Issue #33, November 10, 2006

Public Vs. Private

Bridgehampton Resident Maneuvers for His Own Private Beach

By Dan Rattiner

As you read this, there is an ongoing court battle to determine the fate of an oceanfront beach parcel of dunes in Bridgehampton. The Town owns it and has made use of this property for the last quarter of a century. Now, a man named Simpson, who recently built a house on the lot immediately next door to this beachfront parcel, says the town owns it but can’t use it. And that the only people who can use it are he and his immediate neighbors. A decision is pending.

The story of this property, which is at the end of Surfside Drive, is complicated. But the essence of it is that from about 1965 to 1987, this beachfront property was indeed owned, in common, by Simpson and his neighbors, and they used it as an exclusive recreation area. However, in 1987, they defaulted on their taxes and it was taken over for unpaid taxes by the county. They in turn gave the property to the Town of Southampton, which has owned and used it since.

Simpson’s argument, in court, is that although from that day until this, the Town indeed has the deed to the property, the Town is obliged to only allow Simpson and his neighbors to use it. In essence, he says that in 1987, when Marty Lang was the town supervisor, the Town agreed — and why they would do this is amazing considering that the former owner no longer had control of the property, the county did — to abide by the restrictions placed on the property. These restrictions say this is the recreation area for these homeowners. So now the Town has to maintain the property and keep it up, and the homeowners get the exclusive right to use it. But they have it tax-free. Simpson says this is in the deed.

As I mentioned to Mr. Simpson in an exchange of e-mails, this looks like one half of an under-the-table transaction. What did the town taxpayers get out of this bargain? Nothing. In fact, if Simpson wins, it will continue to cost the taxpayers to maintain and clean up this property, while they are still unable to use it. If ever something cried out for an investigation, this is it. The deeds and bills of sale are all available in microfiche. If Simpson and his friends prevail in court and the townspeople lose their right to use their own beach, it suggests a taxpayer’s lawsuit against the town. Though that will not get the beach back. What kind of deal did they make?

Of course, you might say, it seems almost impossible that a judge would rule that the Town could not use its own property. But you never know. And furthermore, Simpson has hired one of the most effective lawyers I know on eastern Long Island, Bill Esseks, to represent him in this case.

Esseks is responsible for the victory for those developing the East Hampton Golf Club five years ago. The fairways of this golf club were originally plowed through a woods in Springs in the 1960s and 1970s by a man in the heavy construction business, Barry Bistrian. He’d bring his bulldozers there on the weekends. The course slowly got plowed into shape.

Bistrian had gotten the rough fairways plowed when the town stopped him. This was around 1980. He had gotten far enough along so that he wanted to build a clubhouse for the place. And the Town wouldn’t approve it. So with no clubhouse, he reasoned, he had no golf course.

For the next fifteen years, Bistrian simply could not get approval for his clubhouse. But then he hired Esseks. Esseks read all the legal papers and found that the Town had given Bistrian permission to plow the fairways in 1972. “Finish the fairways and greens, and start playing golf on them,” he said. “And forget the clubhouse. Bring in a trailer on wheels, park it there and that’s your clubhouse.” And so the course was finished, the membership was established and now the Town relented about the clubhouse. How could they continue to have a magnificent golf course with trailers like that at the 19th hole? They couldn’t.

In the early going in this beachfront property case, two decisions have come down and the score is one to one. Simpson had put in boulders blocking access to the Town’s property and the judge ruled he had to take them out, which he did. But then the judge also ruled that a restriction on this property that said beach vehicles could not drive down the sand road that crosses this property to the beach would stand.

Now it seems that Simpson is poised to say that if one of the restrictions on the property has to be upheld, then all of them do. And if that gets an approval from the court, it will mean the property is for the exclusive use of only Simpson and his neighbors. And it will be one more public beach access lost forever.

I have thought long and hard about all of this. It is, for one thing, about as selfish and unkind a thing for any individual to do to the other residents of a community in which they live, to try and take a public beach private.

I also wonder why the Town Trustees, a separate government body from the Town Board, has stepped aside as this has proceeded through the courts. The Southampton Town Trustees, a different group entirely from the Town Board, are charged with protecting the bays, wetlands and beaches and keeping them accessible for the use of the townspeople. The Trustees say that since the Town bought the property, they cannot step in to keep the access open. They have to work with the Town. But for hundreds of years, from 1683 until 1987 when title transferred to the Town, the Trustees had fishermen’s and boat launching rights over this property and did exercise these rights.

It has also occurred to me that if there was no hanky panky in this sale to the Town, there might have been another explanation entirely.

Perhaps those who owned the property in 1987 DELIBERATELY stopped paying their taxes. There is case law that says if a property has restrictions over it, then these restrictions have to pass to the next owner of the property. Maybe these homeowners in common looked at this back in 1987 as a way to get to never again have to pay taxes on this beachfront land, and furthermore get the Town to take care of it for them. That’s what would happen if the restrictions passed from owner to owner.

On the other hand, can restrictions such as these, made by a private party, pass to a Town that takes over a parcel because it defaults on paying taxes on the property? That would be some loophole.

I have some suggestions for what the Town could do while waiting for the legal decisions to transpire.

Build a fence along the property line separating the Town’s land from Mr. Simpson’s land. This is perfectly legal. It would keep anybody who uses this beachfront land from looking into Mr. Simpson’s home and he would like that. Although it will also block his view of the ocean where the sun rises. He probably would not like that.

Next summer, if this legal battle is still going on, the Town ought to consider busing beachgoers to this small and isolated beach from the town centers. Busing beachgoers is already in effect from the town centers in two locations in Southampton town, to Sagg Beach and to Flying Point Beach.

Build a beach pavilion at the end of Ocean Road just a few hundred yards from this disputed beach to the West. Simpson has argued that the Town already has beachfront property and a beach. So he just wants the Town to give him his. That’s fair. One for the Town and one for he and his friends. With his maintained by the Town.

Build a beach pavilion and then spread out the lifeguard stands in front of Simpson’s property. There is no denying the beach from the high water mark down belongs to the Town and there is nothing he could do to stop them.

Simpson has his boulders, and when he tried putting a barrier up three years before and failed, the Town Supervisor at the time described him as the height of arrogance. The Town and the trustees should give back what he gives them.