Create successful ePaper yourself
Turn your PDF publications into a flip-book with our unique Google optimized e-Paper software.
The #1 Selling
Real Estate Office
in Lynnfield*
*MLS PIN 1/1/18 - 12/31/2018
LYNNFIELD
FEBRUARY 4, 2021 • VOL. 65, NO. 5
I am a full-time real estate
agent for over 30+ years.
I know and love our town.
If you are looking to buy
or sell or have any real
estate questions, please
feel free to contact me.
Gale Rawding
617-784-9995
FOR SALE
BEACON HILL -
BOSTON
$1,199,999
Louise
Bova-Touchette
617-605-0555
WEEKLY NEWS
SERVING THE COMMUNITY SINCE 1957
A Good Place for Your
Money (vault included)
SAUGUS
$524,900
Rossetti/Poti Team
781-718-4662
16 PAGES • ONE DOLLAR
Nick is the pick
Secatore is interim chief
Sold over asking and
less than 60 days!
LYNN
Evelyn Rockas
617-256-8500
FOR SALE
READING
$669,900
Joyce Cucchiara
978-808-1597
POSTAL CUSTOMER
LYNNFIELD, MA 01940
WOBURN, MA
PERMIT #168
PAID
U.S. POSTAGE
ECRWSSEDDM
PRSRT STD
COURTESY PHOTO
Newly-named Interim Police Chief Nick Secatore
has amassed a well-rounded public safety career.
By Anne Marie Tobin
LYNNFIELD — For the
second time in the last six
months, the Lynnfield Police
Department’s Nick Secatore has
a new title.
Promoted to captain last
summer after recording the
highest score on the captain’s
exam, Secatore is now the department’s
interim police chief,
stepping in for Chief David
Breen, who was scheduled to
retire on Feb. 1.
The appointment was announced
at last Tuesday night’s
Select Board meeting.
“I thank the chair and the
board for this opportunity,”
Secatore said. “This signal
of promoting from within is
a morale booster from the
highest-ranking to the lowest-ranking
in the department
and is a sign of the leadership
of the board and a team we have
built together.”
Board members welcomed
Secatore into the interim job.
“It’s great to see people like
Nick, who grew up in town, be
a part of the department, especially
in these times to be able
to understand the community,”
said Select Board member
Dick Dalton. “I’ve made many
motions over my career, but
this one is truly and incredibly
special.”
Fellow board member Phil
Crawford thanked Secatore for
stepping up after Breen officially
announced his retirement
in October.
“I am a big fan of yours after
seeing you come up the ranks,
and I thank you for stepping up
when the transition from Chief
Breen began,” Crawford said.
“There could not be a better
choice than Nick to be our interim
chief.”
SECATORE, PAGE 2
IN THE NEWS
Page 2:
Town resident is bank’s
new manager
Page 3:
Lights, camera...maybe
not
By Anne Marie tobin
LYNNFIELD — Patience
may be a virtue, but not
when it comes to getting the
COVID-19 vaccination.
So says Town
Administrator Rob Dolan,
whose best advice to residents
seeking to secure vaccination
appointments is,
“don’t wait.”
Time to take a shot
“We will have clinics in
Lynnfield as soon as we
have doses, but don’t wait
— get your vaccination elsewhere,”
Dolan said during
last Thursday’s COVID-19
update. “What we are telling
people is what other municipalities
are also saying, and
that is, don’t wait for your
town to have clinics. Be a
self-advocate, make some
phone calls and utilize all
of the choices that are out
there. We’re only getting
100 doses a week at best, so
do not wait.”
Fire Chief and Emergency
Management Director Glenn
Davis outlined the options
for Lynnfield residents.
He said the sites nearest to
Lynnfield are the Doubletree
Hotel in Danvers, Walgreens
at 166 Walnut St. in Saugus,
Walgreens at 107 High St. in
Danvers, and Stop and Shop
in Woburn.
“Beginning Monday,
people aged 75 and over are
eligible, so go to the state
website, find a site near you
and schedule an appointment.
Have a family member
SHOT, PAGE 2
Page 4:
Fire Department offers
healthy home tips
Page 5:
J Barrett & Company
welcomes Steve Graczyk
Call me today
for your Free
Market Analysis!
The #1 Selling
Real Estate Office
in Lynnfield*
RETAIL UNIT $2,500/MO
LYNNFIELD
NEW LISTING!
SALEM
$339,900
MEDICAL OFFICE CONDO
BEVERLY
$139,900
NEW LISTING!
DANVERS
$549,000
*MLS PIN 1/1/18 - 12/31/2018
Rossetti/Poti Team
781-718-4662
Donna Fiandaca
978-317-8869
Denise Moynihan
781-872-1200
Jim Toomey
617-276-5428
Elaine Figliola
781-910-6454
2
LYNNFIELD — Wakefield Cooperative
Bank Vice President of
Retail Branch Administration and
Business Development Officer
Mohammed Bezzat is pleased to
announce the addition of Lynnfield
resident Bob Clattenburg as assistant
vice president and manager of
the bank’s 596 Main St. branch in
Lynnfield.
Clattenburg has worked in the financial
industry for 29 years, most
recently with North Shore Bank in
downtown Beverly.
His years of experience also
include Salem Five Bank and
Santander (formerly Sovereign
Bank).
“Bob’s extensive background
encompasses a blend of business
development, consultative sales,
staff development, budgeting and
team building,” said Bezzat.
As branch manager, Clattenburg
will cultivate loyal, existing customer
relationships and develop
the bank’s customer base and
connection within the Lynnfield
community.
“Bob’s leadership strengths and
friendly demeanor are welcoming
to customers who have been with
the bank for many years, and to
those we invite to visit us for the
first time,” said Bezzat, adding,
“Bob’s knack for connecting with
people and dedication to his customers’
happiness are an added
bonus to our wonderful Lynnfield
branch.”
Before
Town resident
is bank’s new
manager
Get your car looking
great this winter
Don Winslow’s
AUTO B O D Y
Celebrating 48 Years
After
MON-FRI 8-5 • SAT. 9-12
166 Holten Street • Danvers
(corner of Center & Collins)
978-762-6366 • 978-535-2474
www.DonWinslowAutoBody.com
Clattenburg lives in Lynnfield
with his son, Colby, and his local
volunteerism includes 12 years as
a religious education teacher at Our
Lady of Assumption Parish plus
years of coaching Lynnfield youth
sports.
