Neighbors Cast Wary Eye at Proposed Bridgehampton Horse Stable

People who live near the corner of Lumber Lane and Scuttle Hole Road in Bridgehampton have gotten used to seeing a nearly 30-acre farm field dominating the southerly landscape along the east side of the road.

But many were flabbergasted to learn that the field, the development rights of which were sold more than two decades ago, is the proposed site of a new, sprawling horse farm, whose buildings, paddocks and parking areas would be spread across most of the acreage.

Today, the property is owned by the photographer Steven Klein, but the horse farm is being proposed by Gabi Morris under the name North Edge Stables II.

Morris is the director of residential development for Edgewood Properties Inc., a development corporation started by her father, Jack Morris, whose name may be familiar to some East Enders after it was revealed in 2022 that he was working with the Shinnecock Nation on its plans to build a casino on Shinnecock Territory.

Morris told the Southampton Town Planning Board in an initial appearance last month that horseback riding was her passion and that she was proposing a private facility for her personal use.

Board members, who appeared to be impressed by Morris’s proposal, still seemed taken aback that a single rider might own as many as 26 horses. Morris said she plans to stable her horses at the site for most of the year before shipping them down to Florida for the winter.

Initial plans show the entrance to the complex would be off Lumber Lane, with a main drive leading to a 19,195-square-foot, one-story barn and parking. To the north would be a 21,000-square-foot riding arena and a 7,854-square-foot horse walking structure. A 15,195-square-foot garage, also with parking, is proposed for the southwest side of the property.

On the northwest side of the property, two four-unit, two-story townhouses, each of which would have two bedrooms with private baths on the second floor and an open plan with a kitchen, dining area, and living room on the first floor, are proposed. Morris, and her attorney, Wayne Bruyn, told the board the plan was for there to be a dozen employees, including an around-the-clock, on-site manager, but there could be as many as 16.

The property would also include an outdoor riding area and 11 paddocks to allow horses to graze.

Neighbors, who have been organizing in opposition, say it’s way over the top.

“It looks like a Disneyland for horses,” said Jo Ann Comfort, who operates a small farm just south of the site with her husband Robert. His family used to own the property now being proposed for the horse farm. The development rights were sold to the town in 2001 for $1.87 million by a later owner, Gordon Grey.

“It’s not the view,” Comfort said. “It’s just we as taxpayers used the Community Preservation Fund to buy the development rights, and now they are letting them develop it. If they really are going to let them do this, they should make them pay back the money.”

Charles Platto lives on the north side of Scuttle Hole Road, and his house looks over the field. He said he learned of the plans one day in late June when he noticed a small posted sign announcing a July 11 pre-submission hearing before the Southampton Town Planning Board while he was out walking his dog.

Platto, who spread the word about the application to his neighbors, wrote to the Planning Board questioning how “a huge equestrian facility” could be constructed on protected property “purely for recreational use with no agricultural purpose whatsoever” after attending the initial Planning Board hearing. He said matters were made even worse because Morris only plans to use the property on the weekends in the spring, summer and fall, leaving it to sit empty in the winter.

More than a dozen other Bridgehampton residents have also submitted objections to the Planning Board, citing concerns about everything from the amount and type of employee housing to the destruction of their views.

Word about the application also made its way to the Bridgehampton Civic Association.

“This is a town where one gets the impression you can’t turn your back,” said Pamela Harwood, the organization’s president. “At any moment, there are egregious applications. We feel we have to be vigilant all of the time.”

Sixty residents signed onto a letter Harwood wrote to the board, saying the covenant that accompanied the sale of the development rights in 2001 clearly intended for the property to be protected for its views, to safeguard its soils and to encourage traditional farming. A horse farm, she argued, would be a misuse of the land.

“It is therefore unthinkable that the word and spirit of this legal contract would allow the kind of massive development described in the current application, including oversized stables that would take up a good portion of the land, and a multi-story apartment or townhouse building for housing!” she wrote. “This would erase the scenic views, the open space, and the prime agricultural soils that the legal document governing this property describes as the very goals of the town purchasing this land back in 2001.”

Harwood lamented that North Edge proposal was just one of many. “It’s part of a larger story of the owners of ag reserves trying to push the envelope of those ag reserves to try to get what they want,” she said. Even though the town’s lawyers have learned from past mistakes and tightened the language of new contracts, there are still a number of properties in the town that are vulnerable and attractive to buyers with deep pockets and ulterior motives, she said.

Bruyn, who was reached on Tuesday, said Morris’s proposal met the town’s criteria and was no different than many other horse farm proposals, and he compared it to the private Campbell Stables property on Newlight Lane in Bridgehampton. He said Morris was entitled to have as many as 35 horses on the site, so that her plan was less dense than permitted.

“Everybody thinks that agriculture is purely cultivated row crops,” he said of neighbors raising objections. He added that the state agriculture and markets law clearly recognizes equestrian uses as an agricultural use.

“This is not the first horse farm in Bridgehampton,” he added.

Bruyn said the next step in the process is for the Planning Board to adopt a pre-submission conference report that will outline the board’s initial concerns about the proposal. It is scheduled to review that report at its next meeting on Thursday, September 12. After that, the board will begin the formal site-plan process, the scheduling of which depends on how fast Morris’s team can prepare a formal application as well as how busy the board’s calendar is.

Comfort said she was perplexed and disheartened by the whole thing. “Lumber Lane is one of the last roads that looks like what people came out here for,” she said. “If they let this thing go through, you have to wonder why do we even have the Community Preservation Fund?”