2025 Preview: Key East End Stories to Follow This Year

As 2025 begins, the East End faces a dynamic year of change and growth. From housing developments to environmental challenges, these key stories promise to shape the region’s future and community conversations.

AT THE BALLOTS

Election Day may be nearly a year away, but candidates are already jockeying behind the scenes to line up the support they need to secure party nominations this spring and fend off potential primary challengers.

With the next high-turnout presidential campaigns not until 2028, the coming cycle is an off-year election featuring only local races. Likely seeking second two-year terms will be Suffolk County Legis. Catherine Stark (R-Riverhead), who represents the North Fork, and Suffolk County Legis. Ann Welker (D-Southampton), who represents the South Fork. Same goes for the town leaders who serve two-year terms, such as Riverhead Town Supervisor Timothy Hubbard.

That is, unless New York State succeeds in its appeal bid to overturn an upstate court ruling that threw out a new state law that would have moved all local elections to even-numbered years to align them with state and federal elections.

AFFORDABLE HOUSING

Among the most oft-repeated phrases uttered by those seeking elected office — affordable housing — may see some progress now that the Community Housing Fund (CHF) went into effect in April 2023.

The new law is similar to the Community Preservation Fund (CPF) that allows local municipalities to buy open space using money set aside from a 2% real estate transfer tax on properties valued at more than $500,0000. But instead of 2%, the CHF is a .5% transfer tax and instead of being used to buy open space, it enables localities to use the funds to address the affordable housing crisis that is forcing longtime residents to relocate.

Stay tuned for more affordable housing plans to come down the pike now that the fledgling fund is starting to get some money in the bank to support such projects.

BESS DEBATE

Twin Forks area officials will continue debating what to do with Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS) that the state is urging be built to support renewable energy initiatives but sparks concerns from neighbors due to the difficulty firefighters have in extinguishing lithium-ion battery blazes.

Will moratoria be extended? Will BESS operators finally get the green light to build more of these facilities? And when will the state issue its new fire code to help first responders know best practices for dealing with a worst-case scenario if there is a repeat of the East Hampton BESS fire?

FIMPED OUT

The $1.7 billion Fire Island to Montauk Point (FIMP) storm flooding mitigation project has pumped sand on some South Fork beaches, but work is far from completion.

Attorneys for wealthy Hamptons oceanfront property owners who will be asked to provide for FIMP easements — a legal right of way allowing crews to perform work on private property — may fight such requests. Hundreds of easements are required to advance the project. If negotiations break down, cases can go to court under eminent domain, the legal process in which the government acquires private property for public use.

So far, work has been done to build up beaches outside of the most likely litigious stretches of shorefront. In the meantime, strong storms this winter will continue to remind us that pumping millions of taxpayer-funded dollars worth of sand on the beach is not a permanent solution to rising sea levels.

GILGO UPDATES

After Gilgo Beach serial killer suspect Rex Heuermann was charged this year with three more murders — with the trio of new cases all having East End ties — expect more details to emerge from Long Island’s most high-profile criminal case.

Heuermann pleaded not guilty to the murders of Jessica Taylor and Valerie Mack, who were both originally found dead in Manorville two decades ago, as well as the murder of Sandra Castilla, who was dumped in the Southampton Town hamlet of North Sea in 1993. The new charges bring the total number of murders he’s charged with to seven, nearly half of which were found out east, and doubled the number of years he is alleged to have been targeting victims.

Will the grand jury indict him for additional murders? Can prosecutors keep the defense from throwing out key DNA evidence? And when will this case finally go to trial?

IMMIGRATION ISSUE

President-elect Donald Trump’s planned mass deportations of undocumented immigrants already has advocates and others on high alert for when he is inaugurated on Jan. 20.

While the Hamptons is best known as the playground of the rich and famous, immigrants who often live in the shadows help drive the region’s service industries, farms, and other businesses.

Will mass deportations separate local families? And how may the administration’s effort impact local businesses?

LANTERNFLIES AWAY

East End vineyards and winemakers remain on high alert for the invasive spotted lanternfly that is known to feed on grapes that are the lifeblood of the wine industry.

Experts have described it as a “slow-motion train wreck.” The insects were found on the East End, but North Fork Wine Country has been spared widespread destruction to date.

Will local wineries continue holding off the invasion? And if they can’t, how soon will the wineries rebound?

POT SHOPS LIGHT UP 

Now that the first three state-licensed recreational cannabis dispensaries have opened on the East End, expect more to follow in the new year.

Brown Buddha New York’s Hamptons location offers delivery and pickup for now while it works on getting its shop opened. Strain Stars opened in Riverhead and Beleaf debuted in Calverton.

Other applicants that have applied to open up shop in the Town of Riverhead include Coastal Green, GreenCulture, Northern Light Dispensary, and Zooties, according to records obtained from the town via a Freedom of Information Law request. Results of a similar request to the Town of Southampton showed five more weed retailers in the works there.

And that’s in addition to shops on the Shinnecock Nation territory in Southampton such as Little Beach Harvest.

WIND WORRIES

Work is expected to continue on the off-shore Sunrise Wind farm about 30 miles off the coast of Montauk — and is expected to eclipse the 12-turbine South Fork Wind that went online in 2024.

But given the incoming Trump administration’s preference for backing the fossil fuel industry over renewable energy backed by outgoing President Joe Biden, it appears the policy winds will change and plans for new offshore wind farms will get shelved.

Will Trump follow through on his campaign promise to kill offshore wind on his first day in office? And if he does, what will that mean for the projects in the works off the coast of Long Island?