The glacial moraine left behind millennia ago underlies a fact of life for all of Cape Cod: we live on what is essentially a pile of gravel and sand. Given […]
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Self-Governance in the Assembly
A new session may offer a refreshing model of collaboration
Every two years, the voters in every town on the Cape elect delegates to the Barnstable County Assembly, our county’s legislative body. The new session of the Assembly just begun […]
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Respiratory Illnesses Threaten Health-Care Systems
Covid, flu, and RSV stress hospital staff
We have become accustomed to living in the Age of Covid. Even blasé about it. For almost three years, we have faced existential threats from potentially every person we come […]
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Provincetown’s Sewer Epiphany
Voters accept the dual reality of climate change and the need for more housing
A remarkable consensus developed last week at Provincetown’s special town meeting. A packed town hall auditorium agreed, nearly unanimously, to commit $75 million to an ambitious effort to make this […]
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Equity Must Be Our Goal
Poverty and homelessness are here among us on Cape Cod
On WOMR’s Alternative Radio the other night, I listened to a compilation of talks by Barbara Ehrenreich, who died on Sept. 1 and is best known for her groundbreaking undercover […]
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An Ominous Drought
We may need to rethink our expectations of annual rainfall
This was written in a dune shack in the Province Lands, where, on the day we arrived, the well was not pumping any water. We rationed our limited supply. Until […]
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Law Enforcement and Our Mental Health Crisis
Locking people up has never been a good approach to psychiatric illness
I was in a Brewster back yard on a recent sunny Sunday afternoon that was made for the beach but was instead an introduction to some unfamiliar — to me […]
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Remembering Susan Quinones
An advocate for human rights who inspired by listening
Cape Cod lost a powerful leader last week, and I lost a dear friend and colleague. Susan L. Quinones, Esq., who was coordinator for the Barnstable County Human Rights Advisory […]
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A Debate on Citizen Petitions
How many signatures should be required?
Basic issues of democratic process sometimes arise in the most apparently mundane proceedings. The Barnstable County Assembly of Delegates recently held a hearing on an ordinance proposed by the Cape […]
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Dividing the ARPA Millions
Helping neighbors who are having a hard time is a priority
Forty-two million dollars sounds like a pile of money. Until it gets divided up. Across the Cape this month, the glint of federal American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds has […]
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Stuck in Virtual Reality
Learning, reluctantly, to work together remotely
I’m a meeting guy. I have always been motivated to get together in a room with others and work to find collaborative solutions to the issues of the day. Serving […]
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Public Health and Medicare for All
The full spectrum of preventive care should be available to everyone
One of the clearest lessons of the Covid-19 pandemic is that, for society as a whole to be healthy, everyone needs access to health care. Untested and untreated people in […]
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Let’s Change the Power Structure
Short-term profits won’t allow us to strengthen our fragile electric service
The last week of October brought fierce winds, broken trees and poles, and power outages. In Provincetown, no one had electricity for the first day, and in large sections of […]
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Human Rights Begin Here
That’s why we have a commission that hears complaints about abuses
“Where, after all, do universal human rights begin? In small places, close to home — so close and so small that they cannot be seen on any maps of the […]
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The Covid Cluster: What We Must Do Now
We cannot be ‘back to normal,’ no matter how much we want to be
We had been so careful, keeping our distance, and doing all the right containment measures. Then came an explosive Delta-variant Covid outbreak in Provincetown. For a while, case counts doubled […]
