Editors, Vineyard Gazette:

A big summer home used to be 5,000 square feet. Now a big summer home is 20,000 square feet. Where are we headed?

We applaud the Chilmark planning board for making one small step in the direction of moderation and hope that on April 22, residents of Chilmark will vote yes to the proposed bylaw.

Our understanding is that zoning is there to protect and preserve the character of a community, regulating the use of private land for the common good. One of the main reasons we love living on this Island is because of the open spaces and rural landscape. And we believe that’s also a major reason why most of us live and/or own second homes here. So why wouldn’t we work together to preserve this?

Let’s design a community we can all be proud of, not wait for someone else to do it for us, or even worse, be sorry that we didn’t.

Mollie Doyle and Thomas Bena, Chilmark