A $1.45 million budget approved by the commission last week for the coming fiscal year is an increase of nearly 10 per cent over last year.

A Martha's Vineyard Commission review of the grocery expansion plans in Vineyard Haven will go to a seventh public hearing in February. Sticking points remain amid growing frustration over a drawn-out process.

Visual impact, neighborhood concerns and questions about future use were all factors in the 4-3 commission vote against a large church expansion project on the Edgartown-Vineyard Haven Road in Oak Bluffs. Four commissioners excused themselves from the proceeding.

A new plan to turn 54 acres in Katama into a nine-lot residential subdivision saw favorable review by the Martha's Vineyard Commission last week, while stubborn sticking points remained for a pending church expansion in Oak Bluffs.

Spokesmen for the power company NStar told the Martha’s Vineyard Commission Thursday that they believe the commission has no jurisdiction over a project to install new, oversized utility poles around the Island. The poles have raised the hackles of Islanders and public officials who say they are ruinous to roadside aesthetics and out of character for the Vineyard.

A second public hearing was set for Thursday night before the Martha’s Vineyard Commission on expansion plans for the Stop & Shop grocery store in Vineyard Haven. As the commission begins an exhaustive review of one of the largest and most complicated commercial development projects in recent memory on the Island, public opinion and institutional knowledge about the commission is mixed.