nbuzz NO MANDATORY VAX ON ACK
Most state universities in Massachusetts are requiring students to get vaccinated against COVID-19 before returning to campus, while political leaders are debating whether to impose a vaccine mandate for state employees that interact with the public. No such plans are in the works on Nantucket, where the island’s largest public and private employers say a vaccine mandate is not on the table. Town Manager Libby Gibson and Health Department Director Roberto Santamaria said the
town administration had not discussed the topic in any meaningful way. At White Elephant Resorts, one of the largest private employers on the island, employees are encouraged to get vaccinated, but there is no requirement at the moment, said Khaled Hashem, managing director for hospitality. For Nantucket Cottage Hospital staff, COVID-19 vaccination is also voluntary, not mandatory, as is the policy throughout the Mass General Brigham system.
ISLAND
BUILDING BOOM The
DRIVE-IN
RETURNS
The Dreamland’s drive-in movie theater off Nobadeer Farm Road will be back for an encore. The drive-in was one of the highlights of the pandemic summer of 2020. It was so popular, in fact, that the Dreamland’s GoFundMe campaign to kickstart the project raised more than $185,249, and the nonprofit then sold out every single ticket for the drive-in from the day it opened in early July 2020 through Labor Day. Even with some of the pandemic-related restrictions on indoor movie theaters being lifted, last year’s success spurred the Dreamland to bring the drive-in back in 2021, and the Nantucket Film Festival has already announced part of its programming will take place in June at the drive-in.
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M A G A Z I N E
Anyone with a working pair of eyes knows implicitly that the building trades have been going gangbusters on Nantucket over the past ten months. Since the initial pandemic lockdown in March and April 2020 that paused most projects and new construction starts, building activity around the island has skyrocketed, fueled by a record $1.85 billion in real estate transactions last year. Data from the Nantucket Planning & Land Use Services Department, which tracks building permits by fiscal year (July 1 to June 30), shows the island building boom that is underway. Through just two-thirds of the 2021 fiscal year, the estimated dollar value of new permitted building projects is $242.1 million, already matching the previous fiscal year, and on pace to be the biggest year for island construction in at least five years. As one member of the department told the Nantucket Current: “It’s crazy.”
