EASTHAM — Jerry Cerasale was first drawn to Cape Cod by love for the sea; not just Cape Cod Bay, he says, but the “waves on the ocean side.” He and his wife, Jan, purchased a home in Eastham in 1988, and “when the kids were young, we would come visit Jan’s parents and drive up the beach.” In 2013, the couple moved to Eastham permanently.
His four-decade career has been more land-based — and fiscally focused. An attorney, he’s played a number of private and public roles in Washington, D.C., including as deputy general counsel for the U.S. House Committee on the Post Office and Civil Service and senior vice president for government affairs for the Direct Marketing Association.
Cerasale’s public service work continued in Eastham, where he has served on the housing authority, the Community Preservation Act Committee, and as chair of the finance committee starting in 2017. He stepped down from those positions when he ran for an uncontested seat on the Eastham Select Board in 2022. Now, at 76, he is running for re-election in a competitive race alongside two challengers, Brian Earley and Dave Hobbs, and fellow incumbent Suzanne Bryan.
The town budget — and avoiding overrides leading to higher property taxes — remain central to Cerasale’s priorities. He cites a 14-percent budget increase last year, when a Proposition 2½ override was needed in part to finance over $1 million in unexpected school costs, as “one of the worst votes I’ve ever had to make in my life.” Since then, he said, restoring Eastham’s financial stability has been one of the select board’s major goals.
“I think we’ve managed fairly well to hold the finances in good shape,” he says, offering the examples of the growth in the town’s available capital funds since 2022 and long-overdue payments on repairing town hall.
Housing costs and wastewater infrastructure remain challenges that Cerasale sees in Eastham’s future. “We have to make sure that we can keep the town livable,” he says, including for people of low and middle income, “because housing prices are so high here.”
In his view, upgrades in the town’s wastewater and sewer systems are central to that aim. In December 2023, Town Manager Jacqui Beebe submitted a watershed management plan to the state to address excess nitrogen runoff at Salt Pond and the Nauset Estuary over a 20-year period, which the select board approved. But the town didn’t receive state funds for the project this year, Cerasale says, so the wastewater project will not appear on the warrant at the May 5 annual town meeting.
Cerasale does not support adopting a residential tax exemption in Eastham, which the select board approved for fiscal 2026 in a 3-2 January vote. Instead, he prefers dedicating $50,000 to the residential taxpayer assistance fund, which he said is “needs-based,” requiring residents to apply for tax breaks. “That’s something we’re starting very slowly this year, if the warrant passes,” he says. “That’s another arrow in our quiver to help with affordable housing.”
Two other potential “arrows” that Cerasale supports on this year’s warrant: new zoning rules that make it easier to build duplexes in North Eastham and adopting the “seasonal community” designation under the 2024 Affordable Homes Act.
“We’re getting older,” he says of Eastham’s population. “We have to try and change the demographics and increase some housing so that we can get some more families in here.” In the summer, he said, “there are restaurants that can’t open seven days a week because they don’t have staff. We absolutely need to help that.” He thinks the seasonal communities designation would help the town build housing for municipal employees and “potentially for summer workers.”
Though issues of affordability rank high in his priorities, Cerasale believes the select board should not be responsible for handling the town’s day-to-day operations. “My view is that one of the top jobs that we have on the select board is to make sure we have a good town manager,” he says, “and to give the town manager guidance.”
Cerasale says that Town Manager Beebe has informed the select board of her plan to retire in the next 18 months. Hiring a new town manager who “works well with everyone and keeps the town moving along without chaos and uproar,” he says, would be a “huge priority” for the next select board.
Though Cerasale does not practice law in Massachusetts, “Jacqui Beebe calls me the ‘select board lawyer,’ ” he says, describing his style. “I’m thoughtful. I sit down and I think about what people have to say, and I try to be as fair as I can in looking at it.”
