News Briefs
SSA reduces trips in face of slack demand
The Steamship Authority (SSA) Tuesday voted to reduce the freight vessel Katama's schedule from a maximum of seven roundtrips to four roundtrips per day beginning on April 4.
Wayne Lamson, SSA general manager, cited "current weak economic conditions" as the reason for the schedule cuts. Mr. Lamson told the members that decreased commercial truck traffic to Martha's Vineyard left some voyages of the Katama underused. The change will result in savings as the SSA moves from a triple crew schedule to a double crew. The change will affect the 4 pm, 6:30 pm, and 8:45 pm departures, but unscheduled freight vessel trips will be available if needed during busier times, such as the April school vacation week, management said.
The SSA business summary for January 2009 showed the number of passengers, automobiles, and trucks carried to both Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard is down overall. For the Vineyard, commercial truck traffic shows the largest percentage decline.
Total operating costs for the boatline were down $854,789 or 15 percent from the projected 2009 budget, but with less patronage overall, Mr. Lamson called the reduced freight schedule part of a "balancing act."
"We are being proactive and redoubling our efforts to reduce our operating costs where possible," Mr. Lamson said. "We are trying to identify areas for potential savings in order to offset potential revenue losses if we continue to see a drop off in traffic from last year's levels."
Marc Hanover, Vineyard SSA member, voted to approve the reduced freight schedules but expressed concern. "I don't want to get the calls saying, I can't get a reservation, I can't get on the boat. We want to encourage people to come. It's going to be a real balancing act this season," he said.
Carl Walker, director of engineering, said the Oak Bluffs terminal reconstruction is on schedule. Modifications to the terminal wharf include a larger surface area, permitting passenger loading and unloading from two vessel exits simultaneously.
Acknowledging the popularity of the SSA's free WiFi, and limited bandwidth that prevents passengers from accessing popular websites such as Facebook and MySpace, Mr. Lamson said the boatline is examining improved Internet service, at an estimated cost of $5,000 to $6,000.
SSA traffic dropped in the first two months of 2009
Steamship Authority traffic dropped across the board through February 28, compared to the first two months of 2008.
On the Martha's Vineyard route, passenger trips were off 5.9 percent; auto traffic was down 5.3 percent; and trucks dropped by 8.4 percent.
On the Hyannis to Nantucket route, total passenger traffic was down 5.3 percent; total auto traffic, including reduced rate excursions was down 4.6 percent; and truck traffic was off by 17.7 percent.
Total overall SSA traffic is down 11.3 percent to date in 2009.
No contest for several Tisbury candidates
Geoghan E. Coogan is the lone candidate to fill Denys Wortman's seat on the Tisbury board of selectmen. Mr. Wortman will not run for re-election. Tisbury's annual town election is April 28.
Among other uncontested races, David Dandridge is a candidate for re-election three-year term as assessor. James Pringle seeks re-election for a three-year term on the board of health. Robert Tankard is running for re-election to a three-year term on the school committee.
Mark Campos and Remo Fullin are seeking reelection for three-year terms as constables.
Robert Doyle is seeking a three-year term on the finance and advisory committee (FinCom), joining incumbents Melinda Loberg and Jonathan Snyder, who are seeking reelection for three-year terms.
Races for public works commissioners have generated the most competition in Tisbury in this year's election.
In a three-way contest for two public works commissioner seats for three-year terms, former selectman Thomas Pachico is challenging incumbents Arthur Dickson and John Thayer. Leo DeSorcy, Nancy Hall, and Timothy Stobie will compete for one two-year seat as a public works commissioner.
In another contested race, incumbent Ralph Packer and new candidate Roland Miller face off for a three-year term as water commissioner.
Four candidates will compete for three, three-year seats as library trustees, including Anna Marie D'Addarie, Pamela Street, and incumbents Nan Carter and Jo Weinberg.
No candidates applied for a two-year seat on the FinCom or a five-year seat on the planning board.
Things to make you feel good
The annual Martha's Vineyard Hospital Health Fair Saturday provided attendees with plenty of helpful information. This year's health fair focused on multi-disciplinary services and healthcare options, including prevention, early detection, and the components of a healthy lifestyle. Participants included wellness and health centers, private health practioners, the towns' councils on aging, and representatives from the Wampanoag Tribe and Daybreak Clubhouse.
Eleanor Herbert (left) visits with Suzanne Metell at the Sacred Circle of Yoga booth.
