Abuses of the U.S. legal system, including its ability to drown itself and the public in billions of words, frustrating normal communications, were on display Thursday, Sept. 3 at the Westhampton Beach trustees’ meeting.

Tom MooreWHB legal counsel Brian Sokoloff shows thickness of one of the legal filings in WHB vs. East End Eruv Assn. Photos by Debora Giammarco

The hour and 20-minute meeting was marred by a 45-minute description of legal points involved in the dispute over whether utility poles on public land can carry “lechi” symbols desired by ultra Orthodox Jews to designate a religious enclave.

This was given by WHB outside attorney Brian Sokoloff although WHB officials have been saying for months that the eruv is “in litigation” and cannot be discussed in public.

The Sokoloff presentation was given at the end of the meeting and in the portion designated for "Public Comment." It was not on the agenda published by WHB. It had the effect of limiting public comments.

A similar failure to post an important item on the agenda was made by the Town Counci of Southampton for its Aug. 25 meeting.

That meeting passed, in the last few seconds and with no discussion by the Council members and no public input, a resolution saying that an agreement could be made with the East End Eruv Assn. that would allow EEEA to place lechi religious symbols on SH utility poles in return for EEEA not pursuing monetary damages against the town. Text of this proposed agreement is being sought.

Failure of both SH and WHB elected officials to give residents advance warning of important items on their meeting agendas opens them to charges of lying to the public. Comments are being sought from the officials but so far have not been available on this Labor Day weekend. None of the towns has a PR person available to the press 24/7. Releasing negative news in advance of a holiday weekend is an abusive PR practice.

While Sokoloff was given 45 minutes to discuss various legal opinions and avenues for further legal action by WHB, this reporter was told to stop speaking at the mike after five minutes.

A “rule” was cited but this is the first we ever heard of it. We had been allowed to speak for ten minutes each time at previous WHB meetings.

Sokoloff Was Filibustering

The presentation of Sokoloff went on for so long, wandering off the topic into cases not directly involving WHB and the eruv, that we held up a paper on which was written “Filibuster” and pleaded with WHB trustees to put a stop to this waste of citizens’ time.

The session will be aired in the next few days on the WHB website as well as local Channel 22 which carries civic meetings. No notice of the Channel 22 airings has ever been carried on the WHB website. Link to the schedule of Channel 22 is here.

Sokoloff at one point noted the huge volume of filings by holding his hands about five inches apart and saying this was how thick just one of them was.

GonceJack O'Dwyer attempts to talk to WHB Police Chief Trevor Gonce at meeting's end. "Credentials" of O'Dwyer have been sought by WHB staff before he can be recognized as "press."

Justice Kathleen Tomlinson has complained of the volume of words being generated, saying one filing was 70 gigabytes, equivalent to 125 million pages assuming 1,000 words per page.

Sokoloff’s pesentation was a classic case of “mike control” which we have experienced many times at the PR Society of America Assembly. A parade of 10-11 speakers normally occupies almost the entire morning of Assembly, blocking delegates from speaking.

Discussed are financial reports, review of activities, reports of committees and other materials which should have been emailed to delegates in advance. Delegates have asked for this for years to no avail.

Southampton Sell-Out Not Discussed

Ordered to take our seat, with Police Chief Trevor Gonce standing nearby, we never got to discuss the planned sell-out of Southampton officials to the East End Eruv Assn.

That has been termed “caving to threats and blackmail” of the EEEA by Arnold Sheiffer, chairman of Jewish People for the Betterment of WHB, in a letter published Aug. 3 in the Southampton Press, which was represented at the meeting last night by reporter Alyssa Melillo, who normally covers Southampton. Kyle Campbell, who has covered WHB the past two years, has joined the Daily News.

Tom MooreTom Moore, husband of Mayor Maria Moore, who hosts progess4whb.com website.

We never got to read the letter which noted the sneaky way in which the SH Council passed a resolution saying it would stop opposing an eruv if the EEEA promised not to hit it with any legal or other expenses.

Robert Sugarman of Weil, Gotshal & Manges, lead pro bono counsel for the EEEA, won more than $300,000 from Tenafly, N.J., after a decision ordering an eruv in that city to be taken down was reversed by an Appeals Court in 2002.

The Sheiffer letter noted that the SH action came during the last few minutes of the Aug. 25 meeting and had not been on the agenda.

“They did not ask the citizens and voters their opinion,” said the Sheiffer letter (which was on the second page of letters published that day). They asked for no public comment. Like guilty children about to do something wrong, the action was done quickly with no advance notice.”

Text of Deal Being Sought

We have called and emailed SH officials in an effort to get the wording of the proposed deal with the EEEA and also to get any reaction to the charges that SH has bypassed its citizens in making an arrangement with the EEEA. There have been no responses as of press time.

We told the WHB meeting Sept. 3 that Aug. 25 would be a day that would “Live in Infamy” on the town’s record—a day of surrender to what has been called the “ever-increasing extortion by court procedural costs imposed by the Orthodox Jews’ legal action” in an email to the SH Press by “Highhatsize.”

The U.S. legal system has plenty of critics including lawyer Marion Munley of Scranton who says jury trials have about disappeared, replaced by decisions made by panels of one or three judges. The same criticism is made by the Anti-Lawyer Party which says there are now a “multitude of pre-trials for pre-trials for pre-trials benefitting the lawyers only.”

Thomas Moore, husband of Mayor Moore, wrote in the Sept. 4 progress4WHB blog that he conducts, that "The public comment period was largely consumed by Jack O'Dwyer and his remarks were a reprise of his last visitation to the Trustees on the topic of the eruv." That is incorrect. The "Public Comment" part of the meeting was largely consumed by Sokoloff who had no business speaking during that part of the meeting. He should have been on the formal part. If he appeared during the public part he should have just taken questions from citizens rather than speaking non-stop for 45 minutes.