Selectmen in West Tisbury Fret as Legal Bills Begin to Mount

By RACHEL KOVAC

West Tisbury needs more money to pay its legal bills, and this week selectmen expressed growing concern over the amount of money being spent on attorneys' fees this year. At the regular board meeting Wednesday, executive secretary Jennifer Rand advised the selectmen that the town will not be able to cover its legal costs under the current year's budget.

Expert Finds Town Assessment Methods Fall Outside Norms, Skewing Land Values

By IAN FEIN

BOSTON - An expert land appraiser testified in a legal hearing last week that West Tisbury assessors damaged the integrity of the town's land values when they manipulated data on a property record that resulted in irrational increases to some assessments and property taxes.

Shellfish Markets Report Slow Sales

By James Kinsella
Gazette Senior Writer

The sale of local shellfish has sometimes slowed but hasn't stopped on Martha's Vineyard, which has become an Island of harvestable shellfish in a sea of toxic red tide.

Louis Larsen, owner of the Net Result in Vineyard Haven, which wholesales much of the Vineyard shellfish to local restaurants, estimates that overall Island demand for shellfish is off 50-60 per cent from normal mid-June levels.

Bakery Owner Retains Name

Judge Rules in Humphreys Case, Handing a Victory to Mr. Diaz on Rights to Name, Recipes; Civil Trial Still Possible

By IAN FEIN

Humphreys owner Joseph (Michael) Diaz may continue to use the bakery's name and recipes at his down-Island locations, a superior court judge ruled on Friday.

Red Radishes, Green Bok Choy Fill First-of-Season Farm Basket

By RACHEL KOVAC

The West Tisbury Farmers' Market opened Saturday morning under a gray sky. And while the number of vendors is down this year, shoppers making a trip to the Grange Hall grounds still came away with the best of the Vineyard's farms and fields, along with homemade jams, baked goods, fruits and herbs.

An overflow crowd of Chilmark voters turned out last night to approve the first-ever town-sponsored affordable housing development for this rural community whose property values rank among the highest in the commonwealth.