Photos by Susan Safford
Susan Sanford from Vineyard Complementary Medicine performs cupping therapy, an ancient Chinese localized healing technique in which a vacuum is created under cups placed on the skin.
Federal money for Island energy, SSA projects
The $410 billion omnibus federal spending bill signed into law last week by President Barack Obama includes money for two Island projects.
The bill authorizes $951,000 to establish the Massachusetts Marine Renewable Energy Center, as a partnership between the University of Massachusetts, Edgartown, and Nantucket. Edgartown has taken the lead in permitting and planning for a tidal energy project in Muskeget Channel, the passage east of Chappaquiddick and between the Vineyard and Nantucket.
The project is aimed at developing energy with underwater turbines, driven by the strong currents in the channel.
Also included in the spending bill is $1.9 million for Phase II reconstruction of the Steamship Authority terminal in Oak Bluffs. That construction is currently under way.
Oak Bluffs hires new water superintendent
The Oak Bluffs Water District has named Thomas Degnan as the new district superintendent. Mr. Degnan, from Warwick, R. I., will begin his employment on March 30. He was hired by the unanimous decision of the district commissioners.
"Tom comes to us with over 14 years of experience, most recently with the Pawtucket Water Supply Board, and a 25-year military career," said district chairman Michael DeBettencourt. "He will be a great asset in moving the district forward."
Mr. Degnan succeeds former superintendent Deacon Perrotta, who resigned on June 30 of last year.
In an unusual arrangement, Mr. Perrotta worked half time for the Oak Bluffs Water District, and half time for the Tisbury Water Works. Mr. Perrotta's pay and benefits were the subject of an ongoing controversy in Tisbury. He said he resigned because of that dispute, and the two towns subsequently decided not to continue their regional agreement.
Cape Cod Times will stop Island home delivery
In a letter mailed to subscribers, the Cape Cod Times announced it would discontinue home delivery to Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket on Monday, April 6. The reason said Rob Sypek, members services director, is the "exorbitant cost of transporting and distributing" the newspaper to the islands.
As an alternative the Cape Cod Times is offering an E-edition, an electronic replica of the daily print newspaper, for a monthly subscription of $4.99. The newspaper will also be available at local newsstands.
The end of home delivery is the latest cost-cutting measure announced by the Hyannis-based newspaper, one of several newspapers, along with the Nantucket Inquirer and Mirror and the New Bedford Standard Times, owned in southeastern Massachusetts by the Ottaway Newspapers Inc., a subsidiary of Dow Jones.
In an effort to reduce newsprint costs in March, the newspaper took steps to shrink the size of its Sunday and Monday editions and eliminated the TV listings booklet.
In October, the Cape daily laid off six employees and announced plans to close three of its four bureau offices.
Many Massachusetts newspapers, including the Cape Cod Times, rely on The State House News Service, a subscriber service that specializes in government affairs, for daily news reports on lawmaker activity.
In the face of cutbacks by the regional daily, The Martha's Vineyard Times plans to step up its efforts to provide Island readers with news from Beacon Hill, particularly stories concerning spending and taxes, said Nelson Sigelman, Martha's Vineyard Times managing editor.
"With money tight the decisions lawmakers make, whether about road projects or healthcare reimbursements, are important to Island taxpayers," said Mr. Sigelman. "The Martha's Vineyard Times is home delivered, if you will, to more than 10,000 postal customers. Our only competitor, the Gazette, has fewer than 2,000 Island subscribers, so it makes sense for us to provide our readers with access to that news."
Those reports will increasingly appear on mvtimes.com and in the print edition, Mr. Sigelman said.
Aquinnah tax rate approved
The Massachusetts Division of Revenue approved Aquinnah's tax rate for fiscal year 2009. The new rate is $3.49 per thousand, assessor Angela Cywinski said this week, a 24-cent increase over the old rate of $3.25 for fiscal year 2008, which ends on June 30, 2009.
Trout man cometh
The Martha's Vineyard fishing season unofficially opens Wednesday with the highly anticipated arrival of a Division of Fisheries and Wildlife (DFW) truck carrying a full load of trout from the state's Sandwich fish hatchery.
The DFW stocks Island ponds twice each spring with hundreds of brook, brown, rainbow, and tiger trout. The stocking program is funded by the sale of sporting licenses.
