The developers who want to build a luxury golf club in the southern woodlands section of Oak Bluffs aimed conflict of interest charges at five members of the Martha's Vineyard Commission last week, just days before a public hearing was due to open on a new plan for the golf club. The commission responded by announcing that it will delay the public hearing process until the charges are sorted out by the state ethics commission.
The proposed Down Island Golf Club in Oak Bluffs is now officially
back in the pipeline at the Martha's Vineyard Commission with
plans filed last week and an initial hearing scheduled for June 11.
He arrived when the Martha's Vineyard Commission was still in
its early years - not yet a decade old, not yet accepted as a full
member in the peculiar society known as Vineyard government. In fact,
when Charles W. Clifford took over as executive director of the
commission in 1982, if the commission was anything at all in the Island
community, it was a point of controversy.
The Martha's Vineyard Commission acted swiftly last night to set in motion a plan that could preserve the north shore between the West Chop and Gay Head lighthouses as it is today - pristine and virtually free of any piers, docks or groins.
There are no ripples or wake anymore, but the impact of no Schamonchi and no fast ferry from New London, Conn., has hit some businesses in Tisbury hard, especially along Beach Road where the ferries used to dock and disgorge tourists by the hundreds.
The impact of bringing more summer visitors to the Vineyard using
high-speed ferry service from New Bedford, the tricky practice of
carrying fuel on the boats, and the role that the public boat line plays
in the lives of Islanders - these were all subjects for discussion
at the Martha's Vineyard Commission last week.
Following a late-night discussion that grew cranky at times,
the Martha's Vineyard Commission voted narrowly last week to
designate a district of critical planning concern for the
shorelines of two shellfish-rich ponds in Chilmark.
The vote was 9-6 to approve the Menemsha and Nashaquitsa
Ponds DCPC.
Jennie Greene, the appointed member of the commission from
Chilmark, fought bitterly to block the DCPC.
"I think this is a slam-dunk that a couple of people put
together.
When Tisbury and Edgartown voted to withdraw from the Martha's Vineyard Commission in the late 1970s, what followed was a procedural and political tangle that went on for years.
In Tisbury, the fight was over the second slip for the Steamship Authority. In Edgartown, it was about the rules for the coastal district of critical planning concern.
By the time both towns rejoined the commission in 1984, the tumult had died down, deep political divisions had faded and few people remembered what the fight had been all about in the first place.
Torn down the middle for the third time in three years, the expressions eloquent and heartfelt on both sides of the street, a strained and weary Martha's Vineyard Commission voted 9-8 to reject the Down Island Golf Club plan for the southern woodlands late on Wednesday night.
"The applicant has come back with changes to the plan and the word is that he has addressed all of our concerns. But he hasn't ever addressed my main concern and that's my concern about the character and identity of Martha's Vineyard," declared commission member James Athearn.
The developers of the Down Island Golf Club made their final chess
move last night in the quest to win approval for a luxury golf and
housing project in the southern woodlands, unveiling a hasty
eleventh-hour plan for public play and urging the Martha's
Vineyard Commission to vote on the project immediately.
