Meetings Ahead
Most meetings in Provincetown are held in person, typically with an online-attendance option for both committee members and residents. Click on the meeting you want to attend on the calendar at provincetown-ma.gov for a link to an agenda and details. All meetings are at Town Hall unless otherwise noted.
Thursday, Feb. 1
- Council on Aging Board, 10 a.m., Veterans Memorial Community Center
- Board of Assessors, noon
- Zoning Board of Appeals, 6 p.m.
Tuesday, Feb. 6
- Finance Committee, 2 p.m.
- Conservation Commission, 6 p.m.
Wednesday, Feb. 7
- Historic District Commission, 3:30 p.m.
Thursday, Feb. 8
- Community Preservation Committee, 4 p.m.
- Public Pier Corp. Board, 5 p.m.
- Planning Board, 6 p.m.
Conversation Starter
Dissolving the Pier Corp.
At its meeting on Feb. 12, the select board is set to hear a presentation from town staff and the board members of the Provincetown Public Pier Corp. on a plan to dissolve that independent body and have MacMillan Pier be run by town government.
The pier is already owned by the town, but the Pier Corp. was established as a separate public entity to help ensure attentive management.
Members of the Pier Corp. and town staff now feel that the pier is well organized and can be run successfully by the dept. of public works, with its revenues going into an enterprise fund.
The harbor committee discussed the matter at its Jan. 24 meeting, with member Ginny Binder asking if that board should take up any of the oversight or advisory duties the Pier Corp. was relinquishing.
“Perhaps we will have more of an advisory capacity, and perhaps our mandate will change a little bit,” said member Michela Murphy. “It doesn’t mean we become regulatory or replace the Pier Corp., but maybe we’re the support volunteers.”
From the Front Lines
Olga Shpak, a whale scientist who has worked with the Center for Coastal Studies’ Right Whale Ecology program and who helped document the similarly endangered bowhead whales in the Sea of Okhotsk, is coming to Provincetown to talk about her new life helping to supply soldiers on Ukraine’s front lines.
“I used to be a scientist,” she told Mother Jones last year. She left her conservation job in Moscow to help support Ukrainian soldiers in February 2022 and now runs the nonprofit Assist Ukraine.
She will speak at the Commons in Provincetown at 6 p.m. on Saturday, Feb. 3. —Paul Benson
