{"id":532846,"date":"2026-03-19T13:33:12","date_gmt":"2026-03-19T13:33:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/532846\/"},"modified":"2026-03-19T13:33:12","modified_gmt":"2026-03-19T13:33:12","slug":"nantucket-current-select-board-signals-support-for-new-our-island","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/532846\/","title":{"rendered":"Nantucket Current | Select Board Signals Support For New Our Island\u2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Select Board agreed in principle to a series of comments on Town Meeting warrant articles on Wednesday, including one signalling the board\u2019s support for a new Our Island Home facility. The Select Board\u2019s other comments largely align with recommendations made by the Finance Committee, but the endorsement of the Our Island Home project is a notable departure from the advisory financial body\u2019s opposition to the plan<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The comments will be finalized next week, but the draft discussed Wednesday highlights internal divisions in town leadership over the costly plan for a new skilled nursing facility. A similar article received equally split endorsements last year before garnering the support of a majority of voters on Town Meeting floor and at the ballot box. It was unable to pass, however, as it did not gain the two-thirds support needed at Town Meeting.<\/p>\n

The Select Board has long emphasized that if Town Meeting votes against the plan for a new facility again, it is tantamount to a vote to close Our Island Home. There will not be another chance for the nursing home.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is the last opportunity for the community to vote to build a new facility and stay in the nursing home business, and this not passing [at Town Meeting and the local election] will initiate a procedure to close the current [Our] Island Home,\u201d Select Board member Brooke Mohr said.<\/p>\n

Closure could happen around three to five years after the vote.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is basically it,\u201d Town Manager Libby Gibson said. \u201cIf this is not approved, there will be steps taken at some point to initiate the closure.\u201d<\/p>\n

Proponents argue that the decision is a moral one: if Our Island Home is forced to close, elders may no longer have options on Nantucket, and could be driven off the island for skilled nursing care in their final years, exacerbating costs for families and stripping Nantucket of some of its longest-tenured residents.<\/p>\n

But opponents point to the high cost. A new facility will cost taxpayers an additional $119 million to build, on top of the funds that have already been appropriated, and that doesn\u2019t even consider the annual overrides Town Meeting has to approve each year to keep Our Island Home running, which one town estimate suggests could reach nearly $8 million in just ten years.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you add up the annual losses that this facility will have, it totals, over 15 years, about $240 million – roughly double the amount of the borrowing,\u201d said Finance Committee member Joseph Wright. \u201cAnd to me, that’s not an investment that makes any sense. I’m sorry, but it just doesn’t make sense.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Select Board also reviewed a draft of a positive motion seeking funding for the facility. Such a motion will have to be made, given the Finance Committee\u2019s recommendation against the project.<\/p>\n

The Finance Committee was itself divided, however, and the vote to oppose the override spending article for the new Our Island Home facility was 4-3.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re as split as the rest of the community,\u201d Finance Committee chair Jill Vieth observed after the vote was taken. \u201cI think we reflect the community.\u201d<\/p>\n

The decision on whether to build a new Our Island Home is likely the most controversial one voters will have to make this spring.<\/p>\n

The Select Board also expressed greater skepticism than the Finance Committee of a proposed expansion of the geotube erosion control project along the Sconset Bluff. The town and the Sconset Beach Preservation Fund have remained unable to reach a license agreement, and with other<\/a> major issues looming over the geotubes<\/a>, the Select Board is not convinced that the project is worth recommending to voters.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe put this on in the hopes that we would get to an agreement, and haven\u2019t gotten there yet, and I\u2019m definitely not in support of it without said agreement. I think our credibility is on the line,\u201d Mohr said. \u201cThe Select Board agreed to include this on the warrant, conditional on the hammering out of a license agreement ahead of town meeting.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t probably support this even with a licensing agreement,\u201d Select Board member Malcolm MacNab said. \u201cI\u2019m tired of this always coming up at the last minute. I\u2019ve had it.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not clear exactly what the Select Board\u2019s comment will say.<\/p>\n

The Finance Committee, a Select Board-appointed commission tasked with reviewing warrant articles and town expenditures, generally makes a recommendation on every article in the warrant. Other town bodies, such as the Planning Board and Select Board, also comment on certain articles.<\/p>\n

The Select Board does not make comments on every article, and is less likely to make a comment when they support the Finance Committee\u2019s recommendation, but they did weigh in on several of the higher-profile issues that will go before voters this spring.<\/p>\n

The Select Board agreed to a comment expressing support for a town employee housing project that received a majority of the vote at last year\u2019s Town Meeting but came up short<\/a> of the two-thirds majority needed to pass. The Finance Committee narrowly endorsed<\/a> the article last week on a 5-4 vote.<\/p>\n

\u201cI definitely think we should add a comment,\u201d Mohr said. \u201cI, personally, and maybe the rest of the board, strongly support the development of municipally-owned housing for employees as part of our housing strategy, but also to support government operations.\u201d<\/p>\n

A similar comment will also be included to endorse the next phase of repairs at the LORAN barracks, used as a seasonal dormitory for community service officers.<\/p>\n

The Select Board also supported the Finance Committee\u2019s motions in favor of a sewer expansion<\/a> slated for the Somerset needs area, in favor of design funding for a new Department of Public Works building, and against a proposal to create a stabilization fund for offshore wind expenses\u2014which the town believes would slow down town operations and institute unnecessary restrictions on spending. All of the Select Board\u2019s comments will need to be officially voted through next week, meaning that they could still change.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Select Board agreed in principle to a series of comments on Town Meeting warrant articles on Wednesday,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":532847,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[4,450,27304,451,53906,3,53907,16992,452,453],"class_list":["post-532846","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-breaking-news","tag-breaking-news","tag-breakingnews","tag-current-news","tag-headlines","tag-nantucket-current","tag-news","tag-people-of-nantucket","tag-stories","tag-top-stories","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/532846","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=532846"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/532846\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/532847"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=532846"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=532846"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=532846"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}