PROVINCETOWN — Six weeks after Sarah Peake announced she would not run for a 10th two-year term representing the Outer and Lower Cape in the state House of Representatives, the field of candidates seeking to replace her is becoming more clear.
Hadley Luddy, the 53-year-old CEO of the Homeless Prevention Council, and Michael Herman, the 56-year-old chair of the Orleans Select Board, will compete in the Sept. 3 Democratic Party primary in the 4th Barnstable District, which includes Provincetown, Truro, Wellfleet, Eastham, Orleans, Harwich, and Chatham. The winner will advance to the general election on Nov. 5.
State Sen. Julian Cyr said he had not yet heard of any Republican candidates; the filing deadline is April 30.
On the Outer Cape, select board member Leslie Sandberg of Provincetown, County Commissioner Sheila Lyons of Wellfleet, and select board chair Kristen Reed of Truro all said they had considered running but decided against it.
Sandberg and Lyons said they will run for reelection instead, while Reed said she is still deciding whether to run for a third term in Truro.
Luddy on Homelessness
Luddy moved to Orleans in 1996 with a theater degree from UMass Boston and a master’s in education from Harvard. She worked for the state Dept. of Children and Families (DCF) for five years, for the nonprofit Community Connections for 10 years, and for Big Brothers and Big Sisters of the Cape and Islands for five years before going to the Homeless Prevention Council in 2018.
At DCF, Luddy coordinated the recruitment of foster and adoptive parents. “There were about 11,000 kids in the system,” she said, “and some of them were moving almost every night. We tried to recruit people who could foster for as little as a week or a month, to make it easier for the kids and in hopes that some of the foster parents would move on to longer terms.”
At Community Connections, Luddy said, she helped raise money, and “we set up job training and coaching programs and helped arrange job placements for young adults. I loved that work.”
At both Big Brothers and Big Sisters and the Homeless Prevention Council she revived operations that had grown moribund, Luddy said. The council’s staff has grown from five to almost 20.
“This is boots on the ground for the housing crisis, working with people who are housing insecure and financially unstable,” Luddy said. “We served more than 2,300 people last year, and most of them are paying more than half their income on rent or they’re losing their rentals. In many cases they thought they were stable, and they’re suddenly in a scramble.”
That work, said Luddy, has prepared her for the constituent services part of the state representative job.
She named three broad priorities: housing and economic development, environment and infrastructure, and regionalized approaches to getting more state and federal money to Cape Cod.
“If you look at something like rental assistance, almost every town has a program of its own, but I think we could organize on a broader scale and get more state funding here,” Luddy said.
Herman on Livability
Herman moved to Orleans in 2020 but said he traces his roots back to four different signers of the Mayflower Compact. His great-grandfather was a chauffeur and owned a farm in South Orleans where Herman now lives and grows organic vegetables. His grandfather opened Besson’s Country Store in East Orleans, where his mother grew up in a top-of-shop apartment.
“My mother and uncles all graduated from Orleans High School,” Herman said. “I grew up in Boston but worked here in the summers — on my uncle’s lobster boat, the Lady Louise, at Land Ho restaurant, and at Cape Associates working construction.”
Herman studied economics at Boston College and worked in “the business side of the fashion industry” in Hong Kong, New York, and London. “I started in the clothing business as an intern and worked my way up to senior executive roles over 30 years,” Herman said.
“This is where I spent every summer, and I always planned on moving back here, but Covid accelerated things,” he said. He moved to his family’s farm and was appointed to the town’s affordable housing trust the same year.
Herman was elected to finish the term of retiring select board member Cecil Newcomb in 2021 and won a full term in 2022. He is currently the chair, a position that rotates every year in Orleans.
“I have a track record of working with the community on complex issues,” Herman said, citing the town’s recent initiatives on fertilizer and pesticide reduction. “The environment is what makes people want to come stay in this special place. Without it, we have nothing.”
Herman said that the interlocking problems of “livability” — housing most centrally but also other problems facing young families such as child care, year-round employment, and transportation — are his focus.
“Sarah leaves very big shoes to fill, but I believe I can hit the ground running to fight for our district, secure funding resources, and work on livability for all our residents,” Herman said. “Sarah has also worked a lot in her career for women’s reproductive freedom, LGBTQ+ rights, and gun safety, and I would champion those issues.”
Taking a pass
Sandberg said the district needed a representative who could serve longer than she could.
“Sarah was there for 18 years — she got in leadership and that was an incredible benefit to this district,” Sandberg said. “I would serve for six years at the most, and by then I would be 68.”
Lyons, 67, said she was happy serving the county and didn’t feel called to run.
“If it was five years ago, maybe I would have taken a more serious look,” Lyons said. “But I’m happy where I am. We’re doing important work at the county.”
Reed, 40, said that between working three jobs and serving as select board chair in Truro, “I am too fatigued to do it.” She said she was relieved that Luddy was running, calling her “the right person at the right time for the job.
“If there weren’t any good people running, that would push me to do it,” Reed said. “But I would rather support a candidate who has the energy and feels like it’s the right time for her.”
