Millions in legal fees both paid and pro bono are being expended on Long Island in a fight over whether religious symbols can be put on utility poles. Involved are Verizon, Long Island Power, major law firms and three L.I. towns.

The religious symbols, plastic strips called lechis, were put on utility poles last summer although major legal issues, including separation of church and state, have yet to be settled. The towns and Jewish People Opposing the Eruv are crying "foul."

Westhampton BeachWesthampton Beach website graphic

PR people need to watch how lawyers and the courts work because in many instances legal trumps PR considerations.

The lesson here is that if you lose the battle for public opinion, go the legal route. Burden the opposing side with crushing legal costs. Ruder Finn’s Michael Schubert told the PR Society Ethics panel Sept. 8, 2014 that PR must accept that lawyers have the “final say.”

Lt. Trevor Gonce, WHB Chief of PoliceLt. Trevor Gonce, WHB Chief of Police

This case, involving at least $1 million in legal expenses (list of legal filings) by Southampton, Westhampton Beach and Quogue and at least that amount in time donated to the East End Eruv Assn. (EEEA) by Weil, Gotshal & Manges, world’s 13th biggest law firm with revenues of $1.2 billion and 1,200 lawyers, should never have been accepted by any court to begin with.

Telephone poles, as any schoolchild will say, are no place for religious symbols. They may be owned by utilities but they are on public property. The U.S., only too aware of how many died in religious wars in Europe, was founded on the basis of separation of church and state.

Verizon, PSEG/LIPA Jump Into Fray

What’s surprising in this issue is that two giant companies, Verizon and PSEG/Long Island Power Authority, have jumped into this fray on the side of the EEEA which wants to erect an eruv religious boundary, marked by plastic strips called lechis on utility poles, in SH, WHB and Quogue. Public Service Enterprise Group, operator of Public Service Electric & Gas of New Jersey, the state’s largest utility, took over operation of LIPA on Jan. 1, 2014.

The Hampton Synagogue, WHB, some of whose members are Orthodox Jews, on March 7, 2008 asked WHB for permission to erect an eruv covering about one square mile of the three miles of the village. One rule of the Orthodox for an eruv is that permission must be obtained from local authorities.

Village trustees refused. Mayor Conrad Teller, who was mayor of WHB for eight years until last fall when he was succeeded by Maria Moore, estimated that “90-95 per cent” of village residents were against the eruv.

The basic premise is that no “work” may be done on the Sabbath. However, some rules are suspended in an eruv which converts, for the believers, public property into a “private domain.” Pushing baby carriages and carrying keys would be allowed. However, should it be raining, umbrellas could not be used since opening one is building a tent.

Non-Orthodox Rap Eruv

JPOE“We do not wish to live in a village whose territory has been demarcated by the erection of an eruv on government property,” said Arnold Sheiffer, president of Jewish People Opposed to the Eruv, representing about 300 non-Orthodox Jews in the area. The JPOE website provides a timeline of the legal battle from 2008 to the present. JPOE says the battle against the eruv, which was erected in WHB on Aug. 8, 2014 while issues in the dispute were still unsettled by the courts, “has just begun.” Jonathan Sinnreich, JPOE attorney, called the lechi “a deeply religious and sectarian symbol of a particular religious belief that they (JPOE members) do not share, and in some cases find offensive.”

JPOE says it had written assurance from Verizon and Verizon was quoted “in print” as saying that village approval would be needed before any installation was made. Verizon says it did not “categorically” agree to that.

Verizon, LIPA Sue Three Towns

Robert SugarmanSugarman

Verizon New York and LIPA on Jan. 18, 2011 sued WHB, SH and Quogue seeking an affirmation of their right to permit EEEA to install lechis on their poles in these communities. The suit asked the court to enjoin the three from interfering with the erection of the eruv. Verizon and LIPA in 2010 had signed agreements with EEEA allowing it to erect pole attachments in Nassau, Suffolk and Queens.

Upwards of 200 legal filings have been made in this battle to date, providing a glimpse of what happens in a lawsuit. Value of the legal time, both paid and pro-bono, is probably well over $2 million. Lead attorney for Weil is retired partner Robert Sugarman who probably bills at $1,000 or more hourly, said legal sources. Other Weil lawyers are in the $500 to $600 range.

Weil takes special pride in its pro bono work, requiring all lawyers, from partners to new attorneys, to spend 50 hours a year on such activities. It describes an eruv as “a largely invisible unbroken demarcation of an area through which certain activities may be conducted outside the home on the Jewish Sabbath and Yom Kippur.”

It says Weil won an important victory in June 2014 when the district court ruled that EEEA and the utilities can under state law contract for the attachment of plastic strips to the poles and that nothing blocked them from a contract with one of the municipalities [WHB] where “an eruv has now been created.”

It notes that litigation continues on First Amendment and other important issues before Magistrate Judge Kathleen Tomlinson.

The docket for the case involving Southampton lists 78 filings as of Oct. 30, 2014 including one in which Judge Tomlinson urges the two sides to “narrow the scope of the search terms to be applied.” She noted that “70 gigabytes of non-email data” had been presented to the court. A gigabyte is one billion bytes.

WHB Eruv LitigationSouthampton, as of Oct. 14, 2014, had appropriated $695,000 to law firm Jaspan Schlesinger to fight the eruv. WHB had spent $75,656 with outside lawyer Anthony Tohill as of June 25, 2014. The village website lists more than 70 legal filings by WHB (http://westhamptonbeach.org/eruv-litigation/) and the other parties in the dispute.

Quogue Mayor Peter Sartorius has been asked for the costs of outside and inside legal advice on the eruv. Sugarman appeared before the Quogue board on March 19, 2012, telling it during an hour-long meeting that other communities have allowed eruvs, with court approval, and that board members would be violating the rights of Orthodox Jews to practice their religion if they block this. Verizon and PSEG/LIPA say that if an eruv is disallowed in WHB/SH/Quogue about 70 existing eruvs in New York State will be jeopardized.

Patch, a local news service, in 2012 obtained a “three-inch thick proposal” for the eruv by EEEA which gave specifics of what the group was proposing for Quogue.

Lechis would be put on 31 LIPA poles and 17 Verizon poles. They would be made from 5/8-inch half round, black, thin walled plastic molding secured by galvanized nails. They would run from the ground to no closer than three inches from the wires at the top of the poles.

Further specs are that, “To create the eruv perimeter, the lechis will be connected with a 1/4-inch nylon rope of contrasting color to black.” An eruv is a succession of “doors” created by wires and poles that enclose the prescribed area. One break in any of the lechis invalidates the entire eruv. A rabbi was to inspect all poles each Friday to make sure all were “securely fastened to the poles,” said the EEEA proposal.

Opponents of the installation of the symbols claim that this is an instance of SLAPP—“Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Policy.” The short definition is the rich run less wealthy opponents out of their money via numerous legal filings.

Similar Battle in Miami Beach

An eruv constructed last summer in Pinetree Park, Miami Beach raised the ire of the Freedom from Religion Foundation which said “The city cannot allow such permanent religious displays to be erected on public land.”

The Miami New Times said Miami Beach has a sizable Jewish population that it has “accommodated” for many years and isn’t likely to change now. The FFRF is demanding that all eruvs in Miami Beach be taken down.