Which is it, a short nasal cah-ah or a full-voiced caaw? That is the question that will help distinguish between the unusual fish crow and the ubiquitous American crow.

By LYNNE IRONS

I have had five memorable dogs. Each has lived over a decade and a half. My all-time favorite was Emma Jones, the beagle of my childhood. After college and moving to the Vineyard, I found Emily, who was also a white beagle mutt. She helped me raise my little children. Larry, a blue-tick hound, was always in need of a diet. He was fond of lying on the side of the road, much to the consternation of passersby. He had a habit of going up to the old Woodland where he begged donuts successfully.

A 10-year-old Vineyard project to raise money for disadvantaged in Haiti reached a milestone this year. The locally funded Haiti Fish Farm Project has raised more than $100,000.

Haiti is the poorest country in this hemisphere. Margaret Penicaud of Vineyard Haven and her close friend Jeanne Staples of Edgartown have been working closely with others to bring changes to the lives of some residents of that distant Caribbean country.

A new report prepared for the Martha’s Vineyard Refuse Disposal and Resource Recovery District recommends that Tisbury and Oak Bluffs rejoin the district after a 15-year absence and suggests that the Island consider a larger, more efficient regional transfer station and overhaul its recycling programs.

The town of Tisbury collected $240,000 from the 50-cent levy paid by most passengers on ferry tickets last year and an embarkation fee committee, formed this year in response to controversy over past spending ideas, is in the process of developing final recommendations for where the money should go.

The committee will take its decisions back to the selectmen who will have final sign-off ahead of the annual town meeting in April.

It was a time when the boats were full, business was bustling and the Island seemed like the center of the universe — at least for a few weeks each summer.

The span between 1993 to 2000 was when former President Bill Clinton made the Island the site of the summer White House. In local circles this period is known simply as the Clinton years, an era when the Vineyard hit its pinnacle of popularity and celebrity status.

Oak Bluffs police said this week that Brandy Marie Gibson, the 20-year-old Island woman who was killed in a two-car motor vehicle accident, was driving more than twice the legal speed limit when her vehicle hit a delivery truck at the intersection of Edgartown-Vineyard Haven and County Roads on Jan. 29.

A growing group of West Tisbury taxpayers, furious at their property tax bills and concerned about how the taxes are computed, received little solace during a stormy two-hour informational meeting with Vision Appraisal Technology on Tuesday evening at the Howes House.

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BreAnne Russell, sophomore forward on the high school girls’ hockey team, aptly sums up her love of the game by comparing it to a well-known circular food item.

A team of emergency responders, including members of the state police bomb squad, were called in after a grenade was found in a storage unit at the Sun Island Storage in Vineyard Haven on Feb. 5. Despite some tense moments, authorities eventually determined the grenade was not a threat and likely a novelty item or paper weight.