The Weekly Current: Oct. 12 to 17. The Essex school vote, Manchester's fire engine, and early voting starts
Cape Ann Current Podcast, Oct. 18, 2026
https://capeanncurrent.com/podcast/weekly-current-2026-10-18/

Kerry Jane: Ten people voted, and every one of them said yes to a 95 million dollar school.

Mateo Daniel: Gloucester beat Swampscott under the lights, and I had a dog outside the fence who took it very personally.

Ana Lucia: And one of us turned the heat on this week. It was me.

Kerry Jane: It's all coming up on The Weekly Current.

Kerry Jane: Good morning, Cape Ann. This is The Weekly Current from the Cape Ann Current, a free source of public information for Gloucester, Rockport, Essex and Manchester-by-the-Sea. I'm Kerry Jane. It's Sunday, October 18, and this is our first one. Every Sunday we're going to sit down and go through the week. What we covered, why we covered it, what it means for you, and what's coming up before anybody votes on it. I'm here with Ana Lucia, who covers the waterfront, business and history.

Ana Lucia: Good morning.

Kerry Jane: And Mateo Daniel, who covers sports, schools and community, and reads the police and fire logs every single morning so you don't have to.

Mateo Daniel: Let's go. First episode. No pressure.

Kerry Jane: All right. Before we get into the week, let's do the thing we're going to do every week.

Kerry Jane: Mateo Daniel, how was your week?

Mateo Daniel: Okay so. Friday night. Rain. Newell Stadium. Gloucester and Swampscott.

Kerry Jane: In the rain.

Mateo Daniel: In the rain. And my truck, La Bestia, which normally starts on the third try, took four. In the rain. I'm sitting in the driveway in Rockport going, come on, we have a football game. Tito's in the passenger seat looking at me like, this is your fault.

Ana Lucia: Tito is the dog, for people who don't know.

Mateo Daniel: Tito is the dog. Forty pounds of opinions. He stays outside the fence at every game, that's the rule, and he was out there in the rain with the seagulls, and I swear he was barking at the seagulls like they were the other team.

Kerry Jane: And Gloucester won.

Mateo Daniel: Gloucester won. We'll get there. Then Saturday morning I drove down to Long Beach to check the surf, because after a storm like that you have to look. And it was that northwest wind, 24 miles an hour, 49 degrees if you believed the forecast, which I did not. The water was a mess. Blown out. So I didn't go in. Tito went in. Tito ran that whole beach like he was being paid for it.

Ana Lucia: Did you at least get the scarf out?

Mateo Daniel: The scarf is out. The Revolution scarf comes out of the closet every October, that's the rule, and it came out this week. I've been a Revs fan since I was eight years old. My tío Ramón took me to Foxborough and that was it. I was done.

Kerry Jane: How are they doing?

Mateo Daniel: We're not going to talk about how they're doing. We're going to talk about the scarf.

Ana Lucia: That's a good answer.

Kerry Jane: Ana Lucia, what about you?

Ana Lucia: So, mine is a little quieter. Last Sunday was my last sail of the season. My friend keeps a small boat out of the Annisquam, and I've been learning all summer. Badly.

Kerry Jane: You keep saying badly.

Ana Lucia: Because it's true. But last Sunday I got the boat turned around by myself. No help. First time. And Rui was standing on the dock, and he clapped. My husband does not clap. He's a marine mechanic. He fixes boats all day and I can't turn one around.

Mateo Daniel: Wait, so the boat's out now?

Ana Lucia: The boat came out of the water Monday. So that's it until spring. Which Sardinha is happy about, because now I'm home on Sundays again.

Mateo Daniel: Sardinha is the cat.

Ana Lucia: Sardinha is the cat. Orange. She sits in the bathroom window because that's the only window with a view of the harbor. And she judges it.

Kerry Jane: And Avó?

Ana Lucia: Avó says, Outubro quente traz o diabo no ventre. A hot October brings the devil in its belly. Which she says means it's going to be a cold winter. I don't know if there's any science in it, but we made sopa this morning just in case.