He has served as a board
member of Lynnfield Little League
and both Lynnfield Girls and Boys
Basketball. He is past president of
Peabody Rotary Club where he
served on the Board of Directors,
and past vice president and board
member of the Saugus Chamber of
Commerce.
Clattenberg is a past member
of Greater Beverly Chamber
of Commerce and Peabody
Chamber of Commerce. He holds
a Bachelor’s degree in Mass
Communications with a minor
in Business Development from
Westfield State College.
He can be reached at rclattenburg@wcbbank.com
or
781-334-4050.
Wakefield Co-operative Bank
(WCB) is a more than 130-year-old
mutual institution headquartered in
Wakefield and operating under a
co-operative bank structure.
Being a mutual means that it
has no stockholders and issues no
public offerings. Wakefield Cooperative
Bank’s main office is located
at 342 Main St. in Wakefield
and it has two other branch locations
— one in Lynnfield and 526
Main St. in Melrose.
It is the bank’s mission to provide
exceptional service and innovative
products, with the vision of
seeing every one of its customers
achieve their personal financial
goals and success. Learn more at
wakefieldcoop.com.
WEEKLYNEWS.NET - 978-532-5880 FEBRUARY 4, 2021
help you. I heard earlier today
that many appointments have
opened up. We know the state
is overwhelmed, but keep
trying,” he said, reminding
people that many persons eligible
under Phase 1 (first responders,
front-facing health
care workers and school
nurses) still have not gotten
the vaccine and will also be
seeking appointments.
Davis said that the community
is “actually seeing some
good trending,” with 43 cases
in the last seven days and 88
in the last 14 days.
“That’s down considerably
from what we have seen
during the holiday period,”
Davis said. “We hope this is
good news moving forward as
people seem to be following
the state guidelines — maskwearing,
social distancing,
A TRADITION OF TRUST, CARING & PROFESSIONAL SERVICE TO THE COMMUNITY SINCE 1952
Service to all faiths
Complete Pre-Need Planning
Medicaid Approved Trust &
Insurance Plans
19 YALE AVE.,
WAKEFIELD, MASS.
Nick is the pick for (interim) chief
SECATORE
FROM PAGE 1
SHOT
FROM PAGE 1
Spacious Modern Facilities
Ample Private Parking
Handicapped Accessible
Area Code 781
245-3550 • 334-9966
Conveniently Located off Exit 39 (North Ave.) Rt. 128
Secatore is a 1997 graduate
of Lynnfield High School,
where he was a standout Hall of
Fame wrestler. A Marine Corps
veteran with national-security
clearance, he majored in mathematics
at Merrimack College
and worked as a financial analyst
at Fidelity Investments.
He joined the department
in 2007 where he became a
jack-of-all-trades, serving as
an Internet technology officer,
court prosecutor, detective supervisor,
training supervisor
and the town’s deputy emergency
management director,
among other duties.
A former veterans service officer
for the town of Lynnfield
(2009-2014), Secatore is a
member of the Lynnfield War
Memorial Committee. He
was promoted to captain last
summer after recording the
highest score on the captain’s
exam.
Secatore said one of the most
pressing issues on his agenda is
the new police reform bill that
was passed late last year and
he will be working with Sgt.
Christopher DeCarlo to implement
the necessary changes in
policy and procedures.
“Times ahead are going to be
challenging,” he said. “We have
the new police reform bill that
has been passed so we have to
move forward and implement
those things within a six-month
period and within the year.
“Chris and I have spoken
about this bill. Not only is he an
attorney, he’s our investigation
supervisor, so it’s going to be
exciting to work every day with
him to make sure that Lynnfield
maintains its integrity and conforms
with the new bill in this
interim period and beyond.”
Dolan said that Secatore has
made significant contributions
to town government behind the
scenes, including a total redesign
and rebuild of the town’s
public safety information
technology system. He called
Secatore’s and DeCarlo’s experience
a “one-two punch.”
“This is the beginning of a
great new chapter in Lynnfield,”
Dolan said.
Breen’s retirement capped a
37-year career in law enforcement,
the final 10 years serving
as police chief.
Board Chair Chris Barrett
thanked Breen for his 24 years
Time to take a shot
washing of hands — all the
good stuff, so keep doing
what we’re doing.”
Approximately 70 first
responders have been vaccinated
during Phase 1, according
to Davis.
“That includes fire personnel,
police personnel and
dispatchers and associated
support staff and all school
nurses,” Davis said.
Dolan outlined the details
of the state’s regional plan,
adding that Lynnfield falls
into the district that includes
Wilmington, Andover, North
Reading and Reading.
“Even though there will
be clinics here in Lynnfield,
Lynnfield residents can also
utilize the services provided
by the other communities in
the region,” Dolan said. “We
can do joint services or do
smaller individual Lynnfield
clinics, but the capping on the
number of vaccines is making
it very difficult.”
Dolan noted that anyone
watching local or national
news knows that availability
of the vaccine and the ability
to distribute it has been a
“massive crisis” and that “we
simply are not getting the vaccine
that we need, not even to
the point where we have 10
percent of what we need.”
of “exemplary service” to the
Lynnfield Police Department.
“He has been a wonderful
public servant and been there
at all times to serve, protect and
defend our community,” Barrett
said. “We have great confidence
in his legacy for many, many
years to come as he has put together
a wonderful team.”
Dalton said Breen is “a great
citizen and a great chief,” while
Crawford said Breen has been
“a tremendous role model, not
only for the police force but for
the community,” and also commended
him for performing his
job with integrity.”
Town Administrator Rob
Dolan said the search for a permanent
replacement for Breen
will be a “fair and open process”
and will take approximately
three months, commending
Breen for his leadership.
“There has never been a
harder year to be a police officer
than 2020 with the level of incidents,
and some very emotional
incidents you just wouldn’t expect
both in a small town and
across the nation,” Dolan said.
“The professionalism and dignity
displayed by our police is
a reflection of Chief Breen and
his leadership.”
“That’s a national issue,
not a Lynnfield issue, but
we’ve gotten several calls
from people asking when and
where they can get (their)
vaccine,” he said.
The town will continue to
issue COVID updates via
online video presentations,
posts on the town website and
reverse-911 calls in emergency
situations. The fire department
has already ordered
special distribution equipment,
including refrigerators.
