Posted on October 8, 2025
An effort is on to convince the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation to fund a study needed for a major Army Corps of Engineers dredging project at Mattituck Inlet.
The Mattituck Park District, which owns the beaches to the east and west of the Army Corps jetties at the mouth of the federal navigation channel, believes the jetties have prevented the flow of sand to the east side of the inlet, where Bailie Beach is in danger of breaching a new hole into the mouth of the inlet in a large storm.
Pictured Above: The sharp turn just inside the inlet, as seen from the dunes at Bailie Beach.
After a smaller maintenance dredging project scheduled for this fall was pushed back to the fall of 2026, the Park District began rallying community support for a greatly expanded dredging operation, similar to one conducted there in 2014.
The study would be performed under the Army Corps program known as Section 111, “Mitigation to Shore Damage Attributable to Navigation Works,” but the federal government has made clear it will not undertake the project until a non-federal partner agrees to sponsor a portion of the cost of the study.
The Mattituck-Laurel Civic Association held a public forum on “What is the Future of Bailie Beach and the Mattituck Inlet” at the Park District’s headquarters Monday evening, Oct. 6.
Park District Trustee Chair Kevin Byrne gave an overview of the threats to Bailie Beach, along with Stony Brook School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences Professor of Oceanography Henry Bukiewicz and Southold Town Trustees Nick Krupski and Glenn Goldsmith.
The Mattituck Inlet, as seen in this photo accompanying the Park District’s petition to Congressman LaLota. Bailie Beach is to the left and Breakwater Beach is to the right.
“Jetties interrupt the lateral movement of sand,” said Mr. Byrne at the meeting, pointing out the problems on an aerial image of the inlet. “What you see here clearly is a picture of the Mattituck Inlet as it is today. I don’t think it takes a rocket scientist to see that that’s hardly a natural looking or natural forming coastline.”
He pointed to the western jetty, at Breakwater Beach.
“Over time, this jetty has trapped sand, resulting in the depravation of sand in the opposite side of the inlet,” he said. “This has now reached, we think, potentially catastrophic proportions. The sand has now reached the extreme northern edge of the western jetty. What this means is the jetty can no longer function as a jetty, the sand comes around, builds around the jetty, fills in the inlet, and it denies sand from reaching the far side of the inlet. This sand gradually erodes away.”
“The water line is now at the edge of the grass. It’s gone,” he said of the Bailie Beach side of the inlet. “And once the sand reaches the edge of the jetty (on the west side), it creates a counterclockwise rotating current, which increases the rate of erosion on the eastern side of the jetty. What we now face is a crisis… a good nor’easter now and this is breached. If this breaches, I dare say the Mattituck Inlet, for all intents and purposes, ceases to exist. It makes good sense for the government to address this problem.”
The Park District has started a petition to Congressman Nick LaLota asking the federal government to protect Bailie Beach. It had garnered 560 signatures as of Oct. 6.
But funding for the Section 111 Study must come from a non-federal partner, according to Mr. LaLota’s District Coordinator, Francis Martin, who was at the forum.
“There has to be a non-federal sponsor for it. It can be DEC or any other non-federal entity, and it comes with a cost match,” he said. The sponsor “has to come up with money and Army Corps has to put up a portion. We’re working with Army Corps all the time. We’re trying to figure out the quickest pathway to get that done.”
Mr. Martin said that, while Mattituck Inlet is a federal navigation channel, Bailie Beach isn’t a federally recognized beach, and the Army Corps doesn’t have automatic authority to repair it unless the study proves the erosion was caused by the federal project.
Congressman Nick LaLota’s District Coordinator, Francis Martin
“Getting DEC involved is a huge first step in the right direction for allocating funds for a study,” he said.
State Assemblyman Tommy John Schiavoni’s Legislative Director, Cole Yastrzemski, was also at the forum. He said the “number one state issue is ‘is there enough money for the state to pay for a Section 111 study, if DEC requests that study?’”
He said Mr. Schiavoni and State Senator Anthony Palumbo’s offices, along with the DEC’s Regional Director, are working to see if there is money in the state’s budget line dedicated to Section 111 studies to fund the Mattituck Inlet study this year, or if the legislators will need to advocate for that money in next year’s budget.
