Page 14 THE SAUGUS ADVOCATE – FriDAy, SEpTEmbEr 15, 2023 The Sounds of Saugus By Mark E. Vogler Good morning, Saugus! Sunday (Sept. 17) is going to be a big day in Saugus Center. St. John’s Episcopal Church will observe a special occasion at the 10 a.m. Sunday worship service when parishioners welcome Rev. Roger Nelson, who served for 30 years as priest and pastor at the church before retiring in 2003. The church will be celebrating the 50th anniversary of his arrival and will host a reception following the service in Ashworth Hall at 8 Prospect St., Saugus. During his three decades at St. John’s, Rev. Nelson focused on the youth of the parish, led the EYC for many years and was very active in ecumenical and outreach ministries, which extended beyond the church. He maintained the parish’s ecumenical engagement with other clergy in the community as a member of the former Saugus Council of Churches (which evolved into the Saugus Clergy Association). The Rev. Nelson, 83, is retired and living in New York with family. Later in the day, the Parson Roby Chapter, Daughters of American Revolution located in Saugus will be organizing a special event outside Town Hall. It has been a tradition to ring the bells on Constitution Day – Sept. 1. The local DAR hopes to bring this tradition to Saugus by giving out little bells to the public to ring on the steps of Town Hall at 4 p.m. The event gets underway at 3:30 p.m. when a crowd gathers for a reading of the Preamble to the Constitution, a proclamation declaring the day as the beginning of Constitution Week (Sept. 17-23) and the bell ringing. The weekend kicks off on a patriotic note at 6 p.m. today (Friday, Oct. 15) with National POW/MIA Recognition Day at Veterans Park, with a ceremony to remember those who never returned – the prisoners of war and service members who are missing in action. Food Pantry notes The Saugus United Parish Food Pantry is open today (Friday, Sept. 15) from 9:3011 a.m. Legion Breakfast today There’s a good breakfast deal for Saugus veterans and other folks who enjoy a hearty breakfast on Friday mornings. The American Legion Post 210 at 44 Taylor St. in Saugus offers Friday morning breakfasts for the 2023-24 season. Doors open at 7:30, with breakfast served from 8-9:00 a.m. for an $8 donation. Veterans who cannot afford the donation may be served for free. Town Election Watch It will be a simple, straightforward question that voters will be asked on the Nov. 7 town election ballot. Town Clerk Ellen Schena said the wording of Question 1 will read as follows: “Shall a commission be elected to revise the Charter of the Town of Saugus. Yes or No.” There will be another ballot question asking voters to choose the candidates they would like to see fill the nine-member commission, providing the vote approves the creation of a Charter Commission. Right now, the potential race for the Charter Commission is overshadowing all of the other town political races. Four more town residents – Precinct 2 Town Meeting Member Joseph John Vecchione IV, Lawrence Mingolelli, School Committee Chair Vincent Serino and Christopher Tarantino – had pulled papers this week to make it a potential 30 candidates running for the nine seats. Meanwhile, the races for the Board of Selectmen (eight for five seats), School Committee (nine for five seats) and Housing Authority (four for two seats) have a potential 21 candidates running for 12 seats combined, as of Wednesday (Sept. 13). As a rule of thumb, a local election isn’t much of an election unless you have at least two candidates running for one seat. In the signature race, Board of Selectmen Chair Anthony Cogliano pulled out papers for what he is hoping to be a third consecutive two-year term on the board. All five incumbent selectmen are running for reelection. Former School Committee Chair Thomas Whittredge has pulled out papers for a potential run for the five-member board. Whittredge has been the top vote-getter in the School Committee race for the last two elections. He stepped down six months after his election following the death of his wife. With nine candidates in the field – seven of them with past School Committee experience – this race is currently more competitive than the Board of Selectmen. THE MAIN EVENT: Town officials and past recipients of the Founder’s Day “Person of the Year Award” gathered on a stage set up near the steps of Saugus Town Hall last Saturday (Sept. 8) for the presentation of this year’s honorees: Gail Cassarino and Jack Klecker. (Saugus Advocate photo by Mark E. Vogler) Nothing is official yet. Each of these candidates may run or decide not to. They have four days – up until 5 p.m. on Tuesday (Sept. 19) – to submit nomination papers to the Town Clerk’s Office for certification of signatures. Fifty certified signatures of registered voters are required for the Board of Selectmen, School Committee, the Housing Authority and the nine-member Charter Commission. Only 10 certified signatures of registered voters are required for Town Meeting, but each of the signatures must be from registered voters in the candidate’s precinct. Today (Sept. 15) is the final day to obtain nomination papers – just four days before the filing deadline. Stay tuned. Town Meeting races Forty-seven of the 50 incumbent Town Meeting Members have taken out nomination papers, indicating an interest in running for another two-year term. As of Wednesday (Sept. 6), here is the expression of interest in each of the 10 precincts. In four of the precincts (1, 4, 6 and 10), all five Town Meeting members seemed ready to run for reelection. PCT 1: Susan Dunn, Anthony Arone, Mark Bell, Assunta Palomba, Christopher Jones. PCT 2: Christine Moreschi, Robert Camuso Sr., Peter Rossetti Jr. and Christopher Riley. PCT 3: Arthur Connors, Jr., Richard Thompson, Daniel Schena, Rick Smith and Annemarie Tesora. PCT 4: Glen Davis, William Leuci, Robert Northrup, Maureen Whitcomb, Stephen Doherty. PCT 5: Pamela Goodwin, Jaclyn Hickman, Ronald Wallace, Brenton Spencer and Mary Migliore. PCT 6: Elisa LeBrasseur, Jean Bartolo, Allen Panico, Kevin Currie, William Brown. PCT 7: Stefano D’Anna, John Chipouras, Robert Palleschi, Michael Paolini and Stephen McCarthy. PCT 8: William Kramich Jr., William Cross III, Thomas Traverse and Anthony LoPresti. PCT 9: Katrina Berube, Judith Worthley, Robert Strasnick, Daniel Kelly. PCT 10: Martin Costello, Darren Ring, Peter Manoogian Sr., Carla Scuzzarella, Peter Delios. Meanwhile, 16 potential new candidates had pulled papers to challenge the incumbents in their respective precincts. Precinct 9 Town Meeting Member Robert J. Long can’t run for reelection because a change in the boundaries of his precinct left him and his neighbors in Precinct 4, so Long has pulled papers to run in Precinct 4. The other 15 potential challengers to incumbent Town Meeting members are: PCT 1: Stacey Her - man-Dorent and John O’Brien. PCT 2: Joseph Malone, Matthew Parlante, Yves J. Lamite and Jeannie Meredith. PCT 3: Leonard Ferrari, Jr. PCT 4: Andrew Whitcomb and Stephanie Shalkoski. PCT 7: Fred Federico. PCT 8: Arthur Grabowski and Kristi Talagan. PCT 9: John Cottam. PCT 10: Steven C. DiVirgilio and James Tozza. Currently, there are three precincts where all five candidates would get elected without opposition: 5, 6 and 9. That’s two fewer “no competition” precincts than two years ago. Only six candidates have pulled papers for the five seats in Precincts 3, 7 and 8. Meanwhile, these four precincts are shaping up to be competitive: PCT 2: eight candidates (four incumbents and four challengers). PCT 4: eight candidates (five incumbents and three challengers). PCT 1: seven candidates (five incumbents and two challengers). PCT 10: seven candidates (five incumbents and two challengers). The good news is there is still time – up until Sept. 19 – for potential candidates to pull nomination papers and file them to the Town Clerk to qualify for placement on the Nov. 7 ballot. It’s also good news that four of the five precincts where only five candidates ran for the five seats two years ago have more than five potential candidates at the moment: seven potential candidates in Precinct 1, eight in Precinct 2, six in Precinct 3, six potential candidates in Precinct 2 and 6 in Precinct 7. But THE SOUNDS | SEE PAGE 15
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