Resident demands stewardship of town-owned site
Help could be on the way for a Tarkettle Road resident plagued by overgrowth from an adjacent lot owned by Shelter Island Town.
In a July 7 letter to Supervisor Jim Dougherty, William Dickerson complained that trees on the town-owned lot — known as the Lawnsdale property — threaten to damage his pool and the walkway surrounding it.
Mr. Dougherty said he has referred Mr. Dickerson’s letter to Public Works Commissioner Jay Card Jr., asking what might be done to improve the lot and remove any threat of damage on Mr. Dickerson’s property.
The preserved lot, described as capable of supporting recreation at the time of its August 2007 acquisition, is now overrun with ticks, according to Mr. Dickerson. But what worries him most is that trees on the Lawsdale property abutting his land at 13 Tarkettle Road have grown to heights he fears could result in damage to his property if they came down in storms.
His insurer has told him he wouldn’t be covered for damage since it would be considered “an act of God.”
Mr. Dickerson said when he complained to Mr. Dougherty about the lack of stewardship at the site, the supervisor told him the situation could be worse — he could have a bad neighbor on the land.
“I told him I have a bad neighbor — the town,” Mr. Dickerson said.
When the Community Preservation Fund enabled the town and Suffolk County to buy the 1.2-acre site for $1.2 million, there was no provision for stewardship of acquired lands. That has changed, Mr. Dougherty said, explaining that the Community Preservation Fund Advisory Board has already put plans in place for stewardship of four or five acquired properties and is in the process of laying out plans for the rest of the properties. Mr. Dougherty was chairman of the town’s Community Preservation Advisory Committee at the time of the acquisition.
Mr. Dickerson said he expressed concerns to Mr. Dougherty at the time about how the land would be maintained. Mr. Dougherty told him it wouldn’t be “manicured,” but would be maintained, Mr. Dickerson said.
The now 90-year-old Mr. Dickerson recalls that when he first moved to his Tarkettle home in 1950, he could hit golf balls across his lawn onto the adjacent property. Today those balls would be lost in the woods.
A description of the property carried in the Reporter said the lot was “covered in dense, largely impassable brush . . . dotted with trees.” But a part of the property where it meets Dickerson Creek was cleared and “more easily accessible,” according to the Reporter account.
That cleared part is not adjacent to Mr. Dickerson’s lot.
According to the Town Board resolution approving the acquisition in 2007, the action would “be in the best interest of the community” to protect Dickerson Creek.
“That Lawnsdale property is really a great piece of land,” then Supervisor Alfred Kilb told the Reporter. He said it would help protect the water supply on the peninsula with a particularly fragile aquifer by not allowing a house to be built.
That land could do more than temper development on the Island and protect the aquifer, Town Councilman Glenn Waddington said.
“I could see artists stopping off there to paint because it’s got a fabulous view of Dickerson Creek … it’s just an iconic Shelter Island view.” He suggested clearing a small patch of land and putting a picnic table on it, saying the site would be essentially maintenance-free and “provide a nice stopping-off spot.”