When asked how much the project would cost, Mr. Byrne said he has no idea, but it is “way beyond the capabilities of the Mattituck Park District or even the Town of Southold to fund such a study. It would exhaust more than our entire budget. I’d estimate $500,000 to $1 million. Back in the day, it was $500,000. We have, surely, no opportunity to fund anything like this.”
Mr. Byrne said Southold Town Supervisor Al Krupski and Mr. Palumbo (who were both in the audience), and Suffolk County Executive Ed Romaine have all sent letters to the DEC in support of the study.
Oceanography Professor Henry Bukiewicz gave an overview of the issues facing the inlet.
“The Army Corps have known forever that they have to bypass the sand. I don’t think you’ll have any argument that’s what should be done. The problem is with funding,” said Mr. Bukiewicz, the oceanography professor.
He added that the North Shore of Long Island has unique features controlling the movement of sand, including the formation of offshore sand bars, like one just outside Mattituck Inlet, and the compartmentalization of sand in arcs along the shoreline, which change due to prevailing wind patterns and storms.
He recommended the study include identifying an “offshore borrowing area” for the sand for Bailie Beach, from the sand bars outside the inlet, and that the sand be used to build up the dunes on the Bailie Beach side, in addition to replenishing the beach itself.
“There’s sand all over the place, but keeping it in the same location is a problem,” he said, adding that a 2006 Section 111 study detailed these various sources of sand.
Another study, in 2011 prior to the 2014 dredging, was supposed to provide guidance on the maintenance of the inlet for 30 years.
Mr. Martin, from Mr. LaLota’s office said the Town of Southold “agreed to null and void the 2011 study and change it into a one-time action. The 30-year plan was not realized because of that agreement.”
Mr. Byrne said that happened due to the “settlement of a potential lawsuit by property owners to the west, who were violently opposed to this project the last time it happened.”
(l-r) Mattituck Park District Trustee Chair Kevin Byrne and Southold Town Trustees Nick Krupski and Glenn Goldsmith at the Oct. 6 forum.
Nick Krupski, a Town Trustee on the panel, said he doesn’t believe Southold would agree to limit the project this time.
“Certainly 30 years is a better benchmark than a one-off,” he said.
Glenn Goldsmith, the president of the Southold Town Trustees, which oversee the town’s waterways, was blunt in his assessment of the situation.
“If we’re waiting for the federal government to come and help us, it’s probably going to be breached before that,” he said. “The studies and permits will be years and years and years. The logistics are simple — you’re moving the sand from point a to point b. It’s an easy process. The question is who does it and who pays for it?”
He suggested the Park District get maintenance permits to move 5,000 to 10,000 yards of sand per year from the west side of the inlet to the east, and continue to work to replant the dunes on the east side. The Park District is already working to repair those dunes.
“If we constantly, step by step, keep ahead of it, hopefully the federal government will come by at some point to throw us a bone,” he said. “What we can do, with the town, is take small steps, which hopefully over the long term will lead to results.”
Save the Sound Long Island Project Manager & Senior Science Advisor Louise Harrison asked what the Army Corps would do if a breach did occur, and said she agreed with a suggestion from Mr. Bukiewicz to continue to collect aerial photographs documenting the changes to the inlet and Bailie Beach over time.
“It has been established that the Army Corps is mandated to maintain the navigability of the inlet,” said Mr. Byrne. “In the event of a breach, it now becomes very clear that the Army Corps has a direct and immediate requirement to respond, because that inlet is on the list of protected inlets. The navigability has to be maintained.”
The wetlands on the inlet side of Bailie Beach, at low tide on Monday, Oct. 6.
Mr. Byrne added that the environmental threat from a breach “is greater to the wetland than the beach.”
“There’s a very special marsh and wetland on the inlet side,” agreed Mattituck Park District Recording Secretary Abigail Field. “It’s very pristine. There are lots of natural and endangered species. It’s not about the beach sand being under threat. It’s all of that habitat behind it.”
In the meantime, the Army Corps is slated to do a minor navigational dredging in the fall of 2026, dredging 6,000 to 7,000 cubic yards of sand out of the inlet. By comparison, in the last Section 111 dredging in 2014, they dredged about 100,000 cubic yards of sand.
“That’s kind of like putting a Band Aid on a severed leg, but it’s something,” said Mr. Byrne.