“We want you to know
that we are ready to go, we
have a plan in place, we have
nurses, we have volunteers,
we just need doses,” Dolan
said, adding that the town is
actively working with Senior
Housing, the Council on
Aging and GLSS (Greater
Lynn Senior Services).
“Again, don’t wait as the
amount (of the vaccine) we
get is so minimal you need
to take a multi-faceted approach,”
Dolan said. “I know
it’s difficult, but we can help
work with you. We know
there’s a lot of frustration
as people want to get vaccinated
and we share that. We
are frustrated but hopeful at
the same time. We are desperately
waiting for our federal
and state partners.”
FEBRUARY 4, 2021
WEEKLYNEWS.NET - 978-532-5880 3
MORTGAGES TO FIT YOUR EVERY NEED
MEMBER FDIC / MEMBER DIF EQUAL HOUSING LENDER NMLS #406738
Lights, camera...maybe not
By Anne Marie Tobin
LYNNFIELD — Powerful.
That’s how Lynnfield
Superintendent of Schools
Kristen Vogel described the
message delivered by students
concerning whether or not students
should have their cameras
on during remote Zoom classes.
The issue? A growing
number of students at the high
school and middle school who
are turning off their computer
cameras during remote learning
sessions, and whether or not
the district should be requiring
that students have their cameras
turned on.
“The voices of the students
during the discussion were
powerful,” said Vogel. “They
were clear about their belief
that students should be able to
choose whether or not to have
their cameras on during Zoom
class for reasons of equity and
the social and emotional wellbeing
of the students.
“We also recognize that it is
exhausting and disheartening to
be teaching to a mostly black
screen and have empowered
our teachers to hold students
accountable for their learning.”
Student Council President
Ava O’Brien got the discussion
going early, addressing
the issue in the council report
she presents regularly at school
committee meetings.
“I know that many students
and parents are discouraged by
the hybrid schedule currently
in place,” she said. “I speak for
many students who feel that
students should not be forced
to turn their cameras on during
Zoom classes as it is a personal
choice.
“Many people have different
learning setups and are uncomfortable
learning at home
anyway. Forcing students to
have their cameras on can
create anxiety.”
A few members of the committee
visited the schools this
week to observe how classrooms
are functioning.
Stacy Dahlstedt said she was
blown away by the level of enthusiasm
from the teachers.
“Their energy was phenomenal,
but that being said, we did
see several dark screens at the
middle and high schools,” she
said. “I’d be interested to understand
from a teacher’s perspective
— with so much energy
they are staring at 10 or 2 blank
screens.”
Middle School Assistant
Principal Thomas Sallee
said the effect on teachers is
“terrible.”
“It’s hard enough that they
don’t have students in front of
them, but it’s draining,” he said.
“That same week, there were
teachers in tears as it was so
frustrating. They would love
to see cameras on. The correlation
between students with their
camera on and their achievement
level is that at the middle
school, those kids are doing
better. Teachers are doing their
best to incentivize students to
turn them on, but what happens
is a few drop off and it’s contagious.
You don’t want to be
the last one standing. That’s just
suicide. You don’t want to be
the lone wolf. It’s scary, as there
is a lot of pressure from peers to
turn the cameras off.”
In response to a request from
committee Chair Jamie Hayman
to hear what the students think
and if there is a different level
of engagement when cameras
are turned off, O’Brien said
there are other ways to get engaged
without a camera being
on.
“Things like the chat feature,
we can still do that, so there are
other ways for students to get
and stay engaged,” she said.
“Forcing students to put their
cameras on is more like reprimanding
them, rather than
giving them a choice.”
Sophomore Genna Gioloso
said she agrees that the decision
to turn off cameras is personal.
“I personally don’t mind putting
my camera on but I don’t
know everyone’s situation, so I
think it should be a choice,” she
said.
Committee member Phil
McQueen compared being on
screen during Zoom classes to
being in front of a class for 45
minutes.
“People are staring at you and
that’s not a comfortable feeling,
particularly at the higher
levels,” he said. “It’s a much
more complicated issue.”
Lynnfield High Assistant
Principal Brian Bates agreed.
“Kids aren’t comfortable
seeing themselves on camera.
It’s really a social and emotional
situation,” he said. “But
that doesn’t mean they aren’t
paying attention.”
Committee member Rich
Sjoberg said one thing he took
away from the committee’s
visit to the schools was, “it
showed us the teachers know
how engaged students are and
if they are participating (and)
we should listen to the students’
voices.”
Fellow committee member
Tim Doyle questioned if the
district is doing students a disservice
by not mandating that
cameras be turned on in terms
of being prepared for college or
work situations.
“You cannot draw those analogies
as we are talking about
children,” said High School
Principal Bob Cleary. “Forcing
them is not preparing them for
anything. There is a big difference
between a business
meeting for your job and expecting
the same from the 12,
13, 14-year-olds. Tim’s point is
a good one as we want them to
be prepared, but that’s apples
and oranges. We are encouraging
them to use their video
and that’s where we need to
go.”
“We are challenging them as
it is and, obviously, we want
cameras one, but we can’t mandate
it,” said Bates.
Director of Teaching and
Learning Kevin Cyr said his
primary concern is with heightened
anxiety levels in students
but he is also concerned about
equity issues.
“Families are conscious
about what we see in the backgrounds
of their homes when
cameras are on,” he said. “I’ve
talked to students about the
consequences of not having
cameras on, but how do we enforce
that?”
A. James Lynch Insurance & Real Estate
has been serving the Lynn and North
Shore community approaching 70 years!
• Attracting Buyers in Unique Ways
• Get Honest and Experienced guidance from the pros who know.
• Visit our website ajameslynchinsurance.com
• Here for You....Here for Good
781.599.1500
4
LYNNFIELD
WEEKLY NEWS
(USPS Permit #168)
Telephone: 781-593-7700 • Fax: 781-581-3178
Mailing Address: P.O. Box 5, Lynn, MA 01903
News and Advertising Offices: 110 Munroe St., Lynn, MA 01901
Office Hours: 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday
www.weeklynews.net
Editor: Thor Jourgensen tjourgensen@essexmediagroup.com
Reporter: Anne Marie Tobin atobin@essexmediagroup.com
Sports Editor: Mike Alongi malongi@essexmediagroup.com
Advertising Reps: Ralph Mitchell rmitchell@essexmediagroup.com
Patricia Whalen pwhalen@essexmediagroup.com
Ernie Carpenter ecarpenter@essexmediagroup.com
Retail Price: $1.00
Deadlines: News: Monday, noon; Display Ads: Monday, noon;
Classified Ads: Monday, noon;
No cancellations accepted after deadline.