Kerry Jane: All right, mine. Friday, the rain. We have a bulkhead door on our house in Lanesville that leaks every time it rains sideways, and it rained sideways. Dan, my husband, who is a carpenter, who fixes old houses for other people for a living, put a towel down and said, fixed.

Mateo Daniel: Ha. That's the fix?

Kerry Jane: That's the fix. That's been the fix for three years. And Owen, who is nine and wants to be a harbormaster, stood at the window Friday afternoon watching the lobster boats come in ahead of the wind, narrating each one. Then Saturday. There was frost on the car. First one. And Chowder and I did what we do, which is Plum Cove at first light.

Ana Lucia: In that wind.

Kerry Jane: In that wind. Nobody else there. That's the point. Chowder is eleven, she walks like she's reading every rock, and Plum Cove in the cold with nobody on it is her favorite place in the world. Mine too, if I'm honest. Winter mornings there are better than summer.

Mateo Daniel: That's a strong take.

Kerry Jane: It's the correct take. And then Saturday night Dan and I went up to Halibut Point for the sunset, which we do more than is reasonable. The state park. We check in on the parking pass app every time, and Saturday was check-in number 35 this year.

Ana Lucia: Thirty five.

Kerry Jane: Thirty five. Half the sunset shots you see on the Current's videos are from those trips. So when you see the sun going down over the quarry, that's us, freezing, and Dan saying we should go, and me saying one more minute.

Ana Lucia: Was the house warm when you got home?

Kerry Jane: No. And here's where I want to ask both of you something, because it was 34 degrees Saturday night. Has anyone turned the heat on?

Mateo Daniel: I rent. The landlord has the thermostat. The landlord turned it on Thursday. I have no decision to make and I've never been happier.

Kerry Jane: That is not fair.

Mateo Daniel: It is not fair. It's great.

Kerry Jane: Dan has a rule. No heat before November 1. We've held it for years. So Saturday night it was two sweaters and Chowder on my feet, and I kept thinking about Ana Lucia's story.

Ana Lucia: So. About that.

Mateo Daniel: Oh no.

Ana Lucia: I wrote the heating oil story on Wednesday. The one that says the state's weekly survey has heating oil at six dollars and eighteen cents a gallon. Up 74 percent from this week last year, when it was three fifty six. I built the calculator. I did the math for a 275 gallon tank. I know exactly what it costs.

Kerry Jane: And?

Ana Lucia: And Friday night, after the rain, I turned it on.

Mateo Daniel: Ha. Three days.

Ana Lucia: Three days. Rui was asleep. Rui is always warm, he never wants it on. The radiators banged, Sardinha was on top of one in under a minute, and I stood there thinking, you wrote the story.

Kerry Jane: Ha. Ana Lucia.

Ana Lucia: In my defense, the story also says there's help. Fuel assistance applications have been open since October 1, and the state added money this year. That's in the write-up, with where to go.

Kerry Jane: That's in the write-up. All right. I'm holding to November 1. For the record.

Mateo Daniel: We'll check back.

Kerry Jane: Every week. That's the deal. And this afternoon I'm taking Owen to the Halloween party at Stage Fort Park. Noon to three. He's going as a harbormaster.

Ana Lucia: Of course he is.

Kerry Jane: Maggie says she's too old. She's thirteen. She's too old for everything.

Mateo Daniel: She's not too old.

Kerry Jane: She'll come. She'll stand ten feet away from us the whole time, but she'll come. All right. Let's get to it.

Kerry Jane: Every week we pick the three things that matter most. A decision got made, or it's about to. It costs money or changes a rule. And it touches the most households. That's how we pick. Number one this week is the Essex school. Mateo Daniel, this is yours.

Mateo Daniel: Okay so. Tuesday night, the Essex School Building Committee voted ten to nothing to send the design for the new Essex Elementary School to the state. The number is 95 million, 351 thousand, 985 dollars. That's the whole project.

Kerry Jane: Ten to zero.

