Amid sinking consumer confidence nationally, Island towns and schools have received some rare good news: the RM Packer company agreed to renegotiate their fuel contract based on lower oil prices, saving them as much as $300,000 this winter.

Answers remain hard to come by about the septic grids buried underneath Ocean Park in Oak Bluffs, after a round of drilling at the park conducted earlier this month failed to shed any light as to why treated effluent is seeping to the surface of the popular public park.

Oak Bluffs wastewater superintendent Joe Alosso said the engineering firm of Stearns & Wheler dug about six holes around the park on Dec. 15. He said the digging yielded little information about why the leeching fields are malfunctioning, although that was not entirely unexpected.

The question of what is a harvestable sized bay scallop will be the subject of a public hearing next week on the Cape. The state Division of Marine Fisheries is hosting the hearing at 3 p.m. on Jan. 6 to gather input, following emergency action they took last fall to quiet a dispute between fishermen and regulators.

The hearing will take place at the Barnstable Senior Center, 825 Falmouth Road, Route 28 in Hyannis.

A plan to require all saltwater recreational fishermen to obtain either a state or federal license has been postponed a year to January 2010. The notice by federal fisheries authorities came out recently; a plan to establish a Massachusetts recreational fishing license has also been postponed.

Paul Diodati, director of the state Division of Marine Fisheries, said he is pleased by the delay, as it gives federal authorities more time to work out details for the license.