The Lynnfield Weekly News is published 52 times per year on Thursday by Essex
Media Group, Inc. No issue is printed during the week of Christmas. The Lynnfield
Weekly News is delivered via US Mail to all homes in Lynnfield. It is also
available in several locations throughout Lynnfield. The Lynnfield Weekly News
will not be responsible for typographical or other errors in advertisements, but will
reprint that part of an advertisement in which a typographical error occurs if notified
immediately. Advertisers must notify the Lynnfield Weekly News of any errors in
advertisements on the FIRST day of insertion. The publisher reserves the right to
reject, omit or edit any copy offered for publication. POSTMASTER: Send address
changes to Lynnfield Weekly News, P.O. Box 5, Lynn, MA 01903. © 2016 Essex
Media Group, Inc.
Can’t get to
the store?
Get home
delivery.
Subscribe for half the
newsstand price.
Subscriptions include
full online access.
www.itemlive.com/subscribe
or call 781-593-7700, ext. 1239
WEEKLYNEWS.NET - 978-532-5880 FEBRUARY 4, 2021
Tuesday, Jan. 26
Accidents
Police responded on Tuesday
at 6:58 p.m. to a motor vehicle
accident reported on Route 1
northbound with transport to
Melrose-Wakefield Hospital. A
Walnut Street resident called
police on Tuesday at 8:53 p.m.
to report a vehicle drove off the
roadway into his yard.
Wednesday, Jan. 27
Complaint
Police responded to Whole
Foods on Wednesday at 1:03
p.m. to take a report of a counterfeit
bill.
Enforcement
Police issued a motor vehicle
citation on Wednesday at 10:05
p.m. to a Peabody driver on
Main Street.
Thursday, Jan. 28
Accident
Police received a report on
Thursday at 6:40 p.m. about a
motor vehicle hitting a pole on
Chestnut Street; received a report
on Thursday at 8:24 a.m.
about a vehicle hitting a tree
on Wildewood Drive with injury
reported.
Police Log
Friday, Jan. 29
Medical
Police assisted with medical
transport from Partridge Lane to
Melrose-Wakefield Hospital on
Friday at 12:51 p.m.
Fraud
Police received a fraud report
from a Westover Drive resident
on Friday at 2:36 p.m.
Complaint
Police spoke to a Main Street
resident about a loud noise complaint
on Friday at 10:11 p.m.
Saturday, Jan. 30
Accident
Police responded to a motor
vehicle accident reported at Main
and Lowell streets on Saturday
at 11:29 a.m. and involving a
Peabody and a Milton driver.
Medical
Police assisted with medical
transport from Pillings Pond
Road to Massachusetts General
Hospital on Saturday at 2:04
p.m.; assisted with transport
to Salem Hospital from Main
Street on Saturday at 10:02
p.m. and assisted with transport
from Locksley Road to Beverly
Hospital on Saturday at 11:23
p.m.
Assist
Police received a report of a
broken pipe in a Saunders Road
residence on Sunday at 8:34
a.m. The Fire Department rendered
assistance.
Medical
Police aided with medical
transport on Sunday at 5:42 p.m.
from Elliot Road to Melrose-
Wakefield Hospital.
Fire Department offers
healthy home tips
LYNNFIELD — The
Lynnfield Fire Department
(LFD), in conjunction with
A Healthy Lynnfield, the
town’s Council on Aging,
and the Lynnfield Rotary
Club, has expanded its
safety services for the town’s
seniors.
The program consists of
five components:
The already successful
Lockbox program will continue
to be offered in conjunction
with the Lynnfield
Senior Center and Lynnfield
Rotary Club. This is an excellent
way to provide first
responders fast access to
your home in the case of an
emergency.
To apply for a lockbox,
contact Ron Block with the
Lynnfield Rotary at 781-
334-2036 or by email at
Ronblock1@verizon.net.
Mr. Block will take your application
and forward it to
LFD for installation.
While at your home, members
of the Lynnfield Fire
Department will, if you
choose, conduct a home
safety survey. This is not an
inspection and will have no
negative impact on you. We
will simply walk through
the house and look for items
such as: trip hazards, poor
lighting, extension cord
usage, medications left out,
smoke detector test and batteries,
etc. Our members
will then discuss with you
what they found and make
recommendations.
File of life cards can
be picked up at both the
Lynnfield Fire Department
as well as the Senior Center.
These cards let you fill in
patient information such as
medical history, allergies and
medications as well as other
pertinent information EMTs
and paramedics may need in
the event of an emergency,
and if the patient is unable to
communicate with us. This
card is left in an identifiable
red sleeve that is put on the
refrigerator, and first responders
know to look there.
Disposing of medications
is now easier and safer
with our disposable bagging
system. These can be
picked up at the fire department
headquarters as well as
through A Healthy Lynnfield.
Simply dispose of unwanted
medications (not sharps) into
the bag and seal and shake. It
is then safe to dispose of in
the trash.
Unattended medications
can be inviting to unwanted
eyes. Small children are especially
likely to be curious.
Keep your medications safe
and secure in one of our
lockable medication storage
boxes. With the efforts of A
Healthy Lynnfield, who secured
the funding and boxes,
these can now be picked up
at the fire headquarters.
Residents can utilize any
individual component, or
all five. There are no fees
for these services, with the
exception of the lockboxes.
The lockbox fee will be determined
at the time of application
and may range from
free to $35.
FEBRUARY 4, 2021
J Barrett & Company
welcomes Steve Graczyk
WEEKLYNEWS.NET - 978-532-5880 5
PHOTO | COURTESY
Steven “Graz” Graczyk recently joined J Barrett & Company
For the Weekly News
BEVERLY — J Barrett &
Company is pleased to announce
that Realtor® Steven
“Graz” Graczyk has joined the
agency in the Cummings Center
office.
A well-respected real estate
professional, Graczyk has
a successful record helping
clients buy and sell property
throughout the North Shore.
“I’m looking forward to
being associated with a real estate
firm that so closely mirrors
my own client-centric business
philosophy. My clients often
hear me say: ‘My goal for each
client is simple — your goal,’”
Graczyk said.
