Morpurgo House in Limbo … Again

[caption id="attachment_52131" align="alignnone" width="600"] The Morpurgo House as seen from the adjacent John Jermain Memorial Library. Michael Heller photo.[/caption]

By Kathryn G. Menu

For close to two decades now, many have followed the family disagreements and legal wrangling surrounding 6 Union Street, otherwise known as the Morpurgo House for those familiar with the property’s topsy-turvy history. In late June, it appeared the crumbling, dilapidated home may finally have ended up in new hands after a group of investors purchased the property for $1.325 million, shortly after Sag Harbor Village officials announced they would consider demolishing the sagging structure if it was not properly secured.

It appears now this latest chapter in the Morpurgo property saga has yet to close, however. During Tuesday night’s meeting of the Sag Harbor Village Board of Trustees, Mayor Sandra Schroeder announced a new party has come forward with claims to an ownership interest in 6 Union Street. This development that may slow investors’ commitment to erect a chain link fence around a property — the condition of which village board members have characterized in April as “unsafe and dangerous,” “a fire hazard,” under the “imminent threat of collapse,” and a possible “breeding ground for vermin.”

In late June, Amagansett resident Mitch Winston, along with Mark and Lee Egerman, purchased the property at a court ordered auction on the steps of Southampton Town Hall. The property was in foreclosure, after it became entangled in a mortgage fraud scheme after its initial court-ordered sale in 2007. That mortgage fraud scheme landed an ex-Suffolk County legislator in jail, and resulted in the property changing hands between investment groups amid earlier efforts to foreclose on the mortgage.

The group was prepared to close on the property when they were informed a Charlotte Lisi had filed a notice of pendency against the property in state supreme court against the previous owners of the property. In that claim, the Dix Hills resident argues she provided the previous owners with $100,000 between 2012 and 2014, in return for an ownership claim on the property.

According to Lee Egerman, Ms. Lisi was never named in the chain of title as an owner of 6 Union Street, but that a judge would hear the case at the end of August, at which time he said the partners hope to close on the property.

It is unknown what relationship Ms. Lisi has with Brandon Lisi, a Dix Hills attorney who was one of the successful bidders at the court-ordered auction of the house in 2007. Mr. Lisi pled guilty in 2011 to two counts of grand larceny in the first degree and one charge of grand larceny in the second degree related to a mortgage fraud scheme involved over 50 Southampton homes and commercial properties. Former Suffolk County Legislator George Guldi pled guilty in the same case.

In other village news, the Sag Harbor Village Board of Trustees passed a resolution Tuesday night, transferring $31,779.28 in workforce housing fees collected by Sag Development Partners for its Bulova Watchcase Factory condominium project into the coffers of the non-profit Sag Harbor Community Housing Trust, Inc. In total, that project is scheduled to transfer a total of $2.5 million to the village, which has committed to giving that money to the Housing Trust. The Sag Harbor Community Housing Trust is tasked with developing affordable housing opportunities throughout the Sag Harbor School District.