The bylaw that allows beer and wine sales in Vineyard Haven will not be expanded — at least not this year.
The Tisbury selectmen announced on Tuesday that a special town meeting article asking voters to allow wine sales at the Tisbury summer farmers’ market failed to gain the backing of the finance committee, and as a result will not go on a special town meeting warrant this spring.
Tisbury selectmen were called on last week to mediate a barking dog dispute.
Since last spring Nick Mosey claims he has had to withstand relentless barking from a group of five Shetland sheepdogs on an abutting property on West Spring street. But Mr. Mosey told the selectmen his formative upbringing in postwar London prevented him from contacting the town earlier about the problem.
Early this week David Damroth was strolling Zack’s Cliffs in Aquinnah and gazed across the gulf to Noman’s Land when he saw an eruption from the water a mile and a half out. It was a double spout, a trademark of the critically endangered North Atlantic right whale. For the next 45 minutes he watched as at least three animals romped about the surface.
Two years after a sharply divided town electorate approved the sale of beer and wine in Vineyard Haven restaurants, Tisbury selectmen may ask voters to expand wine sales beyond the dining room. Two Massachusetts wineries are eyeing the down-Island farmers’ market to sell and sample their wines this summer, and this week selectmen said they were receptive to the idea.
“I don’t have a problem with it,” said selectman Jeffrey Kristal. “I’m all for opening up that can of worms that I was accused years ago that I would open.”
In a night of frank discussion Tuesday in Tisbury, selectmen past and present were unafraid of offending more sensitive ears.
“They call it the R-word,” said former Tisbury selectman Denny Wortman. “People don’t even want to mention regionalization.”
In a wide-ranging discussion that touched on all the hot topics—including the Islandwide roundabout referendum—the panel continually returned to the R-word as the most pressing issue of the day.
Ah, the first signs of spring: Crocuses are in bloom, animals are emerging drowsily from their burrows and the forecast is pleasant. Wait, what month is this?
On Wednesday Ben Sipprell, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service forecast office in Taunton, confirmed what Islanders who spend any amount of time outdoors already know: This has been an extremely mild winter, with temperatures for the area averaging five to six degrees above normal.
