Will Town Repeal Noyac Bay Avenue Parking Ban Fiasco?
A very important vote will take place at the meeting of the Southampton Town Board on Tuesday, July 26. It involves who can or cannot park at the end of the very peaceful and quiet Noyac Bay Avenue where it dead-ends, overlooking the inlet into the bay.
This is a public road, paid for and taken care of by the Town taxpayers. However, last year, the members of a club—the Northampton Colony Yacht Club, which exists just next door to the dead end—told the town that many robberies on boats nearby were occurring and asked that NO PARKING signs be put up at the road’s end. A concerned citizen, who used to like to park there to watch the boats come into the harbor, got the police records of thefts and robberies there. There was only one, and that took place in 2008.
It is wrong under any circumstances, in my opinion, for the Town to pass a law preventing the public from parking at a public road end. To do this under false circumstances is a disgrace. Such a law should be repealed. [expand]
If you drive down to that road end, which I did the other day, you will encounter eight signposts with a total of 16 different signs, urging you to keep away. Many of them seem to be other than Town signs. Many are on Town property. You will also be watched. I had been told about this. I stayed at this road end and otherwise drove around the loop of this pleasant residential community for a half hour. I passed a person walking a dog by the side of the road, smiled and waved and got glared at. A vehicle followed me part of the time. I certainly felt unwelcome. I was on Town-owned roads. I pay Town taxes. Why is this happening? Because people living on a few roads in Noyac decided to call themselves “the Northampton Colony Yacht Club?” These are public roads!
Next Tuesday, a proposition is being put to the board to undo this No Parking situation. There are five councilmen. But for some procedural reason, to get something undone, you need four votes out of the five. As it stands, a Republican councilman, Chris Nuzzi, is dead set against repealing these restrictions. It may have nothing to do with it, but the Northhampton Colony holds big fundraisers for his political campaigns. Three of the other four councilmen say they support repeal. And so it all comes down to how the fourth councilperson, Nancy Graboski of Bridgehampton, who is just back from vacation, will vote. We hope she votes to repeal, to bring these signs down and return to the townspeople what a few would take away. [/expand]