Tech savvy with exceptional
networking and relationship
building skills, Steve is known
for his integrity and determination
to make certain his clients
achieve the best possible
outcomes.
Graczyk has 20 years of experience
managing large ($1
billion) and small ($1 million)
institutional financial accounts
PHOTO | COURTESY
The water trough in Lynnfield town center is decorated with
hearts and flowers for Valentine’s Day.
on Wall Street.
He has strong ties to the area
as a lifelong Danvers resident
and he is the youngest of three
St. John’s Prep graduates and is
also a graduate of the University
of Rhode Island.
“As a company one of our
goals is to constantly expand
the depth of our in-house expertise
so having yet another real
estate professional of Steve’s
caliber is very exciting for our
firm,” said J Barrett President
Jon Gray. “In addition, Steve’s
ability to help people understand
the entire real estate process
is a critical skill that will
benefit every client who works
with him.”
Established in January 2007,
J Barrett & Company is a service-oriented
company that has
quickly become the premier
privately-owned real estate firm
on the North Shore. The company
serves the North Shore and
Cape Ann areas from offices in
Beverly, Gloucester, Ipswich,
Manchester, Marblehead, and
in Prides Crossing.
“J Barrett & Company’s reputation
for white glove collaboration
with both agents and
clients is certainly one reason
I wanted to work with the
agency,” Graczyk said.
PHOTO | COURTESY
Yoga instructor Sharon Marrama leads two students through a
mindfulness exercise.
Ten mindful minutes
Sharon Marrama
Want to start living more
mindfully? Well, you can
begin with just 10 minutes a
day. I have selected five areas
of focus: Kindness, Empathy,
Gratitude, Happiness and
Optimism.
Kindness is the quality or
state of being gentle and considerate.
Encourage a culture
of “Random Acts of Kindness.”
Expand your kindness practice
by beginning small with
your family, neighbors and coworkers.
Once you have mastered
that you can think bigger
donations, sponsorships, work
in a soup kitchen. The possibilities
are endless and doing good
makes us feel good.
Empathy is the ability to
share someone else’s feelings.
Create a list of mindful family
rules showing respect for others
time and space. Place it where
everyone can see it. You might
want to write things like; Treat
everyone as you want to be
treated! When Johnny is practicing
guitarbe sure to respect
his space! Help others when
they need it!
Gratitude is a feeling of appreciation.
Each person at the
dinner table has a turn to speak
of something they are thankful
for. At bedtime, when you are
tucking in your children, take a
minute to tell them something
great about them. Ask your kids
to share one thing that happened
that day that made them feel
great.
Happiness is a state of wellbeing
and contentment. Have
a happiness box and place
random notes inside. You can
read them at the dinner table.
Place a smiley face on the
bathroommirror. Write a happy
quote a day on the door that
leads out…ex: Make Someone
Smile Today!
Optimism is a feeling or belief
that good things will happen
in the future. Talk to your kids
about the jar being half empty
or half full. Share with them the
view of seeing things in a positive
manner.
Sharon Marrama, owner
of Here Comes the Sun Yoga
for Kids, a children’s yoga
instructor at several local
schools and studios. She holds
a certificate in Teen Coaching
and writes children’s books
spreading sunshine along the
way.
Call 781-593-7700 ext. 2
to subscribe today.
home delivery rate is
50% off
newstand price!
Subscribers pay only
$4.50 a week.
Sales are strong, let me list your home!
Safe • Clean • Quick
John C. Olimpio CPA
Certified Public Accountant • Attorney at Law
161 South Main Street Suite 307 • Middleton, MA 01949
• INCOME TAX RETURN PREPARATION
• Estate Planning• Wills and Trust Preparation•
Business Planning and Consulting
•Financial Statements Preparation• Real Estate Transactions and Closings
• Internal Revenue Service and Massachusetts Department of Revenue Matters
978-750-6699
• jcolimpio@verizon.net • www.olimpiolaw.com
All Services Provided for Businesses and Individuals
(Located across from Richardson’s Ice Cream)
6
WEEKLYNEWS.NET - 978-532-5880 FEBRUARY 4, 2021
How scammers are using vaccine to steal money, info
By Kristen Jordan
Shamus
Detroit Free Press
DETROIT – Scammers
are using people’s desperation
for COVID-19 vaccines
in the midst of a pandemic
as a bargaining chip
to steal money and personal
information.
Though it doesn’t appear to
be a widespread problem in
Michigan, the state Attorney
General’s Office told the
Free Press last Thursday that
it has gotten one report of a
fraudster offering a coronavirus
vaccine in exchange
for money.
“I hope that can be seen as
a good sign that people are
contacting the proper sources
for the vaccine and being
cautious about who they
provide their personal information
to,” said Ryan Jarvi,
a spokesperson for Attorney
General Dana Nessel.
Eligible for COVID-19
vaccines right now in
Michigan are health care
workers, residents and employees
of long-term care
facilities, people ages 65 and
older, teachers, child care
workers, first-responders,
law enforcement and corrections
officers.
Anybody offering a chance
to jump ahead on the statewide
priority list for a vaccination
in exchange for
money is a scammer, the
Federal Trade Commission
warns.
“You can’t pay to get your
name on a list to get the vaccine,”
the agency said in a
consumer blog post. “That’s
a scam. You can’t pay to
get early access to the vaccine.
That’s a scam. Nobody
legit will call about the vaccine
and ask for your Social
Security, bank account or
credit card number. That’s a
scam.”
An FTC spokesman said
Thursday that because the
COVID-19 vaccines are so
new — both Pfizer’s and
Moderna’s vaccines were
approved in mid-December
— data about the prevalence
of these scams isn’t available
yet. Still, the agency
issued preemptive warnings
about the possibility for
fraud around the vaccines,
which are in high demand
in a nation that has reported
25.3 million coronavirus
cases and more than 423,000
deaths, according to the U.S.
Centers for Disease Control
PHOTO | DETROIT FREE PRESS
People stand in line outside in 25-degree weather 30 minutes before the doors open to receive the Moderna COVID-19 vaccination
from the Oakland County Health Division at Suburban Showplace in Novi, Mich.
and Prevention.
So did the Henry Ford
Health System.
Bob Riney, the Detroitbased
health system’s president
of health care operations
and COO, made this
statement Thursday: “People
should be extremely vigilant
and wary of vaccination offers
that don’t come from
trusted sources like their
doctor, health care provider
or local health department.
