ORLEANS — Volunteers handy with a hammer and saw built a garage for the town's fire truck on Main Street back in 1925. H.K and Theresa Cummings donated the land and town meeting chipped in $7,000. The police department moved in in 1954, and both departments moved to their new building in 1967, at which point the recreation department started using what had become known as the Old Firehouse. After some period...

ORLEANS — In planning their budgets for the fiscal year that begins next July 1, department heads can propose up to a 4 percent expenditure increase over the current year. Selectmen set the standard, which applies to town and school budgets, last week. “Last year, I told the board we were at a crossroads,” Town Administrator John Kelly told selectmen Nov. 1. The standard 2.5 percent annual increase was becom...

ORLEANS — Nauset Public Schools students may travel in propane-fueled buses starting next September. At a meeting of the joint school committees Oct. 26, the Eastham, Orleans and Wellfleet boards and the regional school committee authorized Superintendent Tom Conrad to negotiate an agreement with the Cape Cod Collaborative to provide student transportation starting next fall. Brewster's committee did not have ...

ORLEANS – The 1850 Captain Linnell House is on track to change hands in October 2020 after owners Bill and Shelly Conway signed a purchase and sales agreement last month with the Orleans Historical Society. The Conways will continue to operate their restaurant and host special events until then. After that, OHS will welcome weddings and special civic and private events. In a joint news release with the Conways...

ORLEANS – Voters dug deep into their pockets Tuesday to fund the central core of a downtown sewer system and a new building for Cape Cod Regional Technical High School. They also backed spending $600,000 for HVAC upgrades at the town's elementary school. By a margin of 1,102 to 412, townspeople agreed to borrow $3.68 million to put in sewer pipes and connectors to property lines under Main Street between Acade...

ORLEANS — $29 million. $3.96 billion. Some pretty big numbers were discussed at last week's selectmen's meeting. The $29 million is the amount the town will borrow next month to pay for the new police and DPW/natural resources facilities and a slew of other projects ranging from the recently completed Rock Harbor bulkhead work to replacement of water mains on Beach Road. The $3.96 billion is the ass...

ORLEANS – Voters dug deep into their pockets Tuesday to fund the central core of a downtown sewer system and a new building for Cape Cod Regional Technical High School. They also backed spending $600,000 for HVAC upgrades at the town's elementary school. By a margin of 1,102 to 412, townspeople agreed to borrow $3.68 million to put in sewer pipes and connectors to property lines under Main Street between Acade...

ORLEANS — If voters approve at the ballot box Oct. 24, bidding for and construction of the central section of a downtown sewer collection system can begin within a few months. On Oct. 16, by a vote of 413 to 120 that comfortably exceeded the necessary two-thirds majority, town meeting approved spending $3.68 million to install a sewer system with connections to property lines under Main Street between the Ca...

ORLEANS — Police officers, the faith community, and human rights advocates – not mutually exclusive groups – are putting together a Cape-wide forum on community policing titled “Cape Cod: Making It the Best Place for All of Us!” “We can avoid some of the pitfalls,” said the Rev. Wesley Williams, one of the event's organizers, “by having a conversation with the police right now. We know that there are issues ...

ORLEANS — Philip Scholomiti calls them “the flotsam and jetsam of our planet.” Writing to the board of health earlier this year, the Orleans resident said that flimsy single-use plastic bags “mar our highways, clog our storm drains, slowly leach their chemicals into the soil contaminating our food chain, and devastate the animals that inhabit our oceans, bays, and ponds.” Scholomiti called on the health b...

ORLEANS — The heavy lifting is right up front in the special town meeting warrant to be acted upon Oct. 16 at 6:30 p.m. at the Nauset Middle School gym. Article 1 asks for more than $3.6 million to begin construction of the downtown sewer collection system, Article 3 for a commitment of $94,000 to complete the Lonnie's Pond aquaculture experiment, and Article 4 for $75,000 for an independent review of the 25 perc...

ORLEANS — A state lawyer says that the Department of Transportation's intersection project on Main Street can't be changed to include construction of a sewer collection system, which could delay the sewer work well into the next decade. Later this month, town meeting and voters at a subsequent special election are scheduled to decide on spending $3.7 million for the sewer work. The plan was to have Lawrence-...