To the Editor:
To the powers that be at the Steamship Authority: Please listen to the public outcry from Islanders regarding the proposed changes to the reservation and waitlist system. If you are, as you claim, our lifeline (and make no mistake about it, you are! We are completely beholden to you and your whims), I beseech you to keep the waitlist. Without it, year-round Islanders will feel trapped and panicked, unable to reliably attend important family functions (weddings, funerals, birthdays, reunions), make flights, attend sporting events, etc. Please, with so many things demanding our attention and activism as Americans right now, I beg you, do not add this to the list of items demanding public outcry and response. It’s too much for our minds and hearts.
To my fellow Islanders: If the powers that be at the SSA do not heed our call, we must show up at public meetings, write to board members, and make any and all noise necessary. We love living on this Island too much to allow our “lifeline” to make us feel as though we are being held hostage on it. With all of the other challenges that come with living here (housing crisis, tick crisis, environment crisis, etc.), this change could be the one that pushes many of us over the edge. It will push community members (think teachers, doctors, nurses, emergency responders, etc.) who fear not being able to physically get off-Island, to finally make the permanent decision to leave.
If you are engaged in current events right now, there is no doubt your energies are being pulled in many different directions. However, this issue demands our immediate response. If the proposed waitlist changes are made, it will have dire ramifications on our daily lives in the very near future.
Tonya Katz
Oak Bluffs
