All meetings in Truro are remote only. Go to truro-ma.gov and click on the meeting you want to watch. The agenda includes instructions on how to join.
Thursday, Oct. 14
- Economic Development Committee, 9:30 a.m.
- Housing Authority, 4:15 p.m.
- Energy Committee, 4:30 p.m.
Friday, Oct. 15
- Community Preservation Committee, 5 p.m.
Monday, Oct. 18
- Herring River Restoration Project, Regulatory Oversight Group, 1 p.m.
Tuesday, Oct. 19
- Cemetery Commission, 10 a.m.
- Board of Health, 4:30 p.m.
Conversation Starters
Severing Ties
The Truro eNewsletter began publication in September 2010, launched by Brian Boyle and a team of local volunteers. Sponsored and funded by the town, it appeared monthly, and Boyle and the volunteers were legally classified as public employees.
But a decade later, in December 2020, Truro discontinued its sponsorship of the eNewsletter after it began publishing content in violation of conflict of interest and campaign finance laws. Now it has been replaced by Truro Talks, the town’s brand-new official newsletter — that is, the town’s “only official newsletter,” said Town Manager Darrin Tangeman in the very first issue.
The impermissible content that sank the eNewsletter, Tangeman wrote, “could be viewed as biased, lacking objectivity, or one-sided in its advocacy of Town Meeting articles and election ballot topics.” Specifically, Boyle and his staff began using the platform to boost the agendas of Climate Action Truro and Docs for Truro Safe Water, two private organizations. But the then-official publication cast them as “Town-sanctioned groups with verified content,” Tangeman said.
Boyle, an engineer, is himself a member of Docs for Truro Safe Water. With the other “docs,” who include physicians, a biologist, and a doctor of social work, Boyle prepared a 40-page report in September 2020 outlining how nitrogen contamination in drinking water endangers the Truro community. They claimed that their report underwent a peer-review process; the Independent reported otherwise. Instead of having experts not involved in the study screen the manuscript, Docs for Truro Safe Water admitted that they conducted the “peer review” themselves.
Boyle did not respond to a request for comment by this week’s deadline.
Despite requests from Truro officials urging Boyle and the volunteers to stop generating the unacceptable content, the team failed to comply. Last December, the town severed its relationship with the eNewsletter. The last issue came out in November. It linked readers to a handout from Climate Action Truro and plugged the publication from the Truro “docs.”
Boyle is currently the editor of another newsletter: Truro News, a “free, independent, non-profit media publication for the public,” according to the October issue. Truro News, Tangeman said, “does not represent the town’s facts or position on any issues relevant to our governance and responsibilities.” —Jasmine Lu
