A soaring East End market equals more money for open space

Daily Point

CPF exceeds all expectations

The only question about last year’s record haul for the Peconic Bay Community Preservation Fund was how big that record would be. The answer: Pretty darned big.

The fund, fueled by a 2% tax on East End real estate sales, took in $139.42 million, smashing the mark of $107.69 million in 2014. December’s haul also was a monthly record, at $21.31 million. The biggest beneficiaries among the five East End towns were Southampton ($80.71 million) and East Hampton ($40.94 million).

"I never cease to be shocked by these numbers," Assemb. Fred Thiele (I-Sag Harbor) told The Point. "As far as I can tell from talking to lawyers and real estate brokers, it’s still a strong market."

Thiele, who co-wrote the legislation setting up the fund with recently retired State Sen. Ken LaValle, said he’s not concerned about towns being able to spend the money. Plenty of opportunities remain to purchase open space and stitch together smaller protected parcels into larger ones, and to reduce debt from previous open-space purchases, Thiele said. And the money can be spent on water quality projects, like septic system upgrades.

Thiele has a different concern: spending the money properly. He said he plans to talk to State Comptroller Tom DiNapoli about auditing the fund, which was last done about 10 years ago. They were in the process of arranging for an audit last year when COVID-19 hit, Thiele said, "and everything went sideways."

"There’s always a concern because the CPF is the biggest checkbook in town hall on the East End," Thiele said. "It’s a concern during the pandemic when other revenues are declining … that you keep the guardrails up so there’s no temptation to misuse the fund."

Thiele stressed that he is not casting aspersions on any town officials. But he pointed out that the previous audit showed an illegal transfer of $8 million from East Hampton’s CPF as part of wide-ranging budget mismanagement by a previous administration. The scandal led to the resignation of then-Town Supervisor Bill McGintee, and then-budget director Ted Hults pleaded guilty to two misdemeanor counts of securities fraud and official misconduct.

"There’s no sense there’s anything afoot that’s wrong or anything, but I think the timing for an audit is good," Thiele said.

And there are more numbers to look at than ever before.

—Michael Dobie @mwdobie

Talking Point

Your plan, my plan, our plan?

As Nassau County works to finalize its set of recommendations for overhauling police practices in the wake of the protests following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis last summer, local activists are putting together "The Peoples’ Plan," their vision of what needs to change.

But the two sides have a major disagreement about how the two proposals ought to be viewed.

On Friday, County Executive Laura Curran sent attorney Frederick Brewington, a leader of Long Island Advocates for Police Accountability, a letter asking to see "The People’s Plan" that Brewington and his team are working to complete, stating: "Nassau County welcomes the opportunity to review the suggestions and recommendations included in the ‘People’s Plan.’" Curran plans to file the final draft of the "Police Reform and Reinvention Plan" with the County Legislature on February 16 and wants to "ensure that we have ample time to review recommendations in the People’s Plan prior to that submission."

But to Brewington, the letter misstates the process outlined in Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s executive order 203 and shortchanges the document his group is drafting.

"It’s very odd from our standpoint because that’s not collaborative, what they are suggesting might actually be plagiarism, and it’s not what was envisioned by Governor Cuomo’s executive order," Brewington told The Point Monday.

Brewington said the document LIAFPA is creating is not a set of suggestions, it’s the actual blueprint for the changes that should be made to the Nassau County Police Department. And he says that makes it of significantly more value than the county draft which Police Commissioner Patrick Ryder explained to the legislature during a three-hour presentation and question-and-answer session on Jan. 7.

"They’re asking us for this now but they did not want the input or to see our ideas before dropping this thing they call a plan," said Brewington, who called the county’s plan laughable and insufficient. LIAFPA wants the same opportunity to present its plan to the legislature.

To this, Legislature Presiding Officer Richard Nicolello said early Monday, "We definitely want to see this plan and give Mr. Brewington and the people he is working with a chance to answer questions about it." Monday evening Nicolello told The Point a public safety hearing would be scheduled for Feb. 24, presumably to give Brewington and his allies an opportunity to share their plan.

And it’s clear that the conflict in Nassau isn’t unique. Civil rights attorneys sent a letter with more than 300 signatures to Cuomo Friday asking to push back the April 1 deadline for communities to complete their police reforms to Nov. 1. They say municipalities have not addressed the underlying issues of systemic racism and police misconduct in their plans. Cuomo has yet to comment on the request.

—Lane Filler @lanefiller

Pencil Point

A bigger monster

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Final Point

Letter of Recommendation

If a second impeachment of former President Donald Trump has you in a reflective mood about how America arrived at the present moment, The Point recommends Ayad Akhtar’s "Homeland Elegies," which came out in September.

The book is advertised as a novel but Akhtar, who won the Pulitzer Prize for drama in 2013, has called it a mixture of essay, memoir, fiction, and even Instagram. It opens with a playwright with Akhtar’s name trying to investigate why his Pakistani immigrant father liked Trump. Akhtar’s father is a successful but troubled doctor who made and lost fortunes while gambling and drinking too much and, in the book, actually treats Trump for heart issues in the 1990s.

The book includes lengthy set pieces about a Black Hollywood agent’s reasons for voting Republican; the long shadow of 9/11; the horrors of the healthcare system; nearly-Supreme Court Justice Robert Bork and the antitrust movement; the effect of the financial crisis and an American overreliance on debt in general — all of which are among the reasons Akhtar suggests the Midwestern towns he travels through and knows well (he grew up in Wisconsin) have fallen into hard times and political strife.

Some of the material works as a good pairing with Ezra Klein’s book "Why We’re Polarized," published last year, in which Klein argues that Trump’s 2016 win was not actually that surprising when you look at the demographic and partisan breakdown of the vote compared to previous elections. In 2004, for example, George W. Bush won 93% of self-identified Republicans. In 2016, Trump won 88% — hardly the kind of drop-off you might expect for such an outsider figure.

Klein’s take is that current polarization was building for a while and developed around identity, with the parties becoming so different because of race.

Akhtar’s book touches on some of that kind of analysis as well, plus some wrinkles to simpler identity arguments — the writer himself has been the subject of criticism from both Muslim Americans and the political right, both of whom he paints with clear-eyed complications.

It’s also an often-gripping read, featuring romance and roadside encounters with bigots and police along with the politics. A good break for those stuck on the BREAKING NEWS ticker on cable TV.

—Mark Chiusano @mjchiusano