“The plain fact is that there
is no charge to receive the
COVID-19 vaccine, which is
being paid for by the federal
government. You can’t pay to
put your name on a list to get
the vaccine, or to get early
access, and you don’t need
to provide sensitive personal
information over the phone.
Anyone promising that is
trying to steal your personal
or financial information, and
very likely, your money.”
A Henry Ford spokesman
said Thursday that the health
system isn’t aware of any
specific claims of fraud
around COVID-19 vaccines
in Michigan, but “we wanted
to get this message out to
let people know that these
scams are out there and to be
aware.”
Riney cautioned people to
be wary of any the following:
Offers for early access to
a vaccine upon payment of
a deposit or fee. Requests
asking for a payment to get a
shot or to put your name on a
COVID-19 vaccine waiting
list. Unsolicited emails, telephone
calls, or texts from
someone claiming to be
from a medical office, insurance
company or COVID-19
vaccine center requesting
personal, financial and/or
medical information to determine
your eligibility to
participate in clinical vaccine
trials or obtain the vaccine.
Claims of Food and Drug
Administration approval
for a vaccine that cannot be
verified. Ads for vaccines
through social media platforms,
email, telephone calls,
online, or from unsolicited/
unknown sources. A phone
call or email telling you the
government or government
officials require you to receive
a COVID-19 vaccine.
People also should be
aware that some tricksters
may pretend to be health
care workers to try to get
access to valuable information,
calling, texting or even
knocking on doors to try to
fool people who are eager to
get a vaccine that’s in short
supply, he said.
“Our team members would
never call to ask for your
sensitive personal and financial
information,” Riney
said. “Anyone who receives
a call like this from someone
who identifies themselves
as being from Henry Ford
should just hang up.”
Complaints of fraud can
be reported to the FTC at
ReportFraud.ftc.gov or
through the state Attorney
General’s Office at www.
michigan.gov/ag.
The FTC offers these tips:
1.) Contact a trusted source
for information. Check with
state or local health departments,
your health care provider
or pharmacist to learn
when and how to get the
COVID-19 vaccine. 2.)
Don’t pay to sign up for the
vaccine. Anyone who asks
for a payment to put you on a
list, to make an appointment
for you, or reserve a spot in
line is a scammer. 3.) Ignore
sales ads for the COVID-19
vaccine. You can’t buy a vaccine.
It is only available at
federal- and state-approved
locations. 4.) Watch for unexpected
or unusual texts.
If your health care provider
or pharmacist has used text
messages to contact you in
the past, you might get a text
message about a COVID-19
vaccine. If you get a text, call
your healthcare provider or
pharmacist directly to make
sure the message is legitimate.
Scammers are texting,
too. So don’t click on links in
text messages — especially
messages you didn’t expect.
5.) Don’t open emails,
attachments, or links from
people you don’t know or
that come unexpectedly. You
could download dangerous
malware onto your computer
or phone. 6.) Don’t share information
with people you
don’t know. No one from
a vaccine distribution site,
health care provider’s office,
pharmacy, insurance company
or Medicare, will call,
text, or email you asking
for your Social Security,
credit card, or bank account
number to sign you up to get
the vaccine.
In Michigan, there are several
ways to register to get
a coronavirus vaccine when
you are eligible.
A federal pharmacy partnership
with CVS and
Walgreens pharmacies are
handling immunizations for
living and working in longterm
care facilities.
For senior citizens ages
65 and older, health officials
suggest the best way to register
for a vaccine is to sign
up through your local hospital
system using an online
patient portal, such as My
Chart, through a Meijer or
Kroger pharmacy, or through
your local health department.
Hospitals are handling
COVID-19 immunizations
for their employees and
county health departments
and hospitals are also vaccinating
people who work in
private practice or offices independent
of hospitals.
Vaccines for teachers, law
enforcement officers and
other first-responders are
being handled by their employers
in conjunction with
local health departments.
FEBRUARY 4, 2021
By Riley Beggin
Detroit News
WASHINGTON —
General Motors Co.’s plan
to become carbon-neutral
by 2040 and drop gas and
diesel engines in all new
light-duty vehicles by 2035
reflects a newly Democraticcontrolled
capital pivoting
to an aggressive climate
agenda.
The automaker’s leadership
was emboldened by
changes in Washington,
where President Joe Biden
is touting a similar pledge
— net-zero emissions nationwide
by 2050 — as he
promised significant help to
businesses and consumers
to advance the technology
needed to get there.
Achieving the automaker’s
goal will span several
administrations, Dane
Parker, GM’s sustainability
officer, said Thursday. But
the company leaders have
been talking with the Biden
administration and are encouraged
by its commitment
to advancing emissions-free
vehicles.
“We are excited about the
things that the new administration
is doing to enable this
future,” Parker said. “Their
enthusiasm for electric vehicles
and for an all-electric future
has been something that
has created with us a greater
sense of optimism for where
we’re going and the support
to get there.”
It marks a “huge step” in
a changing auto industry in
Detroit and globally, said
Barry Rabe, a political science
professor at the University
of Michigan. “Is this the beginning
of a larger transition
that could actually accelerate
the whole policy shift toward
electric vehicles?”
That optimism is tempered
by concern within the
industry that workers —
especially hourly workers
staffing engine and transmission
plants — will be
left behind because electric
vehicles require fewer parts
and fewer employees on the
shop floor to assemble them.
Biden and other leaders have
maintained that millions of
new jobs will be created by
green industries, but the transition
between them remains
unclear.
Since taking office just
over a week ago, Biden has
brought the United States
back into the Paris Climate
Accords — an international
agreement to work toward
limiting global warming to
below 2 degrees Celsius —
paused oil and gas drilling
leases on federal lands, introduced
plans to double
offshore wind production,
directed the administration
to begin replacing the federal
fleet with electric vehicles
and more.
He’s calling for additional
sweeping policies that
would require Congressional
approval and significant
spending to the tune of $2
trillion. He says he hopes
to eliminate greenhouse gas
emissions from the energy
and power sector by 2035
and nationwide by 2050.
“In my view, we’ve already
waited too long to deal
with this climate crisis and
we can’t wait any longer,”
Biden said Wednesday. “We
see it with our own eyes. We
feel it. We know it in our
bones. And it’s time to act.”
