The Martha's Vineyard Commission backed away Thursday night from a push to redraw the Vineyard Golf Club's Island membership plan.
Commission members dropped the issue of the subjective selection process citing not principles, but politics. Commissioners openly acknowledged that pushing for a lottery system could do more harm than good, threatening an already strained relationship with a town board.
Using new lawyers but spelling out the same themes, the developers
of the Down Island Golf Club filed a lawsuit against the Martha's
Vineyard Commission late last week, attacking everything from the recent
vote to reject a luxury golf course project in the southern woodlands to
the enabling legislation that created the commission.
Emotions ran high throughout the final night of public testimony regarding a Chapter 40B affordable housing development that, if approved, would place 20 homes on 4.9 acres of land near Tisbury's center.
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.
High nitrate levels found in the private wells of a few Edgartown homes off West Tisbury Road sent health officials scrambling this week - trying to pin down the exact source of what could be a sizable plume running through Edgartown Meadows subdivision.
More than a week into extensive testing, a few fingers point to the homes' neighbor, the Vineyard Golf Club, an 18-hole private luxury golf course that opened in May of 2002.
In an unqualified show of confidence for one of its own members who has been under relentless attack by the developers of the Down Island Golf Club, the Martha's Vineyard Commission voted without dissent last night that commission member Linda Sibley is free from bias and prejudice.
"I don't believe there is anybody on this board that does more homework and takes her job more seriously than Linda. For her to be accused of being a bigot is laughable," said commission member Richard Toole.
A new round of private well tests in an Edgartown neighborhood this week intensified the mystery for Island officials working to pinpoint the source of groundwater contamination spreading through the West Tisbury Road subdivision.
"It's too much of a puzzle, too many unknowns at this point," said Matthew Poole, Edgartown health agent, noting that now 20 per cent of the homes tested have water unsafe for drinking.
Edgartown, Oak Bluffs, Vineyard Haven and West Tisbury town officials received their marching orders this month - recommendations for steps these Island towns should take to protect and enhance public water supplies in order to keep pace with future development.
Owners of the Vineyard Golf Club, a private golf course in Edgartown, are now proposing to build a cluster of luxury homes for club members on the property's southeastern corner.
It's a request that some Island officials think they shot down five years ago.
"I thought if they wanted to build a golf course, fine, but no housing except for staff," said Lenny Jason, Edgartown building inspector who led the move to strike member housing from the project in 1999 during the Martha's Vineyard Commission development of regional impact review.
Eight months after town health officials first detected a contaminated plume running beneath Edgartown Meadows subdivision, they are turning their attention to installing clean drinking water in the neighborhood instead of pinpointing the cause.
"This has dragged on for more than half a year. It's obviously more of a long-term problem," said Matthew Poole, Edgartown health agent.
"The most important thing is for people to have safe drinking water regardless of whether the source is septic systems or the golf club or something we haven't even considered," he added.
