Climate change is complicated; sea level rise is not. We live on an Island — a glorified sandbar — and the sea is closing in on us. It is rising much faster than anticipated. In the last century sea level rose by about a foot. In this century, due to human-induced global warming, it is expected to rise at least five feet, according to a new report by the international Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Program.

Beyond War

Editors, Vineyard Gazette:

A question was recently sent to the Martha’s Vineyard Peace Council: “Are there going to be any more protests at Five Corners like there were when Bush was in office?” The writer had previously expressed his criticisms more directly, so I had an idea what he meant. My answer was a laconic, “There might be, but we’re also taking other actions that promise to be more effective.”

Susan Desmarais recently retired as a Vineyard outreach worker. As a social worker, she is cognizant of privacy issues regarding confidentiality of her clients. What follows are her views on Alzheimer’s disease.

A Night to Remember

Word Play

Fis-SIP-par-ous — adj. Tending to break up into parts, divisive.

It’s often depressing to read about the world outside our own lovely Island, but we do it anyway and occasionally we learn a new word or gain a new insight about some aspect of our own situation. Venerable foreign correspondent John F. Burns of The New York Times was our source for both last Sunday in an essay on the elusive trail of Osama bin Laden.

If anyone opposed the principle of giving Geoffrey Craig (Spa) Tharpe $4,954.90 from the Aquinnah town coffers, they didn’t show up at town meeting on Tuesday night.

Instead, discussion focused on whether the town could find a creative but legal way to reimburse the popular Aquinnah resident for overpayment of his property taxes in 2005 and 2006.

Rents will go up for leaseholders at the Cliffs in Aquinnah this summer.

At their meeting Tuesday, Aquinnah selectmen approved a four per cent rent hike for the cliff lease lots. This marks the first time in four years that the rents have been raised.

Entrepreneurship is in Elio Silva’s genes. Growing up in the landlocked, coffee-rich state of Minas Gerais, Brazil, he worked beside his father as he grew a small grocery into a major supermarket. In his 22 years on the Vineyard Mr. Silva has imported the lessons and work ethic ingrained in him during that time to the two stores he runs on State Road in Vineyard Haven: Tisbury Farm Market and Vineyard Grocer. He has also imported some delicious Brazilian coffee. Last week the Martha’s Vineyard Commission approved Mr.

This spring endangered Northern Atlantic right whales have been seen and photographed swimming in Vineyard waters. Marine scientists who monitor right whales, considered the rarest among marine mammals, reported seeing 57 whales off Noman’s Land and nearly a dozen south of the Vineyard two weeks ago. More than 200 whales, about half the known population, have been seen since January in Cape Cod Bay.

Aquinnah voters opted for a changing of the guard at the annual town election this year, electing former Wampanoag tribal council chairman Beverly Wright as their new selectman.

Ms. Wright defeated two-term selectman Camille Rose 124-95 in the Wednesday election.

A total of 225 voters turned out at the polls, 56 per cent of the 398 registered voters in town. Town clerk Carolyn Feltz presided over the election which still involves hand-counting ballots. Aquinnah uses an antique voting box from 1880; each paper ballot is cranked through the machine.