Express Session in Hampton Bays: Downtown's Future Discussed

Joseph P. Shaw unabashedly called Hampton Bays, “the greatest hamlet in Southampton Town, maybe on the East End,” as he opened last week’s Express Sessions event at Canoe Place Inn in Hampton Bays.

A resident of the hamlet, Shaw, the executive editor of The Express News Group, moderated a discussion of the hamlet’s concerns and concepts, desires and debates. The event, “Does Hampton Bays Want Change?” drew an audience of around 70 to the newly opened luxury hotel’s ballroom pavilion for conversation over kale salad.

At the confab’s conclusion, Shaw noted the conversation would continue, likely for years.

The October 27 event saw five panelists, plus questions and comments from the audience.

At the dais were Southampton Town Supervisor Jay Schneiderman, Councilman and hamlet business owner Rick Martel, and Town Land Planning Administrator Janice Scherer. Hampton Bays residents and board watchers Ray D’Angelo and Gayle Lombardi rounded out the panel.

Officials have been grappling with the revitalization of the town’s most populous hamlet for years. They crafted and adopted a Hampton Bays Downtown Overlay District, legislation that was annulled through a legal action brought by Lombardi. Now, the question has become, what — if anything — does the community want?

Martel opined, “All the things that we really want as a community can come if we just talk about, instead of what we don’t want, let’s focus on what we want.”

Audience members weighed in with a wish list of development they’d like to see, but first, Schneiderman was asked how the process moves ahead given earlier work on the overlay district zoning code change that was, according to Shaw, “something of a disaster so far.”

The lawmaker disagreed. The overlay district was born out of, said Schneiderman, a lot of years of planning and a lot of public participation, reiterating and oft-repeated assertion, “People wanted a walkable, vibrant downtown.”

In an effort to start the process fresh, the supervisor held “listening sessions” with community members throughout the month of October, and said last week, “There’s no clear one opinion, and that’s okay because Hampton Bays isn’t just one vision.” He believes a consensus will emerge and the final product will be “significantly smaller, less intense than what we had proposed the first time.”

That seemed to suit audience member Linda Slezak. She drew applause from the assemblage when she said that what she’s gleaned from conversations so far is, “We don’t really need a major overhaul. There’s nothing that terrible, at least that I could see, about Hampton Bays, that you need to rip it down and start over. What we do need are tweaks.”

Susan Von Freddie, a 49-year business owner and president of the Hampton Bays Beautification Association, spoke of the “big hullabaloo” that ensued when the King Kullen shopping center was proposed two decades ago. It turned out to be very successful and brought walking traffic to that section of downtown, she said. Needed are more businesses on Main Street, she said.

Hampton Bays attorney John Leonard wants to see a men’s clothing store. He’d like to see more retail space.

“I don’t feel like the downtown provides all the services that I need,” he said. “We do need cafes. We need places for people to congregate. We need bookstores. We need clothing stores.”

Praising Schneiderman for hosting the listening sessions, Leonard reported, “All of a sudden you started hearing people, different generations. I’m a Gen X-er. Gen Z-ers, their family members, people who live in this community for tens of years, decades, saying, ‘Actually, you know what? I’d like to see a merry-go-round. I’d like to see an ice skating rink. I’d like to see a cultural center. I’d like to see us somehow come together and save the cinema. I’d like to see places where we can congregate.’”

But D’Angelo emphasized that businesses must be supported and sustainable. The town must also consider the hamlet’s demographics and what businesses residents would frequent.

Schneiderman echoed previous assertions made — by himself and Scherer — that allowing a residential component will enhance small shops’ sustainability. Retail shops need foot traffic, he said, speaking to the need for residential development that coincides with the building of shops and cafes.

You don’t need to add apartment buildings, resident Liz Hook said. Town zoning allows for apartments above retail.

“I do get very confused when you talk about the requirement for the zoning to change in order for us to get all of these wonderful businesses, because the zoning doesn’t have to change,” she said. “Village business is currently zoned to allow all of these retail uses that you’re talking about.”

The town’s efforts to provide housing aren’t limited to Hampton Bays, but, said Schneidrman, “We need to create a pathway for our young people to stay in the community and our businesses to survive.”

“Why does Hampton Bays need an influx of great apartments when they say our children — if you’re talking about Hampton Bays children — they’re not even guaranteed those apartments? asked Marion Boden, who described herself as “Generation A.”

She suggested moving some of the town’s highest volume internal departments to Hampton Bays, and building a municipal building with a parking lot. It would cut down on traffic and bring business to downtown.

