Neighbors Sue East Hampton Village To Stop Herrick Park Improvements

An East Hampton Village couple living adjacent to Herrick Park have sued to stop the construction of pickleball courts and plans for ice skating and concerts in the park, accusing village officials of “gross malfeasance” for not having held public hearings on the park renovation plans before proceeding.

The lawsuit claims that the “newly fashionable game of pickleball” is “outrageously loud,” and that renovating two tennis courts at the park to accommodate pickleball games would create a nuisance for neighbors.

Renovation work on the first phase of the village’s refurbishment of the park, which includes sprucing up the athletic fields and rebuilding the tennis courts, began earlier this month.

The lawsuit asks a Suffolk County court judge to annul the two resolutions adopted by the East Hampton Village Board earlier this year approving the plans to renovate the tennis courts and to halt the work that has begun, as well as to issue an injunction against the park being used for pickleball, ice skating or concerts.

Attorneys for neighbors Michael and Barbara Bebon, who own a home on Main Street that shares a driveway with the Ladies Village Improvement Society, just a hedgerow over from the three existing tennis courts at the southern end of the park, filed the lawsuit in Suffolk County Supreme Court on Monday.

Village officials have said they plan to put up temporary ice skating facilities in the park in the wintertime and host musical performances in the future, the lawsuit says, and that no accommodation has been made to ensure that lighting at the pickleball courts does not impact neighbors.

“Mayor [Jerry] Larsen has publicly stated — and told the petitioners — that in addition to pickleball in Herrick Park, [the village] intends to install an ice skating rink on the tennis courts adjacent to [Bebon’s] home and a concert venue, with a permanent stage to be erected where the basketball courts used to be in Herrick Park, literally less than 50 feet from [the Bebons’] property line,” the text of the lawsuit reads.

The suit charges that the village has marched forward with its plans for a multi-phase renovation of the park without conducting any public hearings or environmental review of the plans and the impacts that it could have on neighbors. While the renovation plans were discussed at several public meetings, the plaintiffs acknowledge, no specific notice was ever given to the neighbors who might be impacted by the changes.

The village has been discussing the plans to incorporate pickleball courts into the renovation of the park for years. The game, which has become hugely popular in recent years — the common advertising pitch for it is that it is the “fastest-growing sport in the country” — is played with a large plastic ball and wooden rackets and can be played on regular tennis courts modified with new striping.

But discussions by municipal regulatory boards of the rise of pickleball as a feature in parks, sports facilities and at homes have often harked to the game being noisier than tennis because of the hard balls and rackets.

“That pickleball is astonishingly noisy — and that [village officials] know and have admitted it — cannot be seriously contested,” the Bebons’s lawsuit says.

It points out that the Village Board held a discussion in March of legislation amending the village code to specifically address the construction of pickleball courts. The Village Board even proposed a six-month moratorium on their construction on private properties to allow time for expert analysis of the noise impacts of the game and devise design options that can mitigate it.

The village legislation reads: “The noise generated by the game has the potential to create a nuisance to village residents,” and requires that any court be constructed or retrofitted to accommodate pickleball be “at least 4 feet below grade.”

The plans for creating pickleball courts during the Herrick Park rehab were not put on hold, however, and did not impose the below-grade requirement.

“So, while [the village] apparently believe it is appropriate to ‘collect data and expert information concerning the noise associated with pickleball courts and mitigate measures on the same’ on courts built on private property,” the lawsuit, which also catalogs other lawsuits brought around the country over the construction of pickleball facilities, reads, “they care not and have made no inquiry whatsoever concerning the pickleball courts now being installed in Herrick Park.”

East Hampton Village Mayor Jerry Larsen said he was disappointed by the lawsuit and that the village had tried to accommodate the Bebons, in their design of the park.

“We removed the basketball court that was 5 feet from their property line, so I’m not exactly sure what their concerns are now” he said on Wednesday.

Village Attorney Lisa Perillo said that the claims in the lawsuit are “untrue and specious” and that she was confident a court would side with the village.

A judge on Monday declined a request by the Bebons’ attorneys to impose a temporary restraining order that would halt the ongoing renovation work on the tennis courts.

The lawsuit details conversations between the mayor and Michael Bebon in March over the neighbors’ concerns about the new features in the park, and accuses the mayor of lying to them about what they say he called “his plan” for the park renovation project.

“In that meeting, Mayor Larsen specifically told Mr. Bebon that his plan involved multiple phases of development and included an ice skating rink on the tennis courts during fall and winter months and the erection of a stage on which to hold concerts,” the Bebons’ attorney, Steven Altman, wrote. “Mr. Bebon and his wife … were shocked and appalled.”

In an email to the mayor the next day, March 22, Michael Bebon asked the mayor for copies of the regulatory approvals for the proposed project required by the New York State Environmental Quality Review Act and said that some of the more grandiose plans were inappropriate for a community park. He suggested that perhaps the ice skating rink could be put at the far end of the park near the Stop-n-Shop supermarket but said that any plans for a permanent concert stage were wholly unacceptable.

“I live here and I have dinner parties on my patio almost every Saturday night during the summer,” he said in the email to Larsen. “If you have one or two concerts during the year on a portable stage I can live with that, but no more.”

“Currently, the park is a peaceful place where people bring their kids and the school children come over for recess to play,” he added. “It is not Disney World.”