There is no access for people with disabilities on the New Bedford passenger ferry Schamonchi, and a Cape Cod advocacy group recently filed a formal complaint with the U.S. Department of Transportation about the problem.
Spokesmen for the Cape Organization for the Rights of the Disabled (CORD) said yesterday they filed the complaint after months of unsuccessful attempts to communicate with the Steamship Authority about the problem.
Amid a proliferation of applications for permanent piers, a new
district of critical planning concern (DCPC) has now been proposed for
the shorelines of two shellfish-rich ponds in the town of Chilmark.
Last week the Martha's Vineyard Commission voted to nominate
the Menemsha and Nashaquitsa Ponds as a DCPC on the Chilmark side.
The popular low-cost excursion fares for Vineyard residents on
Steamship Authority ferries are now slated for major change, if a
proposal by boat line managers is approved next month.
The people of Chappaquiddick may have declared an uneasy
truce in their recent war of words over whether to enact a
district of critical planning concern, but this week there was
an army on the move on the small island at the extreme eastern
end of Edgartown - and it had nothing to do with building
moratoriums or long-range planning.
It was an army of worms - in fact an army of army worms -
and at Pimpneymouse Farm they had just finished plundering a
large hayfield on the southwest corner of the farm.
Amid a long list of caveats about assumptions and the need for more data, Steamship Authority treasurer Wayne Lamson told the boat line board of governors yesterday that he is in the neutral zone when it comes to the financial impacts of the new service model for future ferry operations to the two Islands.
"I feel that we should continue to explore the viability of the service model. But a lot more information needs to be gathered, and certain assumptions need to be validated," Mr. Lamson said at the monthly boat line meeting in Woods Hole yesterday.
The developers of the Down Island Golf Club turned up the heat on
the Martha's Vineyard Commission last night, hammering home the
threat of a large low-income housing project if the golf club plan is
not approved.
Controversial County Deal with Hospital for $50,000 Fee Raises Legal
Questions
By JULIA WELLS Gazette Senior Writer
An unusual county contract set up to funnel taxpayer money into the
Martha's Vineyard Hospital continued to cause shock waves this
week as local officials tried to sort out the origin of a deal to pay
the county a $50,000 fee to administer the contract.
Yesterday, West Tisbury town counsel Ronald H. Rappaport questioned
whether the county has the right to charge the fee.
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.
The Cape and Islands senate district - in place since the
founding of the Massachusetts legislature - will remain largely
intact thanks to the redistricting plan adopted by the state Senate
yesterday afternoon.