Introduced as one of the local senior center’s 98-year-old patrons, Violet Evangelista believes giving new life to the shuttered Hampton Bays Diner is “the first thing that should have been taken care of. That’s the entrance to Hampton Bays. People see that eyesore before they see anything else.”

Audience member Richard Casabianca agreed. The request has been voiced throughout the community repeatedly for years.

Diners are closed all over the place, Schneiderman said. Opening one may not be economically feasible. Nobody seems to want what’s allowed under the zoning code — medical offices, a mattress outlet. Permitted zoning at the diner site may not be in line with what the community wants, he said, “So it sits there year after year after year.”

For some, Good Ground Park is a critical resource that’s also been sitting there, largely unnoticed. Von Freddie and Casabianca both spoke of finding a way to open it up to Main Street.

Casabianca went a step further. He’d like to see the speed limit on Main Street reduced to 25 mph. That way, the thoroughfare officially known as Montauk Highway would seem less like a road through the downtown and more like a road for people going downtown.

Last, Casabianca spoke of the “extraordinary” rehabilitation of the historic Canoe Place Inn. “If you like what happened here, please also do something I’ve been advocating for, for years, which is to use the existing vintage and historic stock as part of the mix. As part the downtown architectural mix, as part of the charm.

“You reinhabit, you restore, you renovate, you rehabilitate, you reuse. Don’t knock it over.”

The form-based code in the overlay district would have called for that, Schneiderman defended. The problem is, Scherer offered, without a form-based code, developers come in and want to “max out” their money, by building the cheapest possible way. “Having those form-based codes help us to get a better product for everyone to enjoy,” she said.

Stating she could see all sides of the argument, Christine Taylor, the executive director of the Hampton Bays Chamber of Commerce, said, “Every time I go to do something with my child, I have this sense of guilt because I’m going to Westhampton or I’m going to Southampton or I’m going to Riverhead because I’m not putting my money back into my community where my neighbors work and I feel like I want to do that. I want to be able to park my car on Main Street, take my daughter to get a toy, take my daughter to get an outfit or go to the park, grab something for lunch. But I feel like we need to have something for everyone.”

“How do we get there?” Shaw asked Scherer. How are desires for a diner, cafes, retail shops fulfilled? “The market is very clearly not driving those businesses to us, and we can’t really wish them into existence,” he said.

It’s not simply sprucing up around the edges, the administrator offered. A significant amount of vacant land in between Main Street and the park is privately owned, and they want to do something.

“We can’t tell people they can’t do anything, and it should stay that way,” Scherer said. “They want to make it worth their investment and while, at the same time we don’t want to give away the show and over-densify, we never did want to do that. We are trying to get it right, to have that balance.

“You build a house on a foundation and you put the walls up, etc. The same thing with the downtown, you set the forms so they stand the test of time or in 30 years they’ll be trying to figure out how to undo it, which is what we do now with the ones that we don’t like.”

There’s a contingent in the community that doesn’t want to see any change. Is that a viable option?

Not according to Scherer. Change is inevitable and the nature of reality, she said. The question becomes “Do you want it to change for the better or continue to deteriorate?” she said.

For D’angelo’s money, infrastructure needs, such as a sewer system, must be addressed before any development proceeds. He favors a sewage treatment plant that can service the needs of a larger area than one first proposed. He and Scherer sparred, when D’Angelo said he was “astounded” that businesses would not be required to hook up. She said that was incorrect, and he read her the passage. Then she said the report has a mistake, which prompted, “I read the stuff you put out and I assume it’s correct,” from D’Angelo.

New businesses would have to connect, but existing establishments would only be required to hook up if they choose to expand. “Where’s the point of putting the sewer district in and not having people hook up to it?” D’Angelo countered.

“This is the problem that we’ve had for the past six years,” Lombardi added. “If we’re going to move forward, and I hope we do, the information that they put out needs to be presented accurately and completely.”

Scherer pointed out the report was posted on the website as a draft, and everyone had “a complete meltdown.”

Lombardi feels that moving forward, community members need to be more engaged and town officials have to do a better job explaining their ideas.

The word “disaster” came up again, when audience member Don Elliot took the mic. He complained that along the west side of the Shinnecock Canal is “a disaster.” Broken glass and garbage litter the area. “And I think it’s a little symbolic of what’s happening here,” Elliot said. “There is no regard for the regular people that come down there.”

Martel, the Town Board’s liaison to parks, promised to walk that area with him. The town has a special crew that can be sent out to pick up trash “at a moment’s notice,” he said. Martel also noted the town’s youth bureau concentrates on that area during its spring cleanups. “I’d love to talk to you about that,” the councilman said.

“Your town in action. That’s good stuff,” Shaw said.