Marketing Push Will Be Needed, Say Backers of Fast Ferry Service
By JULIA WELLS Gazette Senior Writer
Marketing the Vineyard.
That is the key to developing successful high-speed passenger ferry
service between New Bedford and the Vineyard, a partner in a new
business consortium has told the Dukes County county commissioners.
Two purchases announced by the Martha's Vineyard Land Bank
this week will protect a piece of fallow farmland in the town of Tisbury
and a tree-lined ridge with an old brook running through it in the town
of Aquinnah.
Voters in Aquinnah are set to gather next week for a relatively routine special town meeting, but as a swirl of discussion heats up in this tiny town over the Wampanoag tribe's court case on sovereign immunity, the meeting may prove to be not-so-routine.
Five months ago a superior court judge ruled that the tribe could not be sued because of sovereign immunity.
Chappaquiddick's Space Fund, Land Bank Buy Island Trail Link
By JULIA WELLS Gazette Senior Writer
With the national economy stuck in neutral and nonprofit groups
scrambling to compete for a shrinking pool of donor dollars, a quiet
movement on the tiny island of Chappaquiddick is gaining momentum among
landowners to buy open space in their own backyards.
Clerk Magistrate Retires after 39 Years of Service
By JULIA WELLS Gazette Senior Writer
He is a local boy, an Edgartown native with fishing in his soul and
justice in his heart and deft hands that can shuck quahaugs just as
easily as they wield the varnished wooden gavel that is the tool of the
district court clerk magistrate. For many years he was a lone Democrat
laboring in a Republican stronghold, and today, of course, all that has
changed, but after 39 years what hasn't?
A Key Subcommittee Turns Down Southern Woodlands Plan, Citing
Detriments That Outweigh Benefits
By JULIA WELLS Gazette Senior Writer
Capping months of scrappy combat with the former developers of the
Down Island Golf Club, a key subcommittee of the Martha's Vineyard
Commission voted without dissent this week to recommend that a massive
housing project in the southern woodlands be denied.
Developers Bring Their Housing Plan Back to Commission
By JULIA WELLS
Alternately cracking shrill jokes and smacking the table with his
hand, a Bolton housing developer last night unveiled a new version of a
plan to build 320 homes on the southern woodlands property once planned
as the site for the Down Island Golf Club.
Brian Lafferty, who works for property owner and would-be golf club
developer Corey Kupersmith, wasted little time before throwing down the
gauntlet in front of the Martha's Vineyard Commission.
Report Calls for Changes to Strengthen Future Role of Island
Planning Agency
By JULIA WELLS
Overhaul the review process for developments of regional impact.
Encourage districts of critical planning concern. Forge better working
relationships with the Island towns. Improve staff work. Improve public
relations. Planning, planning, planning.
These are the central themes in a comprehensive report card on the
Martha's Vineyard Commission released this week by commission
executive director Mark London.
SSA Governors Approve High Speed Ferry License; Service Begins Next
Year
By JULIA WELLS Gazette Senior Writer
NANTUCKET - Amid a complicated tangle of legal maneuvers and
financial acrobatics, Steamship Authority governors voted yesterday to
ink a deal that will allow a private operator to begin running
high-speed passenger service between New Bedford and the Vineyard next
summer.
