In reading all the recent letters to the editor about the upcoming election, I found the following quote by economist Thomas Sowell, writing in realclearpolitics.com on August 14 and published in the Wall Street Journal, to be right to the point.

As the aunt of one of the varsity girls basketball players on the Vineyard, I was appalled to learn about the behavior of the head coach and lack of responsiveness to parents’ complaints by the school administration.

Responding to the Gazette story about ocean acidification.
In the book Sea Sick by Alana Mitchell, the topic of ocean acidification is discussed at length. Some researchers say that at 450 parts per million, phytoplankton in the southern ocean will die as a result of acidification. The southern ocean is more susceptible but all oceans have their tipping point.

Last Thursday morning a doctor called my office from a 645 telephone exchange and left an urgent message on my answering machine. He sought to arrange a flight to transport a little girl to Cleveland for medical treatment. Shortly afterward, I made repeated calls to the phone number but the line was continuously busy.

On August 1 the Oak Bluffs roads and byways committee voted unanimously, over the protests of neighborhood residents, to recommend that the town selectmen retroactively approve new parking spaces and signs that weeks earlier had been installed on the residential end of Seaview avenue.

Paris and the Vineyard have something in common. In a recent New York Times international edition article, the headline in large bold type read: “Paris Wants Smokers to Kick a Bad Habit: Tossing Butts in the Street.” The story went on to say “A stroll through parts of Paris on weekend mornings is a little like walking in an ashtray.” Paris now plans to install 10,000 so-called snuffers by the end of the year with more to follow.

Barbara Schlesinger’s letter on wind turbines, in the August 21 Gazette, deserves special consideration. After years of researching wind energy, including being certified to install them, and after listening to continuous stories of neighbors being antagonized living near these turbines, my views have changed.

I wish to respond to the points raised in what I will call Schlesinger’s Lament on the editorial page of the August 21 issue of the Gazette. I live across the street from the “Ominous, Omnipresent” Allen farm wind turbine. I think the turbine is actually quite beautiful.

Solvig Sayre of Vineyard Haven has been named to the dean’s list at Eckerd College for the spring 2012 semester. Ms. Sayre is majoring in international relations/global affairs.

A Chilmark summer employee was arraigned in Edgartown district court Thursday after allegedly having a package of marijuana mailed to the harbor master’s Menemsha office.

Emmett L. Ross, 19, was arraigned on August 21 charges in Chilmark of a drug violation near a school or park, possessing to distribute class D drug (marijuana) and larceny less than $250.