Under increasing pressure over his performance, Oak Bluffs town administrator Michael Dutton is now the subject of a disciplinary proceeding in front of the town selectmen.
Selectmen have held two closed-door sessions within the last week to discuss Mr. Dutton’s performance under a section of the state open meeting law that allows executive sessions to discuss and consider the discipline or dismissal of a town employee. A third executive session is scheduled for July 5.
Last weekend several upstanding West Tisbury citizens were met with an unhappy surprise when they went to buy their beach permits for the summer.
“There was a small glitch,” town administrator Jen Rand told selectmen this week, explaining that residents of West Tisbury are unable to purchase town permits if they owe taxes.
Is Goodale’s sand and gravel pit expanding? On Thursday the Martha’s Vineyard commission said no and sent the matter back to the town of Oak Bluffs.
Meet the beetles. The invasive exotic ones, that is. There is the goldenhaired bark beetle, the six-tooth bark beetle, the Mediterranean pine engraver beetle and the most dreaded of them all: the Asian long-horned beetle, which arrived on American shores a decade ago the way many foreign threats do, hiding in wood pallets.
At the Polly Hill Arboretum, collections and grounds manager Tom Clark and collections management intern Alyssa Janilla have been on guard for the unwelcome arrival of the voracious bugs by participating in a USDA monitoring program.
Island officials may be going in circles long before the state decides to construct its roundabout at the four-way blinker intersection in Oak Bluffs. On Wednesday West Tisbury selectmen voted to refer the proposed project to the Martha’s Vineyard Commission for review as a development of regional impact (DRI).
On Tuesday the town of Oak Bluffs will ask exhausted voters once more to come out to exercise their civic duty at a special town meeting. This time voters will be asked to transfer over $216,000 to cover the current fiscal year budget shortfalls including $106,000 from the town’s so-called “rainy day” fund to cover unforeseen health insurance costs.
