Letters

Once again, The Press has sought to separate those of us who call “home” Southampton Village in yet another divisive editorial [“Call It What It Is,” March 6].

Your insistence on labeling our neighbors, friends and relatives as “upper-income” and “wealthy” and “multimillionaire(s)” and “billionaire(s)” is not what we are all about here, and it is troubling that, week after week, you are advocating for what really is class warfare, which we do not need or desire in our special community.

What the editorial board clearly does not understand about this wonderful place is that we share our streets and beaches and stores and houses of worship and schools and history — no matter how hard you try to separate us with such labels.

Most of the “large” places that “the Mellons and Duponts and Ladds” lived in are long gone, and I am perplexed as to why their names are even being brought up, unless it is your thinking that doing so will ferment our anger toward each other. The tax exemption/deferment, or whatever it should be known as, is for every historic house in the village, and my guess is that there are many more small properties than there are large ones, which is not clarified.

Also, those who do renovate historic houses are still going to have to spend a great deal of money in the process, with all of the Architectural Review Board and other restrictions, and those owners, many of whom are already struggling, are not going to have their (high) taxes reduced but simply will not have any increases for the small rehabilitation portion of work that was done for five years.

If you ask any resident what makes Southampton unique, one of the answers is that we have historic protections, and the more that can be done to save and preserve what we have, the better. It is not always about money but quality of life.

Finally, at the end of this editorial, what is finally made known is that what you really want to do is to attack our mayor, and your wondering “whether other motivations are in play” is an implied slight with no factual basis.

We the residents of Southampton will not be split up into different groups, and we will all continue to look after each other. We are all one.

Walter L. Deane

Southampton Village