Coronavirus: Islands Request Exemption To Governor's Guidelines

MARTHA'S VINEYARD — The six island towns of Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket sent a joint letter to Gov Charlie Baker's office on Thursday asking for an exemption to the state's designation of construction and landscaping as "essential" services in the state's stay-at-home declaration. The six Martha's Vineyard towns either approved or provisionally approved their own stay-at-home orders on Wednesday ordering the bans in hopes of protecting the island towns with limited medical resources.

The towns argued that the isolation of the island — as well as the limited capacity to solicit mutual aid and tend to an overload of those needing hospitalization in any community spread — makes its stricter guidelines imperative to the island's safety.

"These local orders were enacted only after significant analysis and contemplation of the particular Islands-specific issues that make the Islands highly susceptible to an uncontrollable COVID-19 outbreak and how to best protect the residents of each of the Islands," the letter from the select board chairs said. "The decision to implement the bans and orders was undertaken collaboratively, in each municipality, between boards, managers and administrators, police and fire departments and boards of health and health agencies."

The towns' orders made exceptions for essential services such as grocery stores, pharmacies and travel to take care of others and their pets, but prohibited construction and landscaping.

"Each of these towns adopted a construction ban to ensure that persons who would typically come to the island to work would understand that the Islands are not 'open for business,'" the letter said. "This ban effectively limits the risk of persons coming to the Islands each day who are infected with the virus and exposing others.In addition, all of the towns on the Islands implemented a stay-at-home order to limit the activity on the island further, and determined that only essential business should be conducted, defining the same to limit the potential for interactions.

"The local bans and orders do not limit the ability of any person to provide essential services or to undertake essential activities, including traveling. The bans and orders do, however, restrict construction and landscaping services from operating on the island for the time period necessary to protect our vulnerable communities. Emergency work would, of course, be allowed to occur as necessary."

The island towns said that construction companies have contacted the town of Nantucket seeking to restart their projects in light of the governor's exemption. While the letter said the Martha's Vineyard Builders Association endorsed the bans, construction companies have suggested that the governor's order supersedes the local ordinance.

"While we may, with all due respect, disagree with certain conclusions, we nonetheless seek your immediate assistance to address the situation on the islands of Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard.It is the sincere and measured concern of the elected and appointed leaders, public safety and public health officials of Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard, and of the President of the Nantucket Cottage Hospitaland the CEO of Martha’s Vineyard Hospital, the only hospitals on each island, that failure to follow through with the construction bans and stay-at-home orders as approved will put the Islands on an irreversible course, leading to an excessive strain on the medical system, law enforcement, EMTs, and potentially to a humanitarian crisis where doctors are forced to make difficult choices about who can be saved.

"We again thank you for the leadership you are providing during this crisis, and implore you to provide us with an immediate response modifying the application of your March 23, 2020 order to the Islands of Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard," the letter concluded.

Ten more deaths related to the new coronavirus were reported as the number of confirmed cases in Massachusetts surpassed 2,000, according to state health officials. There are now 25 deaths connected to COVID-19, the Department of Public Health said Thursday afternoon.

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