WELLFLEET — Timothy Sayre hopes that the third time’s the charm. After two defeats in 2022, he is running again for a spot on the select board in a special town election on Wednesday, Sept. 27.
For a while, it appeared that this would be Sayre’s year because he was running uncontested. His is the only name printed on the ballot. But last week, Curt Felix announced a write-in candidacy, creating competition for the eight-month term. The winner will replace Kathleen Bacon, who announced her resignation from the board earlier this summer.
Born in Boston, Sayre, 67, moved to Wellfleet from Florida three years ago to take over Briar Lane Jams and Jellies, the business on Route 6 started by his grandparents, Esther and Leroy Wiles. Before moving here, Sayre said, he had visited Wellfleet regularly for his entire life.
Sayre immediately tuned in to town affairs. “I have attended virtually every select board meeting for the past three years,” he said. He added that he is an alternate member of the Maurice’s Campground Planning Committee and has attended many shellfish advisory board meetings. “I’m very well versed in a lot of the issues going on,” he said.
Sayre’s reason for pulling nomination papers was simple: “The town had an opening on the board that needed to be filled,” he said. But he believes he is the right person for the job. “I feel I can help make good decisions to keep the town moving forward in the right direction,” he said.
The right direction, according to Sayre, is to hold the town accountable for what it does with its money. “For three to five years, there was no accountability for the money,” he said. “They didn’t even know how much they had in excess funds. They just accomplished that last year under the direction of Charles Sumner and Richard Waldo. The town needs to find the right help to continue fixing its finances.”
Sayre holds a bachelor’s degree in computer science and mathematics from the University of Miami and has spent his career working for Responsible Media Technologies, which he described as a large corporation in Florida, where he said he oversaw a $50-million budget. He did not respond to requests for further information about the company, which does not have a website. Sayre said he also served on an advisory committee in charge of directing revenue to the Palm Beach, Fla. school district.
“I understand numbers. I can do math almost instantly,” Sayre said. “I have learned that I need to slow down when I talk about money, because I understand money. That’s one of the things I can bring forward — helping everybody understand what is going on with our expenditures.”
Sayre said that the town’s staffing crisis is due to a dearth of affordable housing options. “I have spoken to a couple of nurses who are considering leaving the town because there really is no affordable housing,” he said. He added that while Wellfleet has made immense progress on several projects, including at Maurice’s Campground and 95 Lawrence Road, “the town is quite a few years out on those.”
As for the town’s volunteer boards, “We need to make sure that the nonresident taxpayers in town realize that they are eligible to serve on boards,” Sayre said. “Just because you don’t live in town year-round doesn’t mean you’re not smart and you don’t have good ideas.”
Sayre said that his losses in past select board races stemmed from a smear campaign about his political affiliations. “I am not dedicated to one party,” Sayre said. “I support what is in the best interest of the community.
“There is a lot of misinformation going around town about me,” he continued. One example, he said, was a story that he had participated in the attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Sayre said he wants to set that record straight.
“If that were true,” he said, “the Secret Service would have already arrested me.”
