To The Voters At Town Meeting

To the editor: The (Massachusetts Land) Court is running out of patience with Nantucket. Anyone sitting in that courtroom could see where he was going. He may end up taking our ability to rent a dwelling unit away from us to force our hand completely. That means year-round and seasonal. We need to get a grip and put a stop to this endless town meeting argument. Article 66 is the ONLY article that will accomplish this and allow us to take our power back from ACK NOW in whatever veil they are operating behind, look at the signatories on the recent letter we all received this week.

They have operated on misrepresentations, fear mongering, bullying, lawsuits to get their way, and clearly feel that the rest of us are idiots and they have to save us from ourselves. We are being led to our own economic slaughter by the hands of the “we have ours so screw the rest of you” group. They do have the funding to outspend and PR the rest of us to death by using misrepresentations and disregarding the facts. It is time to stop fooling ourselves that ACK Now has anyone’s best interests at heart but their own. This all started because of a few bad apples. The rest of the law-abiding, responsible owners are being thrown out with the bath water. Enough is enough.

Articles 67, 68, 69 are a smoke screen and will result in giving the ACK Now bunch what they want. Do not be fooled by what they are representing disingenuously. Article 66 is to the point and similar to what we tried to do a few times. Keep it simple. The corporate issue was settled last year. They are still trying to use it as if it never existed.

The true facts have been stated over and over for several years. The economic impacts on the commercial part of the community, restaurants, retail and the like, and the impact on families that have to rent to keep their homes that have been in the families for decades or to even afford to buy a home here and still pay the bills to do the upkeep while being able to use it themselves. It would seem that the ACK Now bunch just wants wealthy homeowners who do not have to rent at all. Articles 67, 68, 69 basically accomplish that by making it so hard to rent for the rest of us.

It is beyond time to take our way of life back and preserve our property rights, and vote for Article 66 to stop the madness. The ACK Now bunch wants to ignore the visionary former whalers from 160 years ago who reimagined Nantucket as a tourist destination to keep the island alive. Can we just get on with our lives and livelihoods without this threat of the sword of Damocles over our collective heads and have some peace finally???

Linda Williams