Ponds to be stocked are Duarte's, Uncle Seth's, and Old Mill in West Tisbury, and Old Mill Pond at the head of Lagoon Pond in Oak Bluffs.
Fishermen are allowed a limit of three trout per day from ponds. Fishermen 15 years of age and older must have a Massachusetts freshwater fishing license. Licenses are available from town clerks and online at www.sport.state.ma.us/.
Chilmark will re-advertise police chief's job
Chilmark will re-advertise its police chief job. The selectmen want an applicant pool larger than the three who have applied.
The selectmen this week agreed that the timeline for replacing retiring Chief Timothy S. Rich by July 1 will be tight.
"It will be tight, but we can do it," selectman Riggs Parker said.
"We need to do more due diligence to ensure we have the largest possible pool of candidates," said selectman Frank Fenner.
Warren Doty, the third selectman, added, "Clearly, have not cast the net widely enough."
Noting that response to the ad for the chief's $84,000 job has been far more limited than is normal for town jobs, selectman also made some language changes in the ad, which will run in local and Cape Cod newspapers, as well as on law enforcement websites.
"We advertised the chief's job at the same time we advertised for a school principal. We got 18 responses for the principal's job and three for the chief's job," Mr. Doty said.
The new ad has an April 17 deadline and will be published without language in the initial ad that referred to internal candidates. "That may have limited response," Mr. Fenner said, adding that the applications from initial candidates are "still valid and good."
Selectmen also welcomed the return of the Chilmark Flea Market to the town after a one-year move to the West Tisbury School. They approved a plan to relocate the market to a site on North Road abutting Blueberry Ridge Road. The flea market is held on Wednesdays and Saturdays in the summer season.
Selectmen questioned Ann Deitrich, representing the 42-year-old flea market, about traffic and access to the site. Ms. Dietrich said the market would provide a police detail to handle traffic and would post volunteers to ensure that shoppers do not park in limited space in the abutting 15-home Blueberry Ridge Road community.
The flea market is a principal fundraising event for the Chilmark Methodist Church and historically attracts 50 vendors, Ms. Deitrich said.
The board also reviewed first stage design plans for three proposed affordable rental housing buildings on the Middle Line Road (MLR) affordable housing site. They chose a traditional Cape Cod-style design, one of two provided by architect David Handlin, a town resident who is providing pro bono architectural service for the project. Administrative assistant Chuck Hodginson reported that work has begun on well digging for the project.
West Tisbury Siberian husky sent to the Pen
West Tisbury selectmen last week voted 2-1 to further restrain rather than euthanize a Siberian husky dog accused of at least two attacks on neighboring poultry and livestock.
Selectmen Dianne Powers and Richard Knabel voted to require one of the dog's owners, Chase Marcello, to post a one-year, $200 bond and to build a roofed, chain-link pen with wood or cement flooring, by April 15, to hold Kodah, the accused husky.
Selectman Jeffrey S. (Skipper) Manter voted to euthanize the animal, accused of injuring a duck owned by Nancy Hawksbee of Vincent Road in West Tisbury. Ms. Hawksbee brought the complaint.
At a hearing before the regular selectmen's meeting, Ms. Hawksbee and Mr. Marcello, who lives with Lucia Dillon, also an owner of the dog, on Brush Broom Road, heard animal control officer Joan Jenkinson tell the board that she or her assistant have responded to calls involving the dog, beginning to August 2008.
Ms. Jenkinson said the August incident involved a goat tethered at Flat Point Farm. On January 23, this year, Kodah was reported missing during a time period when chickens were killed at a home on nearby Tiah's Cove Road. Ms. Jenkinson said she was "about ninety nine point ninety nine percent certain that that is the dog that attacked the (Tiah's Cove road) chickens," owned by Keston Smith.
Ms. Jenkinson stopped short of recommending that the dog be euthanized, but she said if the dog is found loose again within a one-year period, another hearing would be requested, and she may then recommend euthanasia.
Selectmen also read a letter from Virginia Jones of West Tisbury calling for action to protect the agricultural nature of the town. "Posting a bond or banishing the offending dog or dogs to another town does not solve the problem, particularly when the behavior is recidivistic. Such events call for strong, and immediate corrective action, including euthanasia," she wrote.
Business Briefs
Island trio launch environmental website
Sifaka World (sifakaworld.com) is a new website designed to provide young people with a fun experience while also supporting wildlife preservation and contributing to conservation organizations. The website, named for an endangered lemur of Madagascar, is the creation of Brian Yennie, Garrett Box, and Deborah Moore.
