A small circle of senior managers at the Steamship Authority last
week quietly filed an application for some $2 million in federal grant
money to help launch an $8 million high-speed passenger ferry operation
between the Vineyard and New Bedford, the Gazette has learned.
A 32-lot luxury home subdivision plan for the Herring Creek Farm in
Edgartown cleared the final hurdle for approval this week, but if a
complicated private agreement for the sale of the farm is completed in
the months ahead, the subdivision may never be developed.
In a barrage of invective and noisy statements to the press, New
Bedford city officials lashed out at the Steamship Authority governors
from Falmouth and Nantucket this week for their vote to kill a pilot
high-speed ferry project between New Bedford and the Vineyard.
It began with a suburban-style subdivision plan, polished
like a shiny apple: Maximum density, 54 luxury homes, two beach clubs
with swimming pools.
It ended last week with a record real estate sale and a
subdivision plan of a markedly different color: Six new luxury homes
added to five existing homes and a vast sweep of farmland saved
forever.
But between the beginning and the end of the Herring Creek
Farm story there is another story.
Steamship Authority governors will be asked this morning to consider
a mid-season fare hike, as the boat line faces escalating costs from
legal bills, rising debt and projected operating losses on the new ferry
run between New Bedford and the Vineyard this summer.
The proposed fare hike is set for discussion only; no vote is
planned until next month. If it is approved, passenger fares and the
popular auto excursion fares for Island residents will all go up.
He arrived when the Martha's Vineyard Commission was still in
its early years - not yet a decade old, not yet accepted as a full
member in the peculiar society known as Vineyard government. In fact,
when Charles W. Clifford took over as executive director of the
commission in 1982, if the commission was anything at all in the Island
community, it was a point of controversy.
Rebecca Gilbert and Randy Ben David have roots - both the
human and botanical variety.
On their farm off North Road in Chilmark they grow root
vegetables such as beets, carrots and onions, and they have wild
root herbs including sweet grass and ginseng.
Rebecca and Randy also have family roots that run as deep as
the rich, sweet soil they cultivate without chemical fertilizers
or pesticides.
Adding a new kink to the tangled business affairs of the Steamship
Authority, a private freight hauler submitted a license request this
week to run year-round ferry service between New Bedford and the two
Islands.
"We are confident that we can operate these routes
successfully at no cost to the Steamship Authority," wrote Craig
Johnson, who is the director of operations for Seabulk International
Inc., formerly known as Hvide Marine Inc.
The Martha's Vineyard Land Bank Commission is no longer
actively negotiating with Corey Kupersmith for the possible purchase of
his property in the southern woodlands, but in a letter to the
Martha's Vineyard Commission this week, the executive director of
the land bank did not rule out the prospect of future talks.
The county manager and the chief executive officer at the
Martha's Vineyard Hospital scrambled to contain the damage this
week after the surprise revelation last week that the county will
collect a $50,000 fee on an unusual contract that will funnel some
$500,000 in taxpayer money into the hospital.
The taxpayer money is intended to help defray the cost of emergency
services at the hospital.
