Dan's Papers - October 6, 2006

Last week, Southampton Town spent $255,000 to preserve 54 acres of vacant land in Westhampton. This puts an end to the dreams of a local Quogue entrepreneur, who some years ago hoped to create "Hampton Water," a beverage that would be "bottled at the source" from a well in our treasured aquifer just under the protected pine barrens north of Westhampton. Hampton Water, this precious commodity, would be shipped around the world to compete with Perrier, Pellegrino and Fiji water.

If these facts seem a bit bizarre - the first because it seems so cheap and the second because it seems so, well, unlikely - then you don't know Joe Gazza. If Donald Trump sees himself as a sort of the royalty of the real estate world in this country, Joe Gazza sees himself as the commando of the real estate world in the Hamptons.

Joe Gazza, who is an attorney, locates very unlikely parcels of land in the Hamptons that seem hopelessly undevelopable, and he buys them cheap and then tries to dream something up. Oh, he does regular real estate too, but in my opinion, it's the commando stuff that's his specialty.

I recall for years there was a crude wooden sign on the vacant triangle of land on the north side of the Montauk Highway just west of Water Mill as you come up the hill from the east - a very prominent piece of property - which read GAZZA and then 516-653-5766 brushed on it in black paint. It was privately owned before Joe bought it and it is seen as a small public park area that could never be built upon, and so Joe thought to find a buyer. I think the Town finally did buy it after running out of patience. Joe never tries to gouge anybody, just turn a bit of a profit.

Then came Joe's idea for Hampton Water. Land in the Pine Barrens is privately owned but entirely protected from development. No buildings can be built on it.

Well, how about UNDER it? Joe thought. He was, perhaps thinking of the oil rights under the Alaskan tundra. All you'd see there is a small oil rig.

Indeed, Hampton Water is probably a very good idea. The water we drink comes from an enormous underground lake that exists under eastern Long Island bounded by Patchogue, Southampton and Riverhead. It is very pure water and very tasty. It could sell. Just a tiny straw in this big underground lake, what could be so wrong? Joe must have thought. As for land on top of the ground, all you'd need was a couple of spigots. Trucks could pull up and load up, then take it all to a bottling and warehouse building elsewhere. Maybe hundreds and thousands of jobs could result from such an enterprise. And Hampton Water would be known around the world. Would Southampton town give him the right to do this? Absolutely not.

Well, you've got to hand it to the guy. He's made a successful career out of all this, although almost entirely under the radar. And now, I think, he is sort of retiring with the intention to just dabble a bit here and there.

The 27 acres he owns are in bits and pieces scattered about, a few even north of the Sunrise. Who the hell knows what he paid for each of them over the years, but for $140,000 for the lot, which converts to $6,000 an acre - a pittance on today's market - it probably worked out for him. And he probably had fun doing it.