ORLEANS — There's really nothing odd about the Odd Fellows. “It's a secret society with no secrets,” said Paul Davies, a former Noble Grand of the Orleans lodge. The Odd Fellows Hall, the tall building at the meeting of Namskaket and Rock Harbor roads, will host a Vintage Market Friday from noon to 6 p.m. and Saturday from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. If you haven't been inside the former Northwest Schoolhouse, it's ...

ORLEANS — Decades ago, Massachusetts voters capped municipal budget increases at 2½ percent, plus new growth. With costs such as health benefits growing at three or four times that level, communities have looked to fees to make up some of the difference. “In 1990, the ability to raise revenues just by raising the tax rate stopped,” Selectman Alan McClennen said Sept. 20. “The whole idea of fees came up. Now ...

ORLEANS — The board of selectmen and the finance committee are on the same page heading into the Oct. 16 special town meeting, with favorable recommendations on water quality projects, HVAC upgrades to the elementary school, and other articles. But not all of last week's votes were unanimous. Majorities of both boards agreed that the town should spend $3.68 million to put in the core of the downtown sewer syst...

ORLEANS — The town of Chatham is willing to patrol its section of Nauset Beach, but it wants to share costs and revenues in a new arrangement with the town of Orleans. “We can't just ask our taxpayers to pay that cost,” Chatham Selectman Shareen Davis said at a meeting of the two boards Sept. 13. “We're trying to find the best-case scenario to offset costs.” Following the 2007 break in the barrier beach, ...

ORLEANS — For a while Saturday night, Mother Nature just didn't want summer to end. A heavy blanket of moist air descended on Nauset Beach, where thousands had lined up to face a towering stack of pallets destined to become a glorious bonfire. As Orleans DJ Tom Tuttle spun (appropriately) the long version of “Light My Fire” (“The time to hesitate is through”), the throngs waited patiently for the pyrotechnic...

ORLEANS — In comic books, secret identities are, well, secret. You're not supposed to let anyone know that you have super powers. This year, Orleans Elementary School has upended that expectation. From the moment kindergarten to fifth grade students walked through the doors last week, they have been encouraged to express their own super powers. Don't expect to see kindergartners flying faster than locomot...

ORLEANS — A 108-year-old tradition was renewed in Orleans Friday when Town Clerk Cynthia May awarded the Boston Post Cane to the oldest resident of the town, Sarah Harris. And the tradition is only a bit older than the honoree. Harris turned 103 in June. “I don't mind being old,” Harris quipped. From the comfort of her living room easy chair, she received the congratulations of Selectmen Jon Fuller and Alan...

ORLEANS — Dogs love the beach, and no dog ever loved Nauset Beach more than Riptide Windjammer. The golden retriever, who lived with the Fancy family, passed away almost 40 years ago. But his legend lives on in “Riptide,” a book by Orleans author Frances Ward Weller. First out in 1990, it's back in a new edition courtesy of publisher David R. Godine. Fran and Frank Weller were seasonal visitors in Orleans...

ORLEANS — With enough events to qualify as a World's Fair, the Orleans Pond Coalition's Celebrate Our Waters Weekend Festival returns Sept. 15 to 17. Praising the donors and volunteers who make it happen, OPC President Jim McCauley said, “We do this for the town. I think the town really appreciates it. Sometimes the politics gets a little tough in Orleans, but I don't think anyone is angry at us over Celebra...

ORLEANS — In recent years, the town has been marching down the field toward its goal of cleaning its waters. At next month's special town meeting, selectmen will ask voters to support grinding out a few more yards now to set up a full-scale attack on the end zone at annual town meeting in May. Some members had higher ambitions for the Oct. 16 meeting, but with four positive votes required to put borrowing qu...

ORLEANS — Selectmen planned to hold their clear-the-air work session on water quality projects last night (Aug. 30) with decisions pending on wastewater collection and treatment options and alternative ways in which the system could be designed, built, and operated. And there's more to come: at the board's Aug. 23 meeting, Selectman Mark Mathison said the shellfish and waterways improvement advisory committe...

ORLEANS — Sharks are becoming a fact of life in the waters off Cape Cod, and the town needs to alter its beach rescue operations. “The regularity of white sharks being in the vicinity of the beach justifies a new approach to ocean rescue,” Natural Resources Director Nate Sears told selectmen Aug. 23. “I no longer feel comfortable sending lifeguards a considerable distance offshore to rescue persons in distre...