Mateo Daniel: Ten to zero. Four people on Zoom, six in the room, exactly enough for a quorum. And the chair went straight to the vote because people had other meetings to get to. The whole business meeting was 26 minutes.

Ana Lucia: Why did we cover it? There's going to be a lot of school votes.

Mateo Daniel: Because this is the vote that starts the clock. Here's the calendar, and you should write this down. The last community meeting on the school is November 4. Then Essex and Manchester both hold town meetings on November 16 to vote on the money. Then both towns vote at the ballot box on December 10 on a debt exclusion, which is the thing that lets the towns raise taxes above the normal limit to pay for it.

Kerry Jane: Explain the state part. Because people hear 95 million and think that's what the towns pay.

Mateo Daniel: Right. The state school building authority pays part of it. In the write-up on the Manchester Finance Committee, the expected state share is about 21.4 percent, about 20.8 million. So the two towns are looking at about 74.6 million between them.

Ana Lucia: And it splits how?

Mateo Daniel: By assessed property value in the year the money is appropriated. On the 2026 numbers, Manchester's share after state aid is about 49.9 million. Essex is the rest.

Kerry Jane: Here's the household number, because this is what everybody actually wants to know. For Manchester, the town's bond adviser figures it comes to about 84 dollars a year for every 100 thousand dollars of assessed value, once all the borrowing is in place. So a house assessed at a million dollars, that's about 840 dollars a year.

Mateo Daniel: And that's not right away. The district plans to use short term notes first and have all the long term debt out by fiscal 2032.

Ana Lucia: Explain it to me like I'm at the game.

Mateo Daniel: Ha. That's my line.

Ana Lucia: I'm borrowing it.

Mateo Daniel: Okay. Like you're at the game. The two towns want a new elementary school in Essex. The design is done. The state has to look at it and say okay. Then the two towns vote twice. Once at town meeting, where you show up and raise your hand, and once at the ballot box. If either town says no, the project has 120 days to come back. After that, they start the whole state process over.

Kerry Jane: What did we learn?

Mateo Daniel: A couple of things. One, a member said the questions from residents keep coming back to why this school costs more than Manchester's Memorial School, and the answer they want to put side by side is that both have a gym, a cafeteria and a library, and the main difference is two classrooms per grade instead of three. Two, the state's number, about 605 dollars a square foot, is what the state is willing to support, not what a school actually costs to build here. The superintendent said that straight out.

Ana Lucia: And a sloping, ledgy site.

Mateo Daniel: And a sloping, ledgy site, which the state doesn't cover.

Kerry Jane: All right. And one more thing from that meeting, because it's the part I keep thinking about. On November 16, Manchester is putting the school article near the top of its warrant. Essex is putting it after six Planning Board zoning articles. So if you're in Essex, you may be sitting there a while. Although voters can move to take it up sooner.

Mateo Daniel: And the National Honor Society kids are running childcare at Essex town meeting from now on. A member said that. So bring the kids.

Kerry Jane: Number two is Manchester, and it's mine. Thursday night the Manchester Finance Committee went through four money articles for that same November 16 town meeting. They backed two, they recommended the school share, and they did not vote on the senior center.

Ana Lucia: Start with the fire engine.

Kerry Jane: The fire engine. Manchester ordered a new engine years ago and planned to keep saving for it. Instead it's arriving about two years early. So the money is needed this winter. The town has 300 thousand dollars saved in its fire apparatus fund. It needs 710 thousand, 927 dollars more, and the committee backed taking that from free cash.

Mateo Daniel: Free cash is what?

Kerry Jane: Free cash is the town's certified leftover money from past years. It was just certified at about 3.4 million. The chair's math was that after the engine, the town's reserves would still be about 10.2 percent of the operating budget, and the committee's goal is 8 percent.

Ana Lucia: Why did we cover it?

Kerry Jane: Because the same truck ordered today would cost about 1.5 to 1.6 million with a three year wait, the chief said. And because the truck it replaces, Engine 1, is a 2011 truck with rusted frame rails. That's going to reserve duty. So the decision is, pay now for the truck you already ordered, or wait. The committee said pay now.

