Mental health counselors at Martha's Vineyard Community Services are now threatening to strike as the agency remains locked in tough contract talks with unionized employees.
For seven months, tensions continued to mount at the negotiation table over pay issues.
At risk are counseling and nursing services for hundreds of Islanders served by the Island Counseling Center and the Visiting Nurse Service, the unionized units of Community Services. In a typical week, ICC handles 180 clients.
Complaining that Edgartown officials turned a deaf ear to their appeals to limit operations at Katama Farm, a group of four Katama residents will go to court Tuesday - pleading with a superior court judge to evict the FARM Institute, newest tenant of the town-owned farm.
High nitrate levels found in the private wells of a few Edgartown homes off West Tisbury Road sent health officials scrambling this week - trying to pin down the exact source of what could be a sizable plume running through Edgartown Meadows subdivision.
More than a week into extensive testing, a few fingers point to the homes' neighbor, the Vineyard Golf Club, an 18-hole private luxury golf course that opened in May of 2002.
For the last two summers, Stanimir Vasilev hauled Vineyard tourists back and forth across Beach Road between Oak Bluffs and Edgartown, practicing his English as visitors stepped aboard the purple and white Vineyard Transit Authority (VTA) bus. Mr. Vasilev came to the Vineyard early and stayed late - as did hundreds of other Bulgarians arriving each summer to help Island businesses through the busy tourist season.
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.
Eight months after town health officials first detected a contaminated plume running beneath Edgartown Meadows subdivision, they are turning their attention to installing clean drinking water in the neighborhood instead of pinpointing the cause.
"This has dragged on for more than half a year. It's obviously more of a long-term problem," said Matthew Poole, Edgartown health agent.
"The most important thing is for people to have safe drinking water regardless of whether the source is septic systems or the golf club or something we haven't even considered," he added.
Moments before seven Island teenagers set to sea this June in a 28-foot wooden vessel bound for the Hudson River, the students speculated that the journey ahead would likely be eventful. One week, 180 miles and several storms later, the novice sailors and their vessel Mabel made it to the shores of New York. Ragged yet safe, the teens agreed: The adventure had been memorable.
