Sag Harbor Mayor Cancels Public Forum in Wake of Article 78 Filing

Sag Harbor Village Mayor Jim Larocca said this week that he has canceled a special meeting the Village Board had been expected to hold on October 26 to field public input on a variety of issues.

The reason? He said he was concerned that the board, which was recently sued by the civic group Save Sag Harbor over its adoption of a local law aimed at creating more affordable housing, would not be able to discuss a proposed comprehensive plan while the legal challenge was making its way through the courts.

In addition, he said he did not perceive that there was much community interest in holding the meeting now.

He promised to revisit the matter in the coming weeks after obtaining guidance from Village Attorney Elizabeth Vail over whether the board would face any legal jeopardy by discussing items related to the need for more affordable housing and other planning ideas until the legal case was resolved.

“My concern is with what are the boundaries of public conversation because we are both the regulators on the Potter project and the defendant in a lawsuit,” Larocca said on Tuesday. He was referring to the proposal floated by the developer Adam Potter and Conifer Realty to build 79 affordable apartments and more than 30,000 square feet of commercial space on a 1.4-acre lot bounded by Bridge and Rose Streets.

Earlier this month, the mayor had pitched the meeting as a community forum that would allow the board to hear from the public on any number of subjects, including, but not limited to the comprehensive plan update he has said will be one of the board’s next priorities. Among the items, the board expected to discuss were truck traffic through the village, the ongoing effort to expand the village sewer system, and water quality initiatives.

The mayor insisted that he had not canceled the meeting solely because of the Article 78 legal challenge brought by Save Sag Harbor, although he said that he feared the suit would likely cast a pall over the effort to encourage developers to step forward with housing plans that could put a dent in the housing shortage.

“This couldn’t be happening at a worse time,” he said on Friday. He said that with interest rates rising, it was possible that Potter and his partners would pull the plug on their project rather than continue.

In the meantime, he said the village’s planning consultants had determined that the Potter and Conifer Realty application was “complete,” which means the formal review process can begin.

The mayor said it was highly unlikely that a court would block the village’s review of that application, although if it ruled that the board had improperly adopted the law permitting it, as the Save Sag Harbor filing alleges, that it could effectively kill the project.