Securing that $2 trillion
may prove challenging
due to tight majorities for
Democrats in both the House
and Senate. But if the administration
is successful,
portions of it would go to
help the auto industry with
research and development of
zero-emissions technology,
installing 500,000 charging
stations nationwide, and providing
consumer incentives
to purchase EVs.
U.S. Rep. Brenda
Lawrence, D-Southfield,
whose district includes GM’s
downtown headquarters, said
we’re witnessing “transformational”
change and is confident
Congress will find the
funding. “We cannot allow
the innovation and the technology
that we’re so proud
of as a country be held hostage.
We’re going to have to
figure it out.”
Those incentives will be an
important part of consumer
adoption, said Parker of GM,
adding that Biden’s commitment
to federal aid is an “important
part” of the company’s
ability to announce their
bold carbon neutrality goal.
Michigan Democrats
praised GM’s decision
Thursday. Gov. Gretchen
Whitmer’s office said she
is “hopeful that other companies
will follow suit and
reduce climate change’s
harmful impacts.”
U.S. Rep. Rashida Tlaib,
WEEKLYNEWS.NET - 978-532-5880 7
GM bets on carbon neutrality
PHOTO | BILL PUGLIANO
Mary Barra, Chairman and CEO of General Motors, is shown at the reveals of the new 2021
Chevrolet Suburban and 2021 Chevrolet Tahoe SUVs at Little Caesars Arena.
D-Detroit, said any air quality
improvement brought on by
the change is a good thing:
“This is the right move. I do
hope they are much more
aggressive” than the timeline
they laid out, she added.
“This kind of move toward
reductions in emissions is
critically important.”
GM is the first major automaker
to set a public deadline
to transition fully to
EVs, exerting immense pressure
on its rivals across the
industry. Ford Motor Co. has
also expressed interest and
invested billions in rapidly
developing electric vehicles,
but it remains committed
at least in the near term to
gas-electric hybrid versions
of such iconic models as the
F-150 pickup.
Still, the threat to bluecollar
workers from the
move to electrification
cannot be under-estimated,
as the United Auto Workers’
research department detailed
in a 2019 White Paper. The
Biden administration argues
that transformational change
is possible without hurting
auto workers, and has promised
to create 10 million
clean energy jobs and more
than double the amount of
jobs in the auto industry as
it transitions to a greener
future.
Former Michigan Gov.
Jennifer Granholm, Biden’s
nominee to lead the
Department of Energy, testified
before a Senate panel
earlier this week. Senators on
the committee from oil, gas
and coal-producing states
expressed concern that their
communities would be left
jobless in a turn to renewable
energy sources. Sen.
Joe Manchin, a Democrat
from West Virginia, begged
Granholm: “Don’t just leave
them in a barren wasteland.”
Granholm assured him and
others that it will be a top priority,
and they’ll use “placebased”
solutions to leverage
existing skills in traditional
energy to grow jobs in new
industries.
U.S. Rep. Tim Walberg,
R-Tipton, struck a similar
chord in a statement: “As the
auto industry makes technological
advancements,
my focus is on making sure
those investments are taking
place in Michigan. At the end
of the day, the autoworkers
in my district want access
to good-paying jobs where
they can manufacture quality
products.”
The UAW released a statement
saying it’s members
“have never shied away from
working with new technology.
Even with these new
product goals, it will be some
time before the transition occurs.
But the important thing
is that President Biden agrees
with our position that any
new jobs replacing (internal
combustion) engines are
union wage and benefit jobs.”
It’s incumbent upon policymakers
to use procurement,
tax credits and other
tools to help companies and
communities retain whatever
domestic jobs they can under
the new industry, said Paul
Bledsoe, a strategic adviser
for the Progressive Policy
Institute who served as a
climate adviser to President
Bill Clinton.
“The alternative is to not
help the industry and see
more jobs and production go
overseas,” he said. “Because
the industry is moving toward
EVs whether you like
it or not.”
Financial planning is
more important than ever…
• Detailed Life Planning
• Education Plans
• Longevity Planning
• Legacy & Estate Planning
• Investment Management
• Retirement Planning
• Long Term Care Planning
• Life Insurance
• Sustainable investing
• Charitable Giving
ANTONIO SORDILLO, CFP®, CRPC®, CPFA
Vice President, Investments
antonio.sordillo@raymondjames.com
20 Burlington Mall Road, Suite 130 // Burlington, MA 01803
781.313.8403 // evergreenfinpartners.com
© 2021 Raymond James & Associates, Inc., member New York Stock Exchange/SIPC. 21-BRNAO-0003 TA 1/21
8
Soup to soothe the soul
By Addie Broyles
Austin
American-Statesman
Chicken soup won’t cure
COVID-19, but it might ease
your sniffles.
After so many months of
pandemic life, we’re getting
better at making ourselves feel
as good as we can, even with
the coronavirus knocking at the
door. (Or maybe even coming
right in the house.)
January is usually a time
when we’re brimming with
excitement for the year ahead,
but with COVID-19 hitting its
predicted peaks just as we experience
our annual cedar fever
season, many of us are digging
deep for extra comfort and
nourishment.
Thanks to the vaccine — and
countless “Chicken Soup for the
Soul”-worthy stories of kindness
that have come out of the past
10 months — many of us are
still finding some hopefulness as
we look toward the year ahead.
Maybe a few new chicken soup
recipes will fuel some of that
feel-betterness, too.
For the best chicken soup,
start with the whole bird and
simmer gently.
———
CHICKEN PARMESAN
SOUP WITH CRUMBLED
CROUTONS
When you need a quick, easy
meal and don’t want to deal
with a pile of dishes, this soup
fits the bill perfectly. It takes
less than 30 minutes to prepare,
from start to finish, and it all
takes place in one pot. Dry pasta
is simmered right along with the
other ingredients and cooks up
perfectly al dente. Crumbled,
store-bought croutons sprinkled
on top add great flavor and texture
and drive home the chicken
Parmesan theme. This is a wonderful
no-fuss, busy-day meal.
