HARWICH – The Harwich Fire Association and the Harwich Conservation Trust are collaborating on a plan for joint use of the former fire station on Bank Street. The association wants to restore the town’s first fire station, constructed in 1927, and use it to some degree as a museum. The trust sees the opportunity to develop an education center with offices and parking for the abutting 66-acre Robert F. Smith Co...

HARWICH – Three members of AmeriCorps Cape Cod are working directly with town departments and the Harwich Conservation Trust to enhance the community's quality of life, focusing primarily on environmental management, maintenance and education. The national AmeriCorps program was established in 1994 and is often referred to as the “domestic Peace Corps.” The AmeriCorps program in Barnstable County started 23 ye...

HARWICH — Students at Monomoy Regional High School are being offered access to a unique program designed to help them understand and avoid addiction, thanks to a $1,500 grant from the Cape Cod Foundation’s Harwich Fund and Chatham Fund. To be offered by Behavioral Health Innovators, the program is a one-of-a-kind speaker series that teaches students about the teenage brain and the biology of addiction, the p...

HARWICH – It’s trick or treat on four wheels once again this year. The community center Halloween party on Friday, Oct. 29, will be a drive-through event, beginning at 5:30 p.,m. “It’s back by popular demand,” Community Center Director Carolyn Carey said. “We will have a drive-through service for you to collect your goodie bag. Dress up and drive in. There’s no need to get out of the car.” The event will...

The town is offering free COVID tests to anyone who attended Monday's special town meeting after one attendee tested positive for the virus. In an email and emergency phone blast Friday afternoon, Town Administrator Joseph Powers said that all close contacts of the person who tested positive have been identified. Those who attended town meeting and have not been contacted are not considered a close contact. ...

HARWICH – Voters approved an increase in the local room tax from 4 to 6 percent at Monday night’s special town meeting, at the same time unanimously supporting using a portion of the revenue for wastewater and affordable housing. The proposal drew a mix of support and opposition. Non-resident Tony Guthrie, who said he has worked in town for 25 years, said he spent a number of years managing the Wequassett Reso...

But Not Without Dissent HARWICH – Special town meeting voters Monday approved funds to revise the town’s comprehensive wastewater management plan but also registered protests against proposals to expand the sewer system in East Harwich. It took two hours for voters to act on the 14-article warrant in which they approved an increase in the short-term rental tax from 4 to 6 percent and approved wa...

HARWICH – The conservation department issued an emergency order allowing the demolition of the former Handler Auto Parts buildings located along Route 28 in Harwich Port after safety issues were raised about the conditions of the buildings and activities on the property. Conservation Administrator Amy Usowski said the police and fire departments sent letters of support for the removal of the structures. The bu...

HARWICH – Wastewater and taxes will be the weighty issues facing voters in Monday’s special town meeting. Several articles seek funds for wastewater design and engineering projects and to make changes to the town’s comprehensive wastewater management plan. Another article seeks to increase the short-term rental tax from 4 to 6 percent. Two additional articles would direct 25 percent of the short- term rental t...

HARWICH - A dozen town officials and affordable housing-related committee members took a tour last Thursday of the 13.3-acre former James Marceline cowyard property off Pleasant lake Avenue, now under the jurisdiction of the town’s affordable housing trust. The tour served to introduce committee members to the property as town officials head into a special town meeting next week seeking to take by eminent doma...

HARWICH - The Exchange Building in Harwich Center was the tallest and most elegant building on Cape Cod for nearly 80 years. It would still be today, according to historian Nancy Viall Shoemaker, if it hadn’t been demolished in 1964. The building, which was located at the corner of Main Street and Pleasant Lake Avenue from 1885 to 1964, was 58 by 100 feet, and rose 104 feet above the village center, Shoemaker ...

HARWICH – Longtime Cape Cod educator Terry Russell was awarded the Massachusetts Association of School Committee’s Division VII All-State Committee honor, the Monomoy school district announced Oct. 8. Russell, a Harwich resident, worked in the Barnstable school system for 40 years, the last 22 of which came as principal at Barnstable Middle School. He joined the Monomoy Regional School Committee in 2011 and ha...