In anticipation of Christmas in Edgartown, the Edgartown select board voted Monday to extend seasonal liquor licenses through Dec. 13.
“It works for the benefit of the residents of Edgartown to have some more choices,” selectman Arthur Smadbeck said at the board’s weekly meeting. “As long as we have no opposition from year-round people, we should just go ahead and do it.”
By law seasonal liquor licenses expire Nov. 30, but in Massachusetts towns have been allowed more latitude due to the pandemic.
Scott Little, general manager of the Harbor View Hotel, told the board an extension for the seasonal license holders is good for the entire Edgartown business community.
“I just wanted to say that as a year-round [liquor license] holder, we would support [the extension],” Mr. Little said.
Keeping seasonal businesses open is a benefit to the town, particularly with some remaining shuttered or closing early, select board member Michael Donaroma said.
“In light of what’s going on, with so many places being closed down because of health and every other thing, it’d be nice to keep whatever we can open,” Mr. Donaroma said.
In other business Monday, the board authorized the design of a small addition to the plaque at the Memorial Wharf honoring Nancy Michael, an enslaved woman who lived on the Island in the early 19th century.
The board appointed town accountant Amy Tierney to represent Edgartown in the upcoming contract negotiations for teachers. Ms. Tierney is the former business administrator for the Vineyard public schools.
The town will undertake a small project to add three to six inches of asphalt on the Edgartown side of the Chappaquiddick Ferry in order to allow easier access to the ferry at high tide, town administrator James Hagerty reported.
The board also:
• Set Nov. 22 to hold a hearing on the alcohol license for the Harbor View hotel.
• Approved a travel voucher for the police to complete a two-day training program.
• Voted to accept a $74 donation to the Edgartown Council on Aging and granted the high school’s Minnesingers group permission to use the Yellow House Park on Nov. 24.
“I’m glad to see [the park] being used,” Mr. Donaroma said.