— Valerie Brunmeier
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 1/2 pounds boneless, skinless
chicken breast, cut into
bite-size pieces
1/2 cup diced onion
1/2 teaspoon salt, plus more
to taste
Freshly ground black pepper,
to taste
2 teaspoons minced garlic
3 tablespoons tomato paste
1/2 teaspoon red pepper
flakes
1 (14.5-ounce) can fireroasted
diced tomatoes,
undrained
6 cups low-sodium chicken
broth (I like Better Than
Bouillon)
8 ounces dry short pasta (fusilli,
penne and elbow macaroni
all make good choices)
1/2 cup finely grated
Parmesan cheese, plus more for
garnish
1/4 cup chopped fresh Italian
parsley
1 cup shredded mozzarella
cheese
1 cup cheese and garlic-flavored
croutons, lightly crushed
Pour the olive oil into a large
pot or Dutch oven and place it
over medium heat. When the
oil is hot, add the chicken and
onion. Season the mixture with
salt and pepper, and sauté until
the chicken is cooked through
and the onion is tender, about
5 to 6 minutes. Add the garlic
and cook for an additional 1 to
2 minutes, until fragrant. Add
the tomato paste and red pepper
flakes and stir to combine well.
Add the diced tomatoes, broth
and dry pasta.
Bring the mixture to a boil
over medium-high heat, then
reduce the heat to low and
simmer, covered, until the
pasta is al dente, about 8 to 10
minutes.
Remove the pot from the
heat, then stir in the Parmesan
cheese and parsley and season
with additional salt and pepper.
Garnish individual servings
with the mozzarella cheese,
crushed croutons and a little
Parmesan cheese. Serves 6.
— From “The Foolproof
Family Slow Cooker and
Other One-Pot Solutions” by
Valerie Brunmeier (Page Street
Taiwan Boy Earns Academic High Honors
at Northfield Mount Hermon
Sheng Chun (Angus) Chang achieved Academic High
Honors has been named to the Head of School’s List
for work completed during the fall 2020 term at
Northfield Mount Hermon. A recipient of Academic
High Honors has earned a GPA of 3.67 or above, with
no grade less than A-.
Angus, 15, a sophomore, is a member of the varsity
swim and golf team at NMH. Angus, who comes from
Taiwan, is the son of Mao Sung Chang and Hsiang Ju
Wang of Lynnfield.
Northfield Mount Hermon is a coeducational boarding
and day school for students in
grades 9–12 and a postgraduate
year. Founded in 1879, NMH
engages the intellect, compassion,
and talents of its students, empowering
them to act with humanity
and purpose. NMH currently enrolls
655 students from 31 states and 53
countries.
WEEKLYNEWS.NET - 978-532-5880 FEBRUARY 4, 2021
Publishing, $21.99)
CHICKEN SOUP WITH
BOK CHOY AND GINGER
We got the idea for this
light, clean-tasting yet aromatic
chicken soup from classic
Chinese poached chicken,
sometimes referred to as “whitecooked”
chicken. The addition
of baby bok choy, simmered
in the broth until the stems are
tender, gives the soup verdant
color and turns it into a meal in
a bowl. The bok choy, scallions
and cilantro are added at the end
of cooking, so prep these ingredients
while the chicken cooks.
Fragrant steamed jasmine rice
would be a welcome accompaniment,
either spooned directly
into the bowl or offered on the
side.
Don’t use cooking sherry
for this recipe; it usually has
added sodium and little, if any,
actual sherry flavor. And don’t
use boneless, skinless chicken
for this soup. Bones give the
broth body as well as flavor. -
Christopher Kimball
1 tablespoon grapeseed or
other neutral oil
1 (4-inch) piece fresh ginger
(about 3 ounces), peeled and cut
into 4 pieces
5 medium garlic cloves,
smashed and peeled
1/2 cup dry sherry
2 teaspoons white
peppercorns
Kosher salt
2 pounds bone-in, skin-on
chicken thighs, skin removed
1 pound baby bok choy,
trimmed and cut crosswise into
½-inch pieces
4 scallions, thinly sliced
1 cup chopped fresh cilantro
2 tablespoons unseasoned
rice vinegar
Kosher salt and ground white
pepper
Chile oil or toasted sesame
oil, to serve
On a 6-quart Instant Pot, select
More/High Sauté. Add the
oil and heat until shimmering.
Add the ginger and garlic and
cook, stirring, until fragrant,
about 30 seconds. Pour in the
sherry and bring to a boil. Stir
in 6 cups water, the peppercorns
and 2 teaspoons salt. Add the
chicken thighs, arranging them
in an even layer.
To cook in a pressure cooker:
Press Cancel, lock the lid in
place and move the pressure
valve to Sealing. Select Pressure
Cook or Manual; make sure the
pressure level is set to High. Set
the cooking time for 20 minutes.
When pressure cooking
is complete, let the pressure
reduce naturally for 15 minutes,
then release the remaining
steam by moving the pressure
valve to Venting. Press Cancel,
then carefully open the pot.
To cook using the slowcooker
setting: With the pot still
on More/High Sauté, bring the
mixture to a boil. Press Cancel,
lock the lid in place and move
the pressure valve to Venting.
Select Slow Cook and set the
temperature to Less/Low. Set the
cooking time for 5 to 6 hours; the
chicken is done when a skewer
inserted into a piece meets no
resistance. Press Cancel, then
carefully open the pot.
To finish: Using a slotted
spoon, transfer the chicken to
a plate and set aside to cool
slightly. Meanwhile, pour the
broth through a fine-mesh
strainer set over a large bowl;
discard the solids in the strainer.
Let the broth settle for about
5 minutes, then, using a large
spoon, skim off and discard
the fat from the surface. Return
the broth to the pot. Remove
and discard any bones from the
chicken and shred or chop the
meat into bite-size pieces.
Select Normal/Medium
Sauté and bring the broth to a
simmer. Stir in the bok choy
and cook, stirring occasionally,
until the stems are tender, about
3 minutes. Stir in the chicken,
scallions, cilantro and vinegar.
Taste and season with salt and
ground white pepper. Serve
drizzled with chile oil or sesame
oil. Serves 6.
— From “Milk Street
Fast and Slow: Instant Pot
Cooking at the Speed You
Need” by Christopher Kimball
(Voracious, $30)
CHICKEN POT PIE
SOUP WITH PUFF PASTRY
CROUTONS
Roasted chicken breasts and
stock provide the foundation for
this beyond-comforting dish.
It’s all the richness of savory pot
pie in soup form, created by the
queen herself. You may already
have most of the ingredients in
this recipe — which is featured
in Ina Garten’s new pandemic-minded
“Modern Comfort
Food” (Clarkson Potter; $35)
— though you may need to
pick up the sherry and fresh tarragon.
Oh, and the Pepperidge
Farm frozen puff pastry to make
those darling croutons.
A few notes: First