Sag Harbor Mayor Proposes Greater Village Involvement in Steinbeck House Preservation Effort

Sag Harbor Mayor Jim Larocca this week called for greater involvement from village government and the community at large, better opportunities for public access, and more transparency in the effort to buy and preserve the former home of Nobel Prize-winning author John Steinbeck.

Under the mayor’s proposal, the village would partner with Southampton Town, the John Jermain Memorial Library and the Sag Harbor Partnership to form a joint venture to oversee the house and property. The village would rezone it as parkland, with a provision for limited public access to the site, including a possible water taxi to and from John Steinbeck Waterfront Park.

Larocca said the village and town could expand on the inter-municipal agreement they signed to oversee John Steinbeck Waterfront Park to manage the property.

Back in February, the partnership announced that it had obtained the support of the Southampton Town Board to use Community Preservation Fund revenues to make an offer to buy the development rights to the property, which is on Bluff Point Lane on a peninsula overlooking Morris Cove. The property was put on the market by the heirs of Steinbeck’s wife, Elaine, in early 2021 for $17.9 million, although the price has since been reduced to $15.4 million, according to a listing on the Sotheby’s International Realty website.

This week, the partnership announced it had raised $1.25 million and was counting on a $500,000 state grant promised by Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr. to help bridge the gap between the town’s undisclosed CPF offer and the seller’s asking price.

The partnership has proposed leasing the property to the Michener Center at the University of Texas, which, in turn, would use it as a writer’s retreat, with those awarded an opportunity to use its cottage and several outbuildings, including Steinbeck’s writing gazebo, being obliged to offer educational programs to Pierson High School and other village organizations. A handful of public open houses also would be required.

Larocca, who has largely kept quiet about the project, said he was spurred to action because he did not know what the partnership was planning to do, and he feared that turning the property over exclusively to the University of Texas would freeze out even limited local access to the site.

While he stressed that he would support the idea of allowing the university to use the property, he noted that the school had no direct connection to Sag Harbor and said he feared the board of directors proposed by the partnership would not be weighted heavily enough toward village participation.

He said a slogan for his proposal could be “Save Steinbeck House for Sag Harbor.”

“One of the ironies of this drama is that some of the leaders of this proposal are among the most avid advocates of transparency,” Larocca said on Tuesday. “It has been very difficult to get information about the details of the proposal, and the effort I’ve made to be informed and participate in the process on behalf of the village has been met with a blanket accusation that I’m against the project.”

The mayor insisted that had never been the case and said he would invite the partnership to a special Village Board meeting in the coming weeks to discuss his plans.

But Susan Mead, the co-president of the partnership, said that she and April Gornik, another member of the core group behind the preservation effort, had met with Larocca three or four times this year to keep him up to date. She added that the organization has provided him with information about its plans as early as January. “He had the opportunity to learn a lot,” she said.

Nonetheless, she said the partnership was “thrilled he has taken an interest in promoting this,” and she added the group would be happy to meet with the Village Board to discuss ways to carry the project over the finish line.

Kathryn Szoka, an owner of Canio’s Books in the village, was the first person to call for the preservation of the property following the news in the winter of 2021 that the property was for sale. Like Mead, she said she was happy the mayor was coming out in support of the project, but said a letter he had written this week to Mead, Gornik and her contained a number of inaccuracies.

She said, for instance, that the University of Texas had agreed to raise an endowment to cover the cost of maintaining the writer’s retreat and the grounds. Plus, she said, the partnership planned to put together a board of directors that would represent a diverse cross-section of the community and its institutions.

But Szoka said rather than quibble with the details of the mayor’s proposal, she wanted to focus on the larger goal.

“Let’s take a step back,” she said. “The Steinbeck property is a national treasure. It’s the home of one of only 13 American Nobel-Prize-winning authors. It needs to be preserved for the ages.”

Southampton Town Supervisor Jay Schneiderman said he had preliminary discussions with the mayor about his concerns.

In the early stages, when the idea of purchasing the Steinbeck house was proposed on top of an earlier proposal to buy the building at 2 Main Street to expand Steinbeck Park as part of the Bay Street Theater redevelopment plan, Schneiderman said the mayor had fretted that there would not be enough money to support both purchases.

“I assured him each would be evaluated on their own merits,” he said, “and it would not be a case of one or the other, and that the town had the fiscal wherewithal to purchase both.”

He said he believed the mayor has the best interest of the village at heart. “The partnership has gone a long way to try to acquire this property and develop a plan for it,” he said, “but the village should be part of the conversation, for sure.”

Southampton Town Councilman Tommy John Schiavoni, who has been working with the partnership in its effort to buy the property, said another criticism from Larocca — that the partnership has yet to have a final plan in place for all phases of the operation — was premature. “We don’t have an agreement yet,” he said, adding that once a deal is struck, the membership of the board and the details for how the property would be maintained would be pulled together before public hearings were scheduled by the Town Board on the use of CPF money.

Schiavoni also cautioned against the idea of assuming that rezoning the property to parkland would not cause objections, adding that neighbors along Bluff Point Lane were adamant that they did not want the property open to the public on an unlimited basis.

But like the other supporters of the partnership’s effort, Schiavoni said he was glad to see the mayor take a more active stance.

“I am pleased to know that the mayor supports the preservation of John Steinbeck’s home as a writer’s retreat,” he said. “The Town Board and I look forward to working with all parties to preserve this critical piece of literary history for Sag Harbor and for posterity.”