Finances Improve at Windemere, Hospital

By JULIA WELLS

The Windemere Nursing Home and Rehabilitation Center ended the year
in the red once again, but senior managers said this week that the
$200,000 operating deficit is a big improvement over last year and a
step in a better direction for the Island's only nursing home.

Martha's Vineyard Hospital chief executive officer Tim Walsh
said yesterday that some hard-won rate relief from Medicaid played a big
role in cutting the numbers at Windemere this year.

Gone is the 02568 zip code above the door announcing the building's identity. Gone, too, are the mail slots marked Tisbury, on-Island and off-Island. Now Vineyard Haven post office customers will drop their mail into bins labeled with two generic classifications, local and out of town. The sleek eagle emblem of the United States post office hangs above the new corner entrance.

Chilmark and Commission Will File Briefs in Sovereignty Case

By JULIA WELLS
Gazette Senior Writer

The town of Chilmark and the Martha's Vineyard Commission will
add their voices to the Aquinnah court appeal over sovereign immunity,
which is now expected to come before the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial
Court this year.

Boat Line and Private Developer Have Plans for Oak Bluffs Center

By MARK ALAN LOVEWELL

The Tivoli, a lost landmark of Oak Bluffs, may come back. This week
two young Island businessmen proposed to build a pavilion resembling the
old dance hall on the same site where the former town hall stands today.
Their plan competes with a second proposal from the Steamship Authority,
which would turn the old town hall into a ticket office.

The Island Health Plan, which seeks to provide affordable health
insurance for many of the estimated 3,000 Islanders now living without
it, is poised to win legislative approval that will enable the nonprofit
group to begin work this spring.

Chilmark Merry-Go-Round Will Bring Police to School

By MARK ALAN LOVEWELL

As their town grows, Chilmark municipal employees are playing a game
of musical chairs at the old Menemsha School.

In November of 2001, when the town library staff needed a place to
work while their building underwent $2.4 million in renovations and
expansion, the Menemsha School became their temporary home.

Owners of the Vineyard Golf Club, a private golf course in Edgartown, are now proposing to build a cluster of luxury homes for club members on the property's southeastern corner.

It's a request that some Island officials think they shot down five years ago.

"I thought if they wanted to build a golf course, fine, but no housing except for staff," said Lenny Jason, Edgartown building inspector who led the move to strike member housing from the project in 1999 during the Martha's Vineyard Commission development of regional impact review.

Less than a month after the holiday season took its bite from people's bank accounts and credit cards, many property owners in Oak Bluffs took another financial hit in the form of whopping tax bills.

Island Filmmakers: Debuting Here, a Documentary on Lost Youth

By JESSIE ROYCE HILL

He handles the direction and production. She, a playwright, tends to
the script. Together, Len and Georgia Morris of Galen Films have made
dozens of award-winning documentary films from their studio in Vineyard
Haven.

A Chilmark subdivision plan now being considered by the
Martha's Vineyard Commission (MVC) represents a golden
opportunity, conservation leaders said this week, to create a walking
trail connecting key public properties up-Island.

The property owners, Richard and Melanie Coleman, agreed last night
to open up their private property for Islanders hiking along the
southern side of Middle Road.