The Vineyard Conservation Society (VCS) will begin its program of guided winter walks this Sunday, Nov. 11, with an interpretative hike around the agricultural land and outwash plain at Katama Farm. The walk takes place from 1 to 3 p.m.
This year’s winter walks embrace the theme of historic land usage crossroads and feature properties where possible crises were averted with the help of VCS.
At Katama Farm, the community united to prevent development that could have resulted in hundreds of building lots.
In following the news coverage of Hurricane Sandy, I was struck by a strange reversal in reporting from before and after the storm. In the days leading up to landfall, the effect of climate change on the likelihood, strength or impacts of the storm was largely ignored; in accounts of the damage post-Sandy, the subject of climate change has been routinely raised.
Art and nature are more closely tied than ever at the Gay Head Gallery on State Road in Aquinnah. A current show features art across a variety of mediums with special goals — to relay the beauty of the natural world and contribute to conservation efforts. A dozen artists have work on exhibit for sale, and anywhere from 10 per cent to 100 per cent of the proceeds from sales will benefit the Vineyard Conservation Society and the Moshup Trail Project.
The Vineyard could see as many as 7,032 more homes on its 17,475
remaining acres of developable land, officials from the state Executive
Office of Environmental Affairs (EOEA) said at an Island forum held
Thursday night.
"That's a relatively short time frame to be faced with
some tough choices," said Christian Jacqz, director of
Massachusetts Geographic Information System, in a presentation to Island
officials at the Howes House in West Tisbury.
Anniversary: Conservation Is Crux of Mission Across 40 Years
By IAN FEIN
Forty years ago a group of Island residents formed the Vineyard
Conservation Society to fend off a development threat in the
Lobsterville moors of Aquinnah. The group convinced the state to put a
limited access designation on West Basin Road, effectively prohibiting
any future subdivision or development in the area and preserving the
untouched strip of land that runs along the northern edge of Menemsha
Pond today.
The Vineyard Conservation Society met Thursday for its annual
meeting and to hear about the Marine Life Census, an ambitious and
inspiring global project that is attempting to catalogue and identify
every life form in the planet's oceans.
The census puts Vineyard conservation efforts into a global context
where scientists around the world are racing to protect marine life.
The dire forecast for the future of the Vineyard environment, signed onto by the Island's major conservation groups 10 years ago this week, was wrong. Dramatically, happily wrong.
Among other things, the 1997 white paper predicted the Vineyard would be built out within eight years, and that only a little over 25 per cent of Island land would be protected by 2005. History has proven these figures to be way off the mark.
As a part of the Vineyard Conservation Society’s Clean Water Initiative in partnership with the Massachusetts Environmental Trust, this season’s program will focus on the health of Vineyard waters. On Sunday Nov. 9, Islanders of all ages are invited to the come to Crow Hollow Farm (located off of New Lane in West Tisbury). This family-friendly walk will proceed around the farm and out to the pretty Pear Tree Point on the Tisbury Great Pond. Participants and kids will have the chance to meet and learn about the ponies, land and water.
Some people, if they shared an award with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. might be pleased to think they’d made it, big-time. Not Brendan O’Neill. He was gratified to think he’d made it, small-time.
Mr. Kennedy, of course, is famous both for his family name and for his record as a crusading and aggressive environmental lawyer. He plays on a national stage.
The Vineyard Conservation Society executive director Brendan O’Neill has been named the 2008 recipient of the Nicholas A. Robinson Environmental Award for his placed-based environmental work on Martha’s Vineyard. The award recognizes significant public service contributions in the environmental field by a graduate of the environmental legal studies program at Pace University School of Law in New York.
Mr. O’Neill shares this year’s honor with Robert F. Kennedy Jr., also a Pace graduate.
