Welcome to the Aquinnah Police Department website!
The
Town of Aquinnah
is located on the Island of Martha’s Vineyard (Dukes County) and is the second
smallest town in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. It was incorporated
as the Town of Gay Head in 1870. The name was changed in August of 1998 to
Aquinnah. The Town is approximately four
square miles and has a year round population of 400. In
the summer months the population increases to many
times that with summer visitors and residents.
Aquinnah is home to the famous Gay Head
Clay Cliffs,
Gay Head
Lighthouse
and spectacular beaches. Summer visitors flock to these attractions. Aquinnah’s
only “business area” is located in the area of the Cliffs.
The Town of
Aquinnah is home to the Wampanoag
Tribe of Gay Head (Aquinnah), which is the only federally recognized
Indian Tribe in the Commonwealth. The Wampanoag Tribe consists of 1,100
members, 300 of which reside on Martha’s Vineyard. Some of the tribal members
live in Aquinnah, in a federally funded
housing area. This area provides housing to Wampanoag families and consists of
approximately 29 houses.
If you visit our Statistics page you
will see that this department averages 400 calls for service a year. Most of
the calls for service are of a minor to moderate nature. Our most urgent calls
are medical emergencies. We rely on the Tri-Town Ambulance Service, which also
serves our neighboring towns of Chilmark and West Tisbury, to respond. This
department also relies on the Dukes County Sheriff’s Department Communications
Center to receive 911 emergency and non-emergency calls and to dispatch these
calls. The Communication Center is the central dispatch center for police,
fire, ambulance services on Martha’s Vineyard.
I hope you find this website useful and if you have any further questions please e-mail us or call the police station at (508) 645-2313.
Chief Randhi P. Belain