Rising tension over West Tisbury’s responsibility to pay the lion’s share of the Up-Island Regional School District budget led to sharp words at a district school committee meeting this week after the West Tisbury finance committee balked at paying for the school budget.

The finance committee took a preliminary vote last week not to recommend the school budget on the town meeting floor in April. The point of tension centers on the Chilmark School, where enrollment is increasing.

Three men were arrested on drugs and gun charges Wednesday after a search in an Oak Bluffs home revealed 175 marijuana plants, a shotgun, rifle and ammunition, according to a press release from the Oak Bluffs police department.

Brothers Joseph DePriest, 41, and Luke DePriest, 31, face charges in Edgartown district court of illegal cultivation of marijuana and weapons violations, Oak Bluffs police chief Erik Blake said, after a search warrant was executed at their home at 2 Dreamers Way in Oak Bluffs.

A Martha’s Vineyard Commission subcommittee decided this week to require a new traffic study for a proposed fuel station off State Road in Vineyard Haven, but not before a bit of open disagreement on the merits.

The Martha’s Vineyard Museum would restore the former Marine Hospital’s view to Vineyard Haven harbor in its ambitious plan to relocate there, renovating the hospital building to house museum staff and collections, razing a 1938 brick addition, building a new barn-like structure running for exhibition and storage space, paving a 50-car parking lot and clear-cutting the property’s front lawns overlooking the Lagoon Pond, which have become overgrown in recent decades.

The Edgartown selectmen voted this week to allow the Atlantic restaurant to change its liquor license from annual to seasonal. The Atlantic is now closed until April.

“If the economy improves they’d love to be back to an annual [license],” restaurant spokesman Sean Murphy said at the selectmen’s weekly meeting on Monday. “The numbers just aren’t there to operate an annual license.” The restaurant has been open year-round for the past two years.

In what is likely to become a common theme, the Oak Bluffs selectmen spent much of their Tuesday meeting discussing the town’s budget problems.

Fresh produce, meat, fish, bread, cheese and wine are the essentials of any meal, and come spring you won’t have to travel past the Triangle in Edgartown to collect your provisions. Three new food establishments plan to open this spring.

On North Summer street, fresh baguettes and baked goods will be for sale at Rickard’s. Slated to open in February, Rickard’s will be serving espresso drinks, soups and lunch items as well.

The Edgartown beautification committee, whose mission is to bring aesthetic improvements to the town not covered by taxes, has begun a fund-raising campaign to beautify the gateway to town.

Committee member Carol Fligor would like to see a sign at the Triangle that says Welcome to Edgartown, established 1671.

WRONGLY BLAMED

Editors, Vineyard Gazette:

I read with great dismay your editorial about our town administrator Michael Dutton. Having lived through the tenure of every town administrator we have ever had in Oak Bluffs and with regular attendance at most of the meetings of the board of selectmen, I can say with all honesty, I think you are sadly mistaken and totally misinformed.

A thin crescent moon appears low in the southeastern sky tomorrow morning, right next to the bright planet Venus. The two are in the zodiacal constellation Scorpius.