2007, after which the numbers started to decline along with the overall economy. Recently, there has been “a really big rebound,” Mr. Thiele said, adding, “What happens on Wall Street really affects what happens on Main Street.”
Since its inception in 1999, the CPF has collected more than $900 million, $97.05 million of that in the last 12 months.
VIRGINIA GARRISON