Nantucket Residents Propose Nine Citizen Warrant Articles For The 2026 Annual Town Meeting

Citizen-sponsored warrant articles that will come before Town Meeting next spring include a proposal for an offshore wind farm stabilization fund and an amendment requiring a two-thirds vote of the Historic District Commission to demolish any building on Nantucket that is over 50 years old.

This year’s warrant is set to include only nine citizen warrant articles, far fewer than in recent years. The 2025 Annual Town Meeting featured 26 such articles.

Notably, there are no citizens’ warrant articles related to short-term rentals, though town boards still have time to bring forward short-term rental proposals before the Select Board officially adopts the warrant in January. After a five-year stalemate, voters approved a bylaw allowing short-term rentals island-wide by right at November’s Special Town Meeting, which has slowed the flood of regulation proposals.

One of the most notable articles on the warrant is a proposal from ACK For Whales' founding director Val Oliver to establish an offshore wind farm stabilization fund. If adopted, the fund would pay for damages from offshore wind projects, cover litigation against offshore wind farms, and provide information about “the harm to Nantucket and its inhabitants arising from off-shore wind farms.”

Money dedicated to the fund could also be used to “seek termination and removal of existing off-shore wind farms affecting Nantucket” and “oppose and prevent the permitting, approval, installation and operation of off-shore wind farms affecting Nantucket.”

Nantucket has already legally committed to supporting some offshore wind through the so-called “Good Neighbor Agreement” signed with Vineyard Wind, which could complicate efforts to seek the removal of nearby turbines.

The article would require all future revenue connected to offshore wind, including remaining money committed by Vineyard Wind, to be paid into the fund. The money could only be used for the purposes designated by Oliver’s article, meaning it could not be used to support local non-profits or businesses, unless they show damage from offshore wind.

Another high-profile article on the warrant relates to the Historic District Commission (HDC). Preservation carpenter Hollis Webb is sponsoring a bylaw amendment that would require a two-thirds vote of the HDC to permit the demolition of any building more than 50 years old. Currently, only a simple majority vote is needed.

Essentially, the article would change the threshold for permitting demolitions of buildings over 50 years old from 3-2 to 4-1, restricting the HDC’s authority to allow the demolition of structures on the island.

Webb’s article would have had profound implications for a recent, high-profile case before the HDC. In July, the HDC voted 3-2 to permit the demolition of the historic Nantucket Electric Company building on New Whale Street, a ruling that was appealed to the Select Board but ultimately upheld. Under Webb’s article, the HDC's 3-2 vote would have failed, and the building would not be demolished.

A number of the other articles on the warrant will be familiar to Nantucket’s voters, including a proposal from Curtis Barnes to transition Nantucket to a Town Council form of government. A similar proposal, brought forward by the Town Council Study Committee, which Barnes sat on, failed at last year’s Annual Town Meeting and at the ballot box.

The 2026 Annual Town Meeting will also see the latest round in the years-long fight between Hillary Hedges Rayport and the Nantucket Planning and Economic Development Commission (NP&EDC)—a Commission she now sits on.

Rayport has long advocated for sharp changes to the NP&EDC, which handles regional planning for the island, and previously sponsored a home-rule petition to reform its governance structure. That petition initially passed by a single vote after a contentious debate at Town Meeting in 2023, but has not garnered the state approval needed to go into effect. The NP&EDC plans to bring forward its own reform article to this year’s Town Meeting, which could set the stage for another tense clash between two groups with dramatically different visions of the NP&EDC’s future.

Rayport now sits on the NP&EDC by virtue of her election to the Planning Board. NP&EDC discussions about the competing reform articles have become heated in recent months, with Rayport occasionally leaving the table to speak as a member of the public in favor of her preferred article.

Nantucket Land and Water Council executive director Emily Molden is also bringing back an effort to tighten a zoning exemption for lots with pre-existing non-conforming structures, which allows development outside of what is usually permitted by Nantucket’s zoning code. At the 2025 Annual Town Meeting, Molden’s article received the support of the majority of voters, but not the two-thirds needed to pass.

Other articles on the warrant include rezoning a portion of 3 Toombs Court from a fully residential district to a more permissive district that allows for commercial use; a proposal to make Boynton Lane a public way; an effort to install two stop signs at the intersection of Surfside Road, Surfside Drive and Miacomet Road; and the latest attempt by Clifford Williams to purchase a municipal waste incinerator for the landfill, a goal has been pursuing for years.

Town Meeting will be held Monday, May 4th, at 4:30 p.m.