Measuring our Island by how we treat the least fortunate
There is a hidden trend on the Vineyard that the public and advocates worry is growing more troubling.
We reported last week on an increasing population of people experiencing homelessness on the Island, with some...
Turn up the volume on calls for affordable housing legislation
A wave of disappointment is crashing here on the Island in reaction to this week’s news that hopes are fading in this legislative session for state lawmakers to pass a way for cities and...
Juneteenth: A holiday for everyone
At the Tabernacle Flag Pole in Oak Bluffs, Islanders gathered at noon Wednesday for a flag raising ceremony marking Juneteenth, the national holiday that celebrates freedom and honors the history and culture of African...
Cost of living is too high
If you are as shocked as our families are by the high prices every time you go into a store on the Vineyard, then you understand how important it is to have the prices...
District attorney and sheriff need to stop squabbling
Back in 1958, John Leo Brady was convicted of first-degree murder in Maryland. During his trial, Brady admitted that he had taken part in a botched carjacking, but insisted that his co-defendant, Charles Boblit,...
Piecing together a broken life
The Island is left trying to piece together the broken shards of the life of Jared Ravizza.
Every corner of the community seems to be struggling to understand how the 26-year-old who washed ashore on...
On this frenetic holiday, pause for Memorial Day’s true meaning
Here comes the sun. Or at least, that is the hope for this Memorial Day weekend, as the unofficial start to the summer season gets underway.
College graduations are mostly over, and students are beginning...
Steamship shows its arrogance … again
In the news last week, the Steamship Authority administration recommended providing a permit to a New Bedford company to deliver freight trucks from the South Coast city to the Island on a year-round basis.
Under...
The new EPA emissions rule
On April 25, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued far-reaching new rules concerning coal-fired power plants: They must capture the air pollution that they produce, or they will have to shut down. The federal...
The Times’ first editorial
Editor’s note: The following is an excerpt from an editorial printed on the front page of the first published MV Times newspaper. The paper came out on Thursday, May 3, 1984. We are republishing...
‘A Timely Issue’
The front page of the newspaper has yellowed into a sepia tone in the frame that hangs in my office overlooking Vineyard Haven Harbor, but the words feel like they are still unusually current....
Through the rancor, Chilmark finds compromise
It’s been quite a week in the news.
The U.S. House of Representatives finally put aside its deep divisions to sign an aid package that will save untold thousands of lives in the grinding war...
Town meetings shouldn’t be a snoozer
Updated, April 18
Town meeting is one of New England’s proudest traditions, and the most hands-on form of democracy in which Islanders can participate. Unlike voting in presidential elections, which can feel like a fait...
Sounding the alarm: losing volunteer firefighters is an unsettling trend
Last week’s news that fire departments are having difficulty recruiting volunteer firefighters should not be taken lightly. While maybe not a five-alarm fire, it underscores a troubling trend on the Island.
Vineyard fire departments have...
Amid growling and whining, the veterinarian shortage is still a business story
There’s been a lot of growling and some whining around one of the few remaining animal health care providers on the Island, which could be losing its space at the Martha’s Vineyard Airport.
Owners at...
Keeping an eye on the offshore wind industry
The offshore wind industry moving into waters close to our shores is no longer something in the distant future. It is here, and with it comes a need to keep a watchful eye: Are...
Oak Bluffs zoning proposal considers solutions for real problems
The Oak Bluffs planning board is proposing a solution to a problem that’s been brewing on the Island for some time, and causing consternation among some Island tradespeople and residents who live near their...
Words won’t save us from the next storm surge
State and local officials have been treading water for too long on how to handle increasingly frequent and destructive flooding at Five Corners in Vineyard Haven.
And it’s hard not to feel like time is...
Our diversity is our strength, especially in schools
Last week we reported on a Feb. 1 Edgartown School committee meeting where more than 200 parents, attending in person and online, fumed about the school’s administration (“Frustrations rising at Edgartown School,” Feb. 8),...
If we want to save the right whale, let’s follow the evidence
Martha’s Vineyard was the most recent scene of a tragedy that has been playing out up and down the Eastern Seaboard, from Canada to Florida.
A dead female North Atlantic right whale, just 3 years...