The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court has finally put beyond doubt the power of local officials to prevent developers from tearing down small houses on undersized lots and replacing them with McMansions.

Almost two and a half years after the state’s highest court deadlocked 3-3 in the case of Katama homeowners who wanted to double the size of their house on a substandard half-acre lot, the court came down decisively against such practices in an almost identical case involving a house in Norwell.

A 50-acre property in the Priester’s Pond area of West Tisbury has changed hands for $15 million.

The buyer is Claudia Miller, whose mainland place of residence and prior connection to the Vineyard, if any, are unknown. The land includes two houses, one that was built in the Berkshires in 1795 and brought to the Vineyard in 1987.

The property, which has frontage on both Priester’s and Crosby ponds, includes one of the oldest farms on the Vineyard. The other house on the tract, the Luce Athearn House, is even older, dating to 1714.

Correction

A story in last week’s Gazette reported incorrectly on the school where the Rev. Judith Campbell completed her post-doctoral work. Her degree is from the Union Institute in Cincinnati, Ohio. The Gazette regrets the error.

West Tisbury selectmen said this week that they plan to redraft the town’s affordable housing ownership covenants to avoid recurrence of the foreclosed affordable home that has the town in court with a West Coast lender.

Questioned at the weekly selectmen’s meeting about the current situation involving a Scrubby Neck Road affordable home, selectman Glenn Hearn said the town could not have predicted the problem.

Come springtime, the telltale signs of Vineyard farming activity will begin to reappear. One day, the fields are lifeless, the next, tractors are out and the soil has been tilled. Before too long, farmhands dot the fields picking berries and greens and juicy tomatoes. The farm stands fill up, parking at the farmer’s market is nowhere to be found, and on it goes until the last pumpkins, squash and apples are harvested.

Possible Dreams Auction

Will Move to Outerland

After 29 years in the garden of Edgartown’s Harborside Inn, the Possible Dreams Auction this August will move a few miles up Island to the grounds of Outerland, the former Hot Tin Roof nightclub, to celebrate its 30th anniversary this summer in a rain-or-shine venue. The auction will be held under a tent at Outerland on August 4.

NANCY GARDELLA

508-693-3308

(vhavenvgazette@yahoo.com)

I am so pleased to receive so many lovely holiday cards and family news from my friends. You know many of them.

Just to update you, Eileen Whiting, our former town treasurer, wrote from Florida that she is well and delighted to have Marjorie Convery in the neighborhood now. I can picture them playing golf while we shovel snow.

Welcome Ryan

Angela and Neil R. Estrella of Vineyard Haven announce the birth of a son, Ryan Fullin Estrella, born on Jan.14 at the Martha’s Vineyard Community Hospital. Ryan weighed 9 pounds, 5 ounces at birth.

Find Family Tree Online

Interested in learning more about your family’s genealogy? At the Oak Bluffs Public Library you now can search Ancestry Library Edition, a popular tool for online genealogical research. If you need help using this new resource appointments may be made to sit with a librarian for a 30-minute consultation. To learn more, call 508-693-9433.

Island Plan Workshop Will

Examine Social Environment

The Island Plan launches its social environment work group with a workshop on Wednesday, Jan. 23 at 7 p.m. at the Oak Bluffs senior center.

The work group will look at the human aspects of the Island, such as the characteristics of the population and community, social, health, educational and recreational services and culture.