Mateo Daniel: And the senior center?

Kerry Jane: The senior center is the one everybody's going to be talking about. The draft article lets the town borrow up to 7.5 million for a senior and community center at the old Masonic building, but nothing can be borrowed until at least 3 million is committed from gifts, donations or grants. The committee did not like the word grants. They'd been told the 3 million would come from residents and donors, and any grant should lower the town's borrowing on top of that, not substitute for it.

Ana Lucia: So one word.

Kerry Jane: One word. The town administrator said taking it out is not a legal problem, and by the end of the night the committee was told the word grants will come out before the Select Board votes on the final warrant. Which is tomorrow. Monday the 19th. And the Finance Committee comes back Thursday the 22nd to vote on the article.

Mateo Daniel: What does it mean for you if you live in Manchester?

Kerry Jane: It means November 16 at Memorial School is a big night. Fire engine, water meters, the school share, the senior center. And one member said something I want to pass along without taking a side on it. He said the town's 20 year capital plan is running about 200 to 240 million dollars and climbing. That's the record. What you do with it is up to you.

Ana Lucia: One line of history?

Kerry Jane: Go ahead.

Ana Lucia: The fire chief said the town has a spare engine it bought from Lynnfield for 100 dollars, and now it's going to be disposed of. I just like that somewhere in the record there's a hundred dollar fire truck.

Mateo Daniel: A hundred dollars. That's cheaper than La Bestia.

Kerry Jane: Number three. The election. Early voting started yesterday, Saturday the 17th, and the big local race is for state representative in the Fifth Essex District, which is all four of our towns. Three candidates. As the state lists them: Christina Delisio of Manchester-by-the-Sea, Republican. Gil Frieden of Essex, running under the Transparency Inclusion Environment designation. And Andrew Tarr of Gloucester, Democrat, who goes by Dru and who won the seat in the special election back on March 31.

Mateo Daniel: What did we do this week?

Kerry Jane: Three things, and they're all on the website. The League of Women Voters of Cape Ann sat each candidate down for a 15 minute interview and the video went up Wednesday. We went through all of it and wrote up what each candidate said, in their own words, with fact checks where a claim could be checked against a record. Then Saturday morning we published Dru Tarr's answers to the Current's questionnaire. Gil Frieden's ran on October 6. Every candidate got the same questions and the same deadline.

Ana Lucia: And Christina Delisio?

Kerry Jane: Same questionnaire, same deadline. Her answers run the same way the moment they come in. All three candidates are side by side in the Fifth Essex voter guide, and you can read the exact questions every candidate got.

Mateo Daniel: Why did we cover it this way? Why the questionnaire?

Kerry Jane: Because it's the fairest thing we know how to do. Same questions, same deadline, their words in quotation marks, and we don't endorse anybody. The Current also doesn't take political ads. So what you get is where they stand on housing, the waterfront, the coast, town budgets, getting around, and all nine statewide ballot questions.

Ana Lucia: Nine.

Kerry Jane: Nine. And the voter guide explains every one of them in plain words, with who's campaigning on each side.

Ana Lucia: So, I have a question. We also ran one Saturday for Governor's Council. Eunice Zeigler. I'll be honest, I had to look up what the Governor's Council does.

Kerry Jane: Most people do. It's an eight member elected board. It votes on the governor's nominations for judges, clerk magistrates and parole board members, and on pardons. Two year terms. Our district is the 5th, and it's Zeigler, the Democrat from Methuen who holds the seat, against Republican William Falcetano of Gloucester. We sent both the questionnaire. We couldn't find contact information for Falcetano, and the write-up says that plainly. If he gets in touch, his answers run the same way.

Mateo Daniel: What does it mean for you?

Kerry Jane: It means you have until Tuesday, November 3, and you can vote early starting now. Check your town clerk's page for the hours. And read the guide first. It's short on purpose.

Kerry Jane: All right. The Desk. Quick ones. Ana Lucia, waterfront.

Ana Lucia: St. Peter's Landing. If you tie up there, your traps have to be off the pier by November 15. The city says the rebuild of the commercial float goes out to bid in February, and the boats will have to move while the work happens. Also from the Waterways Board, about 1,170 moorings were booked this season, a little ahead of last year.

Kerry Jane: Dogtown.

Ana Lucia: Dogtown. A boundary survey, which is the first step to putting the whole thing under one deed, would cost about 300 thousand dollars. The public works director told a committee member the city should pay for it, not fundraisers. Next step is a meeting with the mayor. It has to be done before snow.

Mateo Daniel: Wait, Dogtown isn't one piece of land?

Ana Lucia: That's my one thing I learned. Hold that.

Kerry Jane: Long Beach.

Ana Lucia: The private parking lot at the Gloucester end of Long Beach, about 250 spaces, has an early wetlands filing in front of the Conservation Commission. The commission voted four to nothing on October 7 to get an outside review of where the wetlands lines are drawn. It comes back Wednesday, October 21.

Mateo Daniel: That's the lot I parked in yesterday.

Ana Lucia: Then you'll want to watch that one.

Kerry Jane: Mine. Kondelin Road. The Board of Health subcommittee that tracks the 37 conditions on the planned construction waste transfer station said the blasting study condition has been met, and sent a memo to the Conservation Commission saying its outside reviewer looked at only three of the eight conditions the board asked about. That filing is also in front of the Conservation Commission Wednesday.

Ana Lucia: Busy Wednesday.

Kerry Jane: Busy Wednesday. And Railroad Avenue. Gloucester got a 124 thousand, 300 dollar state grant to rezone the Railroad Avenue area for housing and a smaller grocery store. The City Council still has to accept the grant. If the schedule holds, the zoning is done by next August.

Mateo Daniel: Okay, scores. Friday night, Gloucester football 17, Swampscott 7, at Newell Stadium, in the rain. Gloucester field hockey won one to nothing at Masconomet. Gloucester boys soccer beat Danvers two to one. Marblehead beat Manchester Essex girls soccer one to nothing. And Bishop Fenwick beat Rockport field hockey seven to nothing. Every one of those games has a write-up on the site with the kids' names in it, win or lose. That's the rule.

Kerry Jane: Tito's game report?

Mateo Daniel: Tito reports the seagulls at Newell were the real opponent and he held them to zero.

Ana Lucia: One more. The drought. The state still has our region at Level 2, significant drought, declared October 9. Friday's rain helped. It did not end it.

Kerry Jane: And the Cape Ann Veterans Services office is closed Monday through Wednesday this week for staff training. It reopens Thursday the 22nd.

Kerry Jane: One thing we learned. Ana Lucia, you held one.

Ana Lucia: Dogtown. I thought it was city land. It's a patchwork. City parcels, land trust parcels, and old private woodlots. Some of those woodlots are still owned by families who pay taxes on them. And the city's own plans have called it a priority for years. So the 300 thousand dollar survey is the city finding out what it actually owns.

Mateo Daniel: Mine's the childcare. The National Honor Society at the high school agreed to run childcare at Essex town meeting. Somebody at the building committee just said it, almost as an aside. But that's the difference between a parent showing up and a parent staying home.

Kerry Jane: Mine is a town meeting custom I'd never heard explained. At the Essex meeting, a member said that once an article passes, a supporter stands up right away and moves to reconsider it. So that motion can be voted down, and the result is final before people leave. I've been to a lot of town meetings and I'd never understood why they do that.

Ana Lucia: So you lock the door behind the vote.

Kerry Jane: You lock the door behind the vote.

Kerry Jane: All right. This is the part of the show where we tell you what gets decided this week, before it's decided. Mateo Daniel, you like to say this is the whole point.

Mateo Daniel: It's the whole point.

Kerry Jane: Monday, October 19. The Manchester Select Board votes on the final warrant for the November 16 town meeting. That's where the word grants comes out of the senior center article, or doesn't. Town hall on Central Street, and it's on the town's agenda center.

Ana Lucia: Wednesday, October 21.

Kerry Jane: Wednesday, the Gloucester Conservation Commission. Two things we talked about. The Long Beach parking lot wetlands lines, continued from October 7, and the Kondelin Road waste station filing. Both on the city's agenda center, both watchable online.

Mateo Daniel: Thursday.

Kerry Jane: Thursday, October 22, two meetings. The Gloucester City Council's Budget and Finance Committee takes up the 124 thousand dollar Railroad Avenue grant. And the Manchester Finance Committee comes back to vote on the senior center article.

Ana Lucia: And next week?

Kerry Jane: Tuesday, October 27, the Gloucester City Council's regular meeting, where the full council is expected to vote on accepting that grant. Same day, 1 to 2:30 in the afternoon, the Planning Board's housing subcommittee meets on Zoom to look at cottage cluster zoning for the city's smaller lots. Then it's November 4 for the last Essex school community meeting, November 16 for both town meetings, and December 10 for the ballot votes.

Mateo Daniel: How do people take part?

Kerry Jane: Three ways. One, go. Every one of these is public. Two, watch. Gloucester posts recordings on the city website, Manchester posts video, and we link every one. Three, write. Boards take written comment, and the agenda tells you where to send it. And if you can't find the agenda, our Meeting Finder on the website pulls them all in one place by town.

Ana Lucia: And the chair of the Essex committee asked people to come to the November 4 meeting in person. She said it's the last chance to ask questions and hear from neighbors. That's her asking, not us.

Kerry Jane: The week ahead. Mateo Daniel.

Mateo Daniel: Today, Sunday. Gloucester competitive cheer is at Wilmington at 11:45. And the Halloween party at Stage Fort Park, noon to three, where Kerry Jane will be chasing a nine year old harbormaster.

Kerry Jane: Correct.

Mateo Daniel: Monday, big day. Boys soccer, Peabody at Gloucester, Newell Stadium, 4:30. Manchester Essex boys at Mystic Valley, 4:30. Girls soccer, Gloucester at Peabody, 5:30. Volleyball, Georgetown at Gloucester in the field house, 5:45. Field hockey, Rockport at Amesbury, 6. Times are from the MIAA, check with the schools if anything moves. And coaches and parents, you can report a game on the site, with scorers and highlights.

Ana Lucia: Weather. After the frost this morning, today is sunny and near 53. Calm. If you're going to Stage Fort Park, it's a good day for it. Seas build Monday afternoon, four to six feet, so if you're on the water, Monday is not your day. And if you're pricing oil, the calculator is on the site, under Business.

Kerry Jane: Early voting is open. Town clerk pages have the hours. November 3 is Election Day. The Veterans Services office is closed Monday through Wednesday. And Ana Lucia's deadline.

Ana Lucia: November 15. Traps off St. Peter's Landing.

Kerry Jane: That's the week. Ana Lucia, how's the soup?

Ana Lucia: Avó says it needs more kale. Avó always says it needs more kale. And she says the heat is fine, I'm not made of stone.

Mateo Daniel: Mami's calling at one. She's going to ask if I ate. I'm going to say yes.

Kerry Jane: Did you eat?

Mateo Daniel: I had a breakfast sandwich.

Ana Lucia: That counts.

Kerry Jane: And I have a nine year old to get into a harbormaster costume, in a house with no heat, by choice. Everything we talked about today comes from public records and government data. The meeting recordings, the agendas, the MIAA, the candidates' own words. The sources are on the website at capeanncurrent.com, with every write-up we mentioned. If we missed something, or got something wrong, send it to news@capeanncurrent.com. And if you have a question you want us to answer next Sunday, send that too.

Mateo Daniel: Let's go.

Ana Lucia: See you next week.

Kerry Jane: I'm Kerry Jane, with Ana Lucia and Mateo Daniel. This has been The Weekly Current. Keeping Cape Ann current.