November 2025 - Director's Corner
By Melissa Mahoney, November 10th
East Coast Autumn Glory on Martha’s Vineyard
This past October, I had the joy and privilege of visiting Martha’s Vineyard for a family wedding. Beyond the beauty of the island itself, it was a significant reunion for my dad and his four brothers, who hadn't been together in over 15 years. Our journey—plane, car, and ferry from Woods Hole—landed us in port on a blustery, post-nor’easter day, with fall colors in their full glory.
Exploring Martha's Vineyard in the autumn is like stepping into a series of perfect postcards. Everywhere you look, there's the ocean, the sound, forests, stone walls, and beautifully maintained homes. It’s absolutely stunning! Given its reputation as a major sailing and fishing region, it wasn't long before we discovered connections to the local seafood and commercial fishing communities. My cousin, in fact, is marrying into a family that has operated a seafood business on the island for four generations!
Melissa with Shelley Edmundson of the MVFPT
We also had the opportunity to meet Shelley Edmundson, Executive Director of the Martha’s Vineyard Fishermen’s Preservation Trust (MVFPT), a local nonprofit dedicated to sustaining commercial fishing and preserving fishing culture on the island. In the lively fishing port of Menemsha, Shelley graciously gave us a tour of their recently acquired fish processing building—a piece of living history—and their dockside facility, the MV Seafood Collaborative.
I’m always keen to learn how other coastal communities address the challenges of maintaining viable small-boat fishing operations. Similar to the Monterey Bay Fisheries Trust, they recognized the strength of community ownership of fishing rights as a means to safeguard access. The MVFPT continues to lease quota and has also initiated a community-supported fishery (CSF), a seafood donation program (launched during COVID, just like ours!), and they manage a wholesale fish receiving and processing program in Menemsha.
They've successfully secured grants for new infrastructure, which is shared among operators at the port. This includes a new ‘gin’ boom on their dock, a cold storage unit, a small processing facility, and a truck for transporting seafood off-island for wholesale distribution to Boston-area restaurants. Their success appears rooted in strong direct ties to the fishing community and their role as an integrated business within the industry, while simultaneously serving as an advocate and resource for fishermen. I was truly inspired by how much they achieve with limited resources
Recently, they published an incredible seafood cookbook, The Sea Table, that features local recipes and stories and photographs of fishing families. Producing a similar book for our Monterey Bay region would be a dream come true. Perhaps that’s a project we can begin to explore next year…?
In the meantime, I’ll be pulling out my wool sweaters and bracing for winter’s arrival!