155 Island Businesses Urge Select Board To Withdraw From "Good Neighbor Agreement" With Vineyard Wind

"We feel that we represent the no longer silent majority of this island," Jesse Sandole told the Select Board Wednesday night.

Sandole, the owner of 167 Raw fish market and one of the leaders of the new group Keep Nantucket Wild, was presenting a petition signed by more than 150 island businesses urging the Select Board to withdraw from the "Good Neighbor Agreement" with Vineyard Wind.

"As you know, mass industrialization of our oceans is already underway," Sandole said. "The offshore wind turbines installed today are just the beginning of a vast effort led by foreign-owned oil and gas companies to install 1,300 wind turbines off our shores in a combined lease area larger than the state of Rhode Island. It's hard to imagine. In a very short time, our seascape has become dominated by dystopian steel towers looming higher than the tallest skyscrapers in Boston, a clear and jarring violation of our national historic landmark status."

The Good Neighbor Agreement - which was signed in 2020 by the town, the Nantucket Preservation Trust, and the Maria Mitchell Association - bound the town and those organizations to commit their support to the offshore wind energy project in exchange for $16 million to mitigate the potential historical, cultural, and economic impacts of the turbines on Nantucket. Vineyard Wind also agreed to several other concessions, including the removal of the row of turbines closest to the island, painting the turbines a “non-reflective off-white/light gray color to blend into the horizon” and installing an aircraft detection lighting system (ADLS) which will only turn on if there is an aircraft in proximity to the turbines.

But the Good Neighbor Agreement has been roundly criticized by island residents opposed to the Vineyard Wind project, and following the blade failure on July 13 that sent debris onto Nantucket's beaches and beyond, those objections have only grown louder. On Wednesday, Sandole aired them on behalf of a large number of island businesses that have joined Keep Nantucket Wild's cause. 

"As we've already seen, offshore wind projects will pollute our waters, alter our ecosystems, contaminate our food chain, negatively impact our tourist-driven economy, and devalue our island real estate," Sandole said. "If we allow the very essence of Nantucket to be destroyed, our island will face grave economic consequences. Cultural Heritage Partners, the law firm representing the town, has already informed us that we should prepare for more blade breaks. This is unacceptable. We feel the time is now for the Nantucket Select Board to act rather than continuing to support current offshore wind development at every level of government, as the Good Neighbor Agreement stipulates. It is time for Nantucket to withdraw from the Good Neighbor agreement and instead fight these projects at every level of government and fight for our island."

In October, the Maria Mitchell Association announced that it was withdrawing from the Good Neighbor Agreement, fueling the calls for the Select Board to follow suit.

If the Select Board is feeling the pressure, its members gave no indication Wednesday as to whether the petition would influence them to take any action. Following Sandole's comments, Select Board chair Brooke Mohr simply thanked him and moved on to the next speaker, although that is the board's standard operating procedure for public comment. The Current reached out to Mohr Thursday morning for comment on Sandole's petition, and while she stated she would get back to us, we did not hear back from her. Mohr's position on the Good Neighbor Agreement and whether the town should remain a signatory, however, was outlined in a recent letter to another Vineyard Wind opposition group, ACK For Whales.

"ACK for Whales has praised Maria Mitchell Association for withdrawing and implores the Town to also do so," Mohr wrote. "But what is not clear is what actual benefit the Town would derive from doing so. The Good Neighbor Agreement provides leverage above and beyond that which BOEM has or will provide the Town. Walking away from it simply unilaterally disarms the town. It doesn’t hurt the developer in any way other than symbolically. And that symbolism, although perhaps satisfying, comes at a high cost. The Town cannot sue for violations of an agreement that it walked away from. The Town will continue to pursue strategies that are grounded in the reality of our legal options, and doing so is in the best interests of our community."

Sandole acknowledged the Select Board's position in his comments on Wednesday but emphasized Keep Nantucket Wild's position on withdrawing from the agreement.

"A point that has consistently been made by the Select Board is that you do not have the power to stop these projects," Sandole said. "And while we acknowledge that, we believe that the full power of the board has yet to be seen, given that we are still negotiating with offshore wind companies. Until we withdraw from this agreement, and instead of negotiate - fight - we will not know the full power of this board. The 155 Nantucket businesses that currently make up our coalition humbly ask you to withdraw from the Good Neighbor agreement and do what is right for the future of our island."

Another leader of the Keep Nantucket Wild group, Evie O'Connor, also spoke out during the public comment segment of Wednesday's Select Board meeting.

"I also want to take this opportunity to amplify the voice of the voices of the indigenous communities, specifically the Aquinnah Wampanoag tribe," O'Connor said. "We urge the board to carefully consider the amicus brief submitted to the Supreme Court by the Aquinnah Wampanoag tribe, who are the indigenous people currently on Martha's Vineyard and the living relatives of the original people of Nantucket. This brief is in support of the Nantucket Residents Against Turbines, also known as ACK For Whales, in their Supreme Court case regarding offshore wind. The Aquinnah Wampanoag tribe has deep historical ties to the North Atlantic right whale, an already endangered species whose habitat and existence is directly threatened by Vineyard Wind and subsequent wind farms."

Vineyard Wind, which is owned by Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners and Avangrid Renewables (a subsidiary of the Spanish energy giant Iberdrola), has so far paid $4 million of the promised $16 million in mitigation payments promised in the Good Neighbor Agreement. From that initial payment, $2.5 million was deposited into an account administered by the Nantucket Community Foundation, which in May distributed $780,000 in grants from the "Offshore Wind Community Fund." The Maria Mitchell Association received a one-time payment from the initial outlay by Vineyard Wind, but the amount was never disclosed, and the non-profit has declined to comment on whether it gave the money back when it withdrew from the Good Neighbor Agreement.