Town Issues 38 Airport Curfew Summonses: Supervisor

EAST HAMPTON, NY — Town officials cracking down on violators who have disregarded curfews at East Hampton airport.

According to East Hampton Town Supervisor Larry Cantwell, there have been 38 summonses issued for curfew violations this year that are currently before the town's justice court.

Some defendants are charged with multiple violations, he said.

"The town will continue to actively enforce the curfew limits at the East Hampton Airport," Cantwell said.

In 2015, the East Hampton town board adopted legislation that put the brakes on the use of the airport between 11 pm.. and 7 am. Noisy aircraft are forbidden between 8 p.m. and 9 a.m., and anything more than two uses of the airport, one arrival and one departure, by a noisy aircraft in one week is not allowed.

There was initially a fourth restriction pitched, that would have put a ban on all weekend helicopter traffic during the busy summer season, but that was excluded from the final vote.

The Friends of East Hampton Airport (FOEHA) coalition filed a lawsuit in April, 2015 against the Town of East Hampton to prevent the aviation bans passed by the Town Board.

“Friends of East Hampton Airport remains steadfastly committed to preserving East Hampton Airport’s vitality and accessibility to the public,” Loren Riegelhaupt, spokesman for the group said at the time. “[Suing] is a course that we concluded we had no alternative but to pursue after months of trying, without success, to convince the Town to follow its obligations under federal aviation law.”

In a statement from East Hampton Town, they claimed the lawsuit was “stripped of its rhetoric” and that “the 34-page complaint is entirely predictable and contains no surprises”.

According to the town, the restrictions would not affect almost 80 percent of the operations at the airport.

The coalition accused the town of violating federal law, claiming that local governments have “no authority to use their police powers to regulate aircraft in flight or to impose airport noise or access restrictions,” according to the lawsuit.

In an article posted by AINonline.com on Tuesday, East Hampton issued a series of criminal summonses to “several” Part 135 and 91 operators for alleged noise and curfew violations, according to NATA. The summonses, the article said, set an October 31 appearance date and threaten arrest for failure to appear.

The lawsuit claimed that the town’s adoption of the bans are in violation of the Airport Noise and Capacity Act of 1990 (“ANCA”), which is a national aviation noise police established by Congress.

Under the ANCA, airport proprietors are not allowed to enact any noise or access restrictions on any aircraft classified by the FAA as “Stage 2” and “Stage 3” aircraft, (which produce less noise than ”Stage 1” aircrafts) unless they first complied with ANCA’s requirements, which the town did not do, according to the lawsuit.

However, according to East Hampton Town, the Airport Noise and Capacity Act no longer applies to East Hampton Airport, according to a press release.

Patch file photo.