Westhampton Beach Board Plans New Beautification Effort

A five-year plan by the Westhampton Beach Village Board will see the village covered in daffodils — 50,000 of them, to be exact.

The plan, spearheaded by resident Marcus Stinchi of Stinchi Landscaping, is a continuation of a project that began two years ago following the Main Street revitalization project, in which 10,000 daffodil bulbs imported from Holland were planted along the eastern and western ends of the Main Street business district, at a cost of $4,500 for the price of the bulbs.

Stinchi, who is volunteering his services, plans to plant another 10,000 bulbs this fall in central areas along Main Street, followed by 10,000 more each year for the following three years, he said at a board work session last Wednesday, March 15.

In all, the 50,000 bulbs would be planted by fall 2026. The last 30,000 bulbs will be planted in the new landscaped areas in the recently renovated North, South and Mill Road municipal parking lots, Mayor Maria Moore said this week.

The village will pay for the bulbs out of its beautification budget, but Stinchi’s crews will do the plantings at no cost to the village.

Since daffodils bloom early in the spring, the hope is that they will be a draw to visitors of the village in the spring shoulder season, who would then patronize local shops and restaurants.

“The board was in favor of the bulb program, and there are sufficient funds in the beautification line of the budget to accommodate the request,” Moore said. “Marcus often contacts me with suggestions for the improvement of aesthetics in the village. His suggestions are always appreciated, as is his willingness to donate his time to get the job done.”

According to the mayor, Stinchi said that he is also working with the U.S. Postal Service to renovate the landscaping at the post office to be more consistent with the new Main Street plantings, and plans to donate several thousand bulbs to be planted there as well. He hopes this will happen this spring with the bulbs being planted there this fall, she said.

Stinchi said he was inspired by the Main Street redevelopment completed three years ago, and wanted to contribute to its success in making Westhampton Beach a destination village.

“We were involved as a consultant for the Main Street project,” he said. “We really just wanted to have some excitement of color, and to bring people in the offseason into town. With the goal in mind that if the village supported this major bulb program that people would say, ‘Hey, let’s go to Westhampton and see the bulbs that are coming up,’ and that they would visit the restaurants and shop downtown.”

The high-quality bulbs, which will flower every year in April and May, are a mix of colors, he said. The reason that daffodils were selected, he said, is because the deer and rabbits won’t bother them. “Daffodils, we found, are the heartiest,” he said.

Stinchi hopes that once the 50,000 bulbs are planted, the village will continue the program, he said.

“I tried to push them for 100,000 bulbs,” he said. “We’ll see where it goes. You know, the botanical gardens in the city, they’ve been doing bulbs for years. They did a million-bulb project. I don’t know how many people they get, but I’m sure tens of thousands of people go to see them.”

He suggested that the village, or the Chamber of Commerce, could plan events around the blooming of the flowers.

“Like the cherry blossoms in D.C.,” board member Brian Tymann said at the work session.

The board last week agreed to put a resolution on the agenda for its next meeting to approve the expenditure for the first 10,000 bulbs this fall, with the intention that the program would continue into 2026. The price of the bulbs as risen slightly since the initial bulbs were planted in 2020, Stinchi said, and would most likely cost about $1,000 more this year, or about $6,000, with a 10 to 15 percent increase every year.

“It’s beautiful,” Moore said. “It’s such a nice surprise every year when the daffodils come up.”