CHATHAM – Before moving any further with a proposed agreement, Chatham officials want assurances that both the town and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service will have equal responsibility for management of the waters west of the Monomoy National Wildlife Refuge. Language in a draft memorandum of understanding proposed by the Fish and Wildlife Service commits both parties to working “cooperatively” to protect the res...

CHATHAM — They're among the first seasonal residents to arrive each year, and they're a fixture on the local waterfront until fall arrives. Ospreys are a familiar, often beloved part of the local landscape. So when utility crews removed an osprey nest from a utility pole off Morris Island Road earlier this month, it left a number of neighborhood residents concerned and angry. In an email copied to The Chroni...

CHATHAM – Seth Rolbein, a long-time Cape journalist and former senior advisor to Cape and Islands Senator Dan Wolf, was named director of the Cape Cod Fisheries Trust last week. Rolbein will work with the trust's current director, Paul Parker, through the end of the year, when Parker will head up a new organization that will seek to bring the trust's model of community ownership and management of fishing quota...

CHATHAM – Despite the theft of four of the 43 sharks in the park – one of which has yet to be recovered – an auction of the whimsical sculptures exceeded last year's total by nearly $8,000. The online auction, which ended last Friday, earned $50,079, half of which goes to the sponsor, the Chatham Merchants Association, and half to the individual artists whose work attracted thousands to the downtown display ov...

CHATHAM – Planned improvements at Old Mill Boatyard have been scaled back after bids for the work came in above the available funding for the project. The most significant element of the work – replacement of the bulkhead at the town-owned Stage Harbor facility – remain in new bid documents issued last week. Other items have been removed and a few included as alternatives which could be added into the project ...

William Shakespeare had a connection to Chatham. Sort of. That’s according to Bernard Cornwell of Chatham, the internationally best-selling author of nearly 60 novels, including the televised Sharpe series and the recent Lost Kingdom series. Cornwell, 72, spoke for 60 minutes last Sunday in the Eldredge Public Library during the annual meeting of the Chatham Historical Society. His topic was “Shakespeare’s ...

HARWICH — The town has only limited power over the use of drones within the community, town counsel has ruled in a legal opinion relating to a local regulation seeking to keep the devices away from public beaches. In early April members of the recreation and youth commission and Recreation Department Director Eric Beebe came before selectmen with a proposed regulation seeking to ban the use of drones and other...

EAST HARWICH — Firefighters from four towns and the Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation were busy this weekend battling a persistent fire in Hawksnest State Park. The fire started deep in the woods, making it difficult for firefighters to get to the fire and stage equipment to battle it. Deputy Fire Chief David LeBlanc said the department received a call about 3:30 p.m. on Saturday afternoo...

HARWICH — While there was some bad news for the Saquatucket Harbor waterside reconstruction project last week, the landside project received good news this week in the form of a $187,500 Coastal Resilience Grant Program award from the Massachusetts Coastal Zone Management. The funds will be used to assist with planning, engineering and permitting landside improvements proposed at the harbor and on the newly pu...

HARWICH — The town of Harwich became the sixth municipality on the Cape to receive approval from the Cape Cod Commission on its comprehensive wastewater management plan last Thursday. “It's a great milestone,” said David Young, P.E. of CDM Smith, Inc., the town's consultant, when the commission unanimously voted to adopt the draft decision from its subcommittee. Young pointed out the town has been working on t...

CHATHAM ─ When the Chatham Skate Park at the airport was demolished in 2013, skateboarders, scooter tricksters, BMX bikers, and roller-bladers were left with nowhere to roll, let alone catch some air, unless they wanted to travel. Thankfully, the new skate park opened at Volunteer Park in December, and has been impressing everyone from beginners to seasoned skaters since. On a recent sunny summer afternoon t...

For some students, prepping for their first year of college means a summer filled with specific books to read. For Monomoy graduate Jen Keim college prep meant a summer filled with golf, and lots of it, including several key tournament wins and finishes. “I finished my last tournament yesterday before college,” said Keim during a phone interview that took place two days before she made the trek to Florida Atla...

A few years ago Brett and Danielle Tolley learned about a group called the FisherPoets Gathering in Astoria, Ore. “Gosh, there’s nothing like that on the Cape,” Danielle Tolley of Chatham remembers saying to her husband. “Why is the public so disconnected from the fishing community?” And so in 2014 the Tolleys and their close friends Shannon Eldredge and Russell Kingman, also of Chatham, founded the Cape Co...

"Off the record, any Chronicle men around?"  Both the Star and Bulletin are in the governor's back pocket during his run for U.S. Senate in an unnamed southern state, but not the crusading Chronicle in Monomoy Theatre's production of “Johnny On A Spot.” Ellen Fiske, playing Chronicle publisher Mrs. Wigmore, marches right into the offices of Governor Jefferson Davis Upjohn to confront his chief of staff Nicky A...

CHATHAM – The last time I was on stage at Monomoy Theatre was in 1998, when I sat in as a juror in “Inherit the Wind.” Seemed about time for a return engagement. For the past two summers, my youngest son Lir has appeared in shows at Monomoy, one of the last true summer stock theaters on the Cape. This year, there were no roles for 9 year olds in any of the season's eight plays. Although disappointed, the fa...

The great composer Jerry Herman closed his wonderful musical “La Cage Aux Folles” with the song “The Best of Times is Now.” The concept in the title of that song actually expresses the feelings of lots of Chatham residents. For many retirees and many summer residents, life in the summer in Chatham is about as good as it can get. The weather is wonderful, the beaches are beautiful and the water has warmed up, t...