Brookhaven Beaches Open this Weekend, But Not for Swimming
Brookhaven Town is opening four major beaches for Memorial Day weekend for residents only. The town is reducing parking by 50 percent to ensure social distancing.
The beaches the town is opening are: Davis Park, on Fire Island; Cedar Beach in Mount Sinai; Corey Beach in Blue Point and West Meadow Beach in Stony Brook.
These beaches will open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. The town will lock all parking lots at 6:30 p.m.
While residents can bring umbrellas and blankets, they must wear face masks or coverings in areas outside of the water or general beach area.
Lifeguards will be on duty and residents are allowed to enter the water, but they may not swim.
The town will provide restroom facilities that will be cleaned and sanitized every hour by staff.
After Memorial Day weekend, the beaches will have no public restroom facilities or lifeguards on duty during weekdays.
Residents can purchase Resident Parking Stickers from the Town of Brookhaven Parks Department through BrookhavenNY.gov/Stickers. For more information, call 631-451-8696.
Resident parking stickers are required to park in the beach parking lots.
Lifeguards, park employees and town code enforcement will monitor the distance between families.
Viral Numbers
Separately, hospitalizations from COVID-19 continue to fall, dropping by eight to 497, which is the first time the number has been below 500 since the end of March.
The number of people in Intensive Care Unit beds also declined, dropping five to 164.
In the meantime, 30 people have left the hospital in the last 24 hours.
After a drop in deaths on Monday, the number increased again in the next day, with 18 people dying from complications related to the virus, bringing the total in Suffolk County to 1,772.
The number of people who tested positive for the virus increased by 103 to 38,297, which excludes the 10,345 people who have tested positive for the antibody without having a previous test.
In the antibody tested administered by Northwell Health for first responders, about 9.7 percent of those tested have come back positive, which is an increase over the earlier figure when tested first started. At this point, about 2,900 test results have come back for first responders.
County Executive Steve Bellone (D) continues to urge the Veteran’s Administration to allow volunteers to place flags at the two national cemeteries located on Long Island.
