Sag Harbor Village Board Squabbles Over When To Proceed With Affordable Housing Effort

A month after the cornerstone laws in Sag Harbor’s effort to address the need for affordable housing in the village were struck down in court, Mayor Jim Larocca on Tuesday sought to get the ball rolling again by holding a community forum on the subject between now and when he leaves office at the end of June.

“I think the urgency of the affordable housing crisis is real. I don’t see any reason to wait to inaugurate this conversation,” Larocca said in introducing his idea for a forum next month. “I say, let’s get on with it.”

But Larocca got pushback from Trustee Aidan Corish, who said he would prefer to wait until a new board was seated, so it could “start with a new dialogue and a new direction.”

As they have done on and off over the mayor’s term, Larocca and Corish squabbled.

“My understanding of the constitutional system is that we are in terms, and while we are in our terms, we are under oath to do the jobs we signed up for,” Larocca said. “I don’t understand the reason for waiting, except to diminish a lame duck mayor. Is it your idea that because you have a retiring mayor we should shut Village Hall for the next two months and wait for a new board?”

Corish again said he wanted to delay, and when pressed by the mayor to give a reason, he replied simply, “I believe it will be a more fruitful conversation under new leadership.”

Larocca received support from Trustee Tom Gardella, who is running for the mayor’s office next month. “The affordable housing issue is not a simple issue. It’s very complex,” he said. “We have a small village. Density is a big issue. There are environmental issues. There’s a lot that goes into solving such a problem.”

He said the sooner the village got started, the better off it would be. “As far as a conversation goes, I’m willing to talk whenever, to whoever, when you want to talk,” he added.

Trustee Ed Haye also seemed to favor moving forward. But Larocca withdrew his proposal, saying he did not want to press the issue with a divided board.

Larocca said he had “put my heart and soul into this job” and vowed to work until his term ended on June 30 — and he took one last opportunity to criticize both Corish and Trustee Bob Plumb.

He said that Corish, who oversees the village sewage treatment plant, had called for tougher regulations for restaurant grease traps earlier in the meeting, but in the past two years, “he has never put forward a proposal.” And he criticized Plumb, who is the board’s liaison for long-term planning issues, for having reported for the past seven months “that nothing has happened.”