EASTHAM — The 569 people who turned out for Eastham’s annual town election on Tuesday, May 20 returned incumbents Jerry Cerasale and Suzanne Bryan to the select board. They defeated challengers Dave Hobbs and Brian Earley, who are both members of the planning board.
Cerasale, a lawyer by training, is a former chair of the town’s finance committee. He was the top vote-getter of the four candidates with a total of 401. Bryan, a 2007 graduate of Nauset Regional High School, received 369 votes. Both were elected to the select board for the first time in 2022, running unopposed.
Hobbs came in third with 224 votes, and Earley’s tally was 88.
The turnout represented a little more than one-eighth of the town’s 4,183 registered voters, according to Town Clerk Linda Sassi.
During their campaigns, both Bryan and Cerasale pitched themselves as neighborly candidates capable of working through disagreements thanks to a set of shared core values. Both hold strong opinions on the residential tax exemption (RTE), for instance — at candidates night on May 12, Bryan said she “supports any tools that make Eastham affordable for young families,” while Cerasale said that the policy “violates everything people tell me on ethics” — but each praised the other’s cooperative style in discussing and implementing select board policies.
Hobbs’s supporters ran a vigorous campaign for him, appearing outside town hall on election day to wave signs at passing drivers. Hobbs, who owned a hydroelectric company before moving to Eastham in 2016, acknowledged the “difficult decisions” ahead for the select board, especially connected to the RTE, which he said was “tearing apart” residents and nonresidents. Nevertheless, Hobbs said he favored the RTE.
Earley, meanwhile, pitched himself as a candidate interested in developing Eastham’s infrastructure. In an interview with the Cape Cod Times, he said he favored the restoration of passenger rail service to Outer Cape Cod, with an Eastham station for battery-operated cars at the town-owned T-Time property. Earley said the top issue facing Eastham is increasing taxes.
Potentially implementing an RTE won’t be the only big decision Bryan and Cerasale will have to confront in the near future. It will also fall on the select board to find a new town manager to replace Jacqui Beebe, who plans to retire soon, and to guide the town through the process of reducing nitrogen in Salt Pond — most likely by the construction of a municipal sewer system. The future of the sewer project could depend on the results of a special town meeting on June 23, where voters will decide whether or not to accept a $50-million low-interest loan from the State Revolving Fund.
“I’m thrilled to be working with Jerry and Suzanne for another year,” said select board chair Aimee Eckman on Tuesday. “They’re both incredibly dedicated, and they want the best for Eastham. I’m glad that voters saw in them what I see.”
In other election results, Sara Higgins won a second term on the board of library trustees with 409 votes, while newcomer Robin Rowe won a first term with 249. One spot on that board was vacated by chair Joanna Stevens, who did not run for re-election. Two other challengers — Robert Harnett, whose father previously served on the board, and Michael Narracci, a former lead editor for the Red Sox broadcast on NESN — got 143 and 137 votes, respectively.
The library trustee election was contested this year thanks to an effort by Higgins and other board members to encourage people to run. During candidates night, all three challengers espoused similar values, opposing book bans and characterizing libraries as places that bring communities together.
Rowe seemed to win over voters during her closing remarks on May 12 by quoting author Doug Wilhelm: “A library is a house of hope. It’s a place where we all, no matter what our situation, can feed our ideas and develop our dreams.”
Higgins also won a second term on the Eastham Elementary School Committee; Lindsey Jenna Palmer, deputy editor at the educational website BrainPOP, won a first term. Both ran unopposed, and both have children in the school. Committee chair Ann Crozier had decided not to run for re-election.
Moira Noonan-Kerry, who ran unopposed for the Nauset Regional School Committee, was re-elected with 495 votes.
Voters said yes to Question 1, which requested a debt exemption for the purchase of two half-duplexes across from Salt Pond from the Delgizzi family. The purchase had previously been authorized at town meeting for the purpose of renovating the units and constructing a wastewater pump station on the property. The vote was 494 to 149.
Voters also approved a nonbinding public advisory question that called for state officials to “employ all means available” to stop the company decommissioning the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station from discharging contaminated wastewater at the site. As in Truro, that question got a resounding yes, with 494 voting in favor and 57 voting against.