Sifaka members explore the website as animated animal characters, chat with people around the world and play wildlife themed games and activities, according to a press release.
The creators said 10,000 people have signed on since November and they are now launching paid memberships. For more information go to sifakaworld.com.
Sharky's Cantina names general manager
Sharky's Cantinas, located in Oak bluffs and Edgartown, announced the promotion of Tatiana Pavlenko from bar manager to general manager of the Oak Bluffs location. Ms. Pavlenko has worked at Sharky's since it opened in 2005.
"We have learned that promoting from within is the best way to improve our operations and run a great business," said owner JB Blau. "Tatiana cares so much about her customers, her co-workers, and her work environment that the promotion was a no-brainer."
State House News Service
Associated Industries backs out of group supporting gas tax hike
The state's largest employer organization is "backing away" from a coalition of transportation policy interest groups, in part because of the coalition's advocacy for a higher fuel levy. The umbrella group, which recently bankrolled a public opinion survey showing support for a gas tax boost, includes local advocacy organizations, including the state chapter of the National Association of Industrial and Office Properties, the Mass. Building Trades Council, the Conservation Law Foundation, the Western Massachusetts Economic Development Council, and the Mass. Municipal Association. John Regan, executive vice president for government affairs at Associated Industries of Massachusetts, said Friday that AIM was "backing away" from Our Transportation Future. "We've distanced ourselves from that coalition and we're now doing our own things, because we feel it's important to chart a course that reflects the feelings of our board of directors," Regan told the News Service. He said AIM was concerned the state's effort to tackle a gaping transportation debt could feature too much revenue and not enough reform. "This is not an anti-gas tax position," Regan said. "It is a position much like the Senate's, which is you've got to do the reforms first, and demonstrate that there's real serious effort underway to reform the way the Commonwealth does its business in the transportation arena." AIM's name has been removed from the Our Transportation Future website. AIM was notably absent from a clutch of business organizations that endorsed a 25-cent gas tax hike earlier this month.
Mass. entities recoup $340 million from AIG
Massachusetts municipalities or government entities received $340 million in guaranteed investment agreement proceeds from AIG Finance Products Corp. late last year, the insurance and financial services giant disclosed as part of its explanation of the use of an $85 billion emergency federal loan provided to the company last year. The disclosures came as President Barack Obama, reacting to reports that AIG executives received hefty bonuses while the company sought federal relief funds, called for U.S. Treasury officials to look into the matter. Municipalities and government entities typically use guaranteed investment agreements (GIA) to invest bond proceeds until the funds are needed. AIG spokesman Nick Ashooh said the funds delivered to Massachusetts represented returns that were due before the company encountered severe financial problems in connection with its credit default swap portfolio. "The point of all this is all the money didn't just go to foreign banks," Ashooh told the News Service. "A lot of it went to Main Street in one way or another." Ashooh did not have a breakdown of the Massachusetts entities that received the GIA funds between Sept. 16, 2008, and Dec. 31, 2008. A state Treasury official said the state Water Pollution Abatement Trust received funds, but other recipients under AIG's category of "municipal counterparties" were not available. In a statement, AIG Chairman and CEO Edward M. Liddy said AIG's disclosure of numerous counterparties didn't change the company's commitment to maintaining the confidentiality of its business transactions and was made following conversations with the counterparties "and the recognition of the extraordinary nature of these transactions." AIG's disclosures included $4.2 billion in two payments to UBS, the company on the verge of demanding a payment of $300 million to $400 million from the Mass Turnpike Authority in connection with Big Dig financing arrangements made earlier this decade.
Corrections
A news brief in the March 12 issue of The Martha's Vineyard Times, "Be at the spelling bee," omitted the name of speller Jared Bardwell, a fourth-grader at the Chilmark School.
A FARM Institute advertisement that appeared in the March 12 issue of The Martha's Vineyard Times failed to make clear that the 25 percent discounts offered for Island students are for the weekly summer programs. Eligible participants must attend school year-round on the Vineyard. Scholarships for Island students are also available. The FARM Institute telephone number is 508-627-7007.
In an article in the March 12 issue of The Martha's Vineyard Times, "An ice time," the YMCA and Martha's Vineyard Ice Arena should have been described as sponsors of the seventh and eighth grade skate night.
