As the affordable housing crisis on Martha’s Vineyard escalates to unprecedented heights, a wide-ranging group working to establish a housing bank will host two public listening sessions this week to hear feedback from Islanders. The first session is tonight from 7 to 8:30 p.m.
The fight for affordable housing on the Island cannot be won without a serious wad of cash, according to the activists for cheaper housing.
On Wednesday night at the Grange Hall in West Tisbury, advocates unveiled a plan that could funnel millions of dollars into the effort on the Vineyard and promise tangible results as early as next year in the form of cash for land and houses and subsidies for rent or down-payments on homes.
For the second time in as many years, a grass roots coalition to form a Martha’s Vineyard housing bank has begun to take hold on the Island —this time joining at least six other communities across the commonwealth.
With five towns now calling for further review, the plan to create an Islandwide housing bank is officially on hold. West Tisbury voters decided Tuesday night to reconsider an earlier vote to approve the bank.
The Islandwide housing bank appears to be headed back to the drawing board after Chilmark voters put the brakes on the plan at their annual town meeting Monday night.
After strong defeats in the three down-Island annual town meetings and a victory in West Tisbury last week, proponents of the controversial housing bank are turning their attention up-Island, where two more town meetings and a vote on the bank’s funding mechanism remain.
Edgartown and Oak Bluffs voters defeated the controversial housing bank question Tuesday night, while in West Tisbury the question won approval. Tisbury voters take up the question tonight.
