Housing Crisis Spurs Initiatives
Grim Housing Needs Assessment Underscores Important Search to Ease Lack of Affordable Shelter on the Vineyard
By MANDY LOCKE
Twenty-eight million dollars.
It's less than five per cent of the $6 billion Vineyard
housing market. It's only $6 million more than the recent $22
million sale of the former Sharpe house in Edgartown. It's but a
$233 contribution from each seasonal and year-round resident.
You know exactly who they are - your son's second grade teacher, your neighbor whose spouse left last year, the EMT who revived your father last month. It's the regional high school class of 1997.
This is but a snapshot of the nearly 2,000 faces of those unfortunate enough to struggle month after month, year after year with the lack of affordable housing on Martha's Vineyard.
You've heard their stories dozens of times, but do you know just how severe the affordable housing problem is?
Consultant John Ryan this week provided firm statistical underpinnings for what Islanders have known anecdotally for years as they watch the struggles of friends and neighbors: The housing crunch on Martha's Vineyard has become a full-blown crisis.
The Island Affordable Housing Fund hired Mr. Ryan of Development Cycles to study the Vineyard's affordable housing problem.
Officials from the Martha's Vineyard chapter of Habitat for Humanity announced this week that they have signed a purchase and sales agreement to buy two acres of land in Edgartown.
The land is located off the West Tisbury Road near Bennett Way and, if all goes as planned, the group hopes to begin constructing two houses there late this spring.
It's apt that this news comes now, since this week also marks the completion of the chapter's first house on the Island.
The fight for affordable housing on the Island cannot be won without a serious wad of cash, according to the activists for cheaper housing.
On Wednesday night at the Grange Hall in West Tisbury, advocates unveiled a plan that could funnel millions of dollars into the effort on the Vineyard and promise tangible results as early as next year in the form of cash for land and houses and subsidies for rent or down-payments on homes.
An initiative to build a $3.5 million dormitory for summer employees at the airport is at least two years away from completion. Members of a committee looking at the feasibility of a complex said there is much work to do, but support is widespread.
