Repeatedly pressed to report on their finances, STAR AquaCenter made a splash at a “Breakfast of Champions” by finally revealing the name of the donor of their initial $5 million for a “public” swimming pool [“STAR Pool Push Continues, With Major Donor Named,” 27east.com, June 27]. It is anticipated that the pool will be named after them.
This hardly fulfills the due diligence expected of the town after Jay Schneiderman handed over to STAR a $4.9 million, 7-acre parcel of land, purchased with Community Preservation Fund money for “open space.” The town enticed the project (and its promoter, Naples, Florida, resident Josephine DiVincenzi) from Red Creek, where it had been approved, was better suited and moving along.
No financial statement attesting to monies on hand to build and maintain this sports facility has been sought by the town. And none provided. Except for unsubstantiated coy hints.
The estimate of $20 million to “build the center,” reported in The Press, is woefully incorrect, if not laughable. The original estimate to construct the pool alone was $26 million, and the cost of everything to do with construction has skyrocketed, as everyone knows. This figure does not account for the monies needed to be raised annually for maintenance, staff, insurance.
Mr. Schneiderman should realize the importance of stringent accountability and oversight, since his involvement in a similar project in East Hampton, when he was supervisor there, belly-flopped and cost taxpayers a bundle. STAR AquaCenter is rumored to be enamored of that particular pool model.
Despite sentimental references to drowning children and “building character,” this “pool” quickly morphed into a proposed two-story sports complex with asphalt for 167 cars (so much for “open space”), and a “meeting room” and “flex space” more suited to the fitness needs of an older demographic, able to pay the anticipated membership fees.
It is not designed to close the “racial and economic gap between who wades in the shallow end of a pool and who jumps off the diving board,” as Andrea Dozier Nartey, in a perplexing metaphor, says it must.
No need was established for this potential financial sinkhole to migrate from Hampton Bays to Southampton, except a push from Schneiderman. A marketing arm was added — what funds pay for that? — aided and abetted by pool and sports facility developers from the Midwest and a free pass on oversight.
Absent from the self-congratulatory pronouncements is any consideration of the already gridlocked traffic grinding down all the surrounding residential streets from Country Road 39 to Hill Street that this will add to. Nor the concurrent bocce courts, tennis, etc., just approved for Moses Park around the corner. Nor the environmental impacts.
Look before you leap? The town prefers to pave the way and look away.
Frances Genovese
Southampton
The quote attributed above to Andrea Dozier Nartey actually was a paraphrase written by the author of the article, not a direct quote — Ed.
Shut Him UpFolks: it is time to take Michael Daly at his word(s), unpleasant as that may be. First: glide by his smarmy greeting card calls for “love.” His own words reveal him, above all, and consistently, a purveyor of hate and...
Suffering in SilenceWhen our world gets out of balance, we lose our comfort and security. Too much or too little of anything spikes our fear, and we lose our sense of peace. Those who have what they want and need are comfortable....
Advocate & Adjudicate?The previous administration of [Supervisor Jay] Schneiderman and current board member Tommy John Schiavoni did not give high priority to monitoring appointed public officials for ethical lapses in their private life activities. This laissez-faire policy towards ethics enforcement appears to...
Soil Is CallingIn a book titled “In Old Southampton,” Abigail Halsey reminds us that in the early days of Southampton, “every man was a farmer and a fisherman.” But those days are long gone and most people, today, have no connection to...
A Web of InterestsKudos to Craig Catalanotto [“What Are We Doing?” Letters, April 18] and Barbara Ring [“Tangled Web” Letters, April 18] for their letters to the editor shining a light on the web of special interests, conflicts of interest and misinformation that...
Dates of InfamySeptember 11 and October 7, similar dates of infamy for strong allies with similarly divergent reactions. Now gathered mobs of protesters are cheering on those who cry “Death to America” and call for the complete annihilation and genocide of the...
Your VoiceOn June 25, registered Democrats will go to the ballot box to determine who will represent their ticket for New York’s 1st Congressional District. Although CD1 has recently been held by Republicans, both parties have assumed leadership over the years....
Master ClassI thank Barbara Ring for aptly proving my point. In response to my letter [“An Alliance,” Letters, April 11], which decried the state of civic public discourse in Hampton Bays as being overtaken by misinformation, fear-mongering and conspiracy peddling, Ring...
