As summer approaches, one of the big questions surrounding the Island also happens to surround it literally — the beaches.

While up-Island towns have taken steps to limit parking at the scenic beaches in West Tisbury, Chilmark and Aquinnah in an effort to enforce social-distancing protocols, down-Island leaders appear to be waiting on guidance from Gov. Charlie Baker before drawing their own lines in the sand.

The issue has come up at multiple selectmen’s meetings this past week, looming over the summer and adding to the litany of concerns facing town leaders as warm weather, and the arrival of seasonal residents, rapidly approaches.

“I’ve obviously been receiving a lot of calls and concerns about the status of beaches this summer,” Edgartown town administrator James Hagerty said at a selectmen’s meeting Monday. “I’d love to have the answers, but unfortunately, I don’t.”

Mr. Hagerty said he has received calls numbering in the “double-digits” over the past few weeks about town beaches, second only in quantity to those from angry landlords who have lost summer tenants. He said the beach issue was just as complicated

South Beach, an iconic mile-long stretch of sand and dune that runs along the south shore at Katama, is owned by the state but managed by the town, according to Mr. Hagerty, making regulations complicated. Norton Point, the Island’s proverbial beach version of the wild west, is owned by Dukes County but managed by the Trustees of Reservations, in a similar framework.

In Oak Bluffs, Joseph Sylvia State Beach, a popular, nearly five-mile barrier beach and swimming destination featured prominently in the film Jaws, is owned by the state but managed by the county. Even the issue of jumping off the bridge — a rite of passage for the Vineyard summer — has come up at selectmen’s meetings, with leaders unsure of how to handle it.

“It’s all a little nebulous right now,” Mr. Hagerty said.

While up-Island beaches like Lucy Vincent, Philbin and Lambert’s Cove are normally known for their sweeping vistas and pastoral serenity, the down-Island beaches are more public and recreational, and with that, more crowded, often impassable on days like Fourth of July. Limiting parking along State Road, for instance, would be much more difficult than in Aquinnah.

That’s why town leaders are relying on the state for guidance.

“The state is going to have to come up with something,” Mr. Hagerty said. “I couldn’t see the state not coming down with some guidance on how municipal and public beaches will be run. And then, if it comes down, we can either stick to the governor’s guidance, or we can come up with something more restrictive.”

At an Oak Bluffs selectmen’s meeting Tuesday, county commissioner Christine Todd told selectmen that the county’s goal was to ensure that all the Island’s beaches operated with the same rules — to both limit confusion, and make things as clear as possible.

“I am of the belief, and I think my fellow commissioners are, anything other than private beaches should all be following the same guidelines,” Ms. Todd said. “If we can get our boards of health for each town to agree on certain guidelines for the beaches, then the county would like to have consistency with the beaches that we manage.”

But even the little guidance that the state has provided has been inappropriate, according to Ms. Todd, who felt that Governor Baker’s rules were too restrictive. The governor closed beach parking lots in the commonwealth after people flocked to the shoreline on a warm Saturday in early April, limited sedentary behavior like laying on blankets, and has banned anyone over the age of 70.

“I know I, and some of my fellow commissioners, felt some of them were a little too strict,” Ms. Todd said. “I am just hopeful that the towns will get together on this one and have some uniformity on the guidelines on the Island for all the public beaches.”

At a press briefing Monday, Governor Baker demurred on when he might give guidance for beaches, saying it would depend on what other New England states decided. Right now, he was content with keeping parking lots closed.

That hasn’t stopped leaders on the Island from being proactive.

“We already ordered some sanitation stations,” Mr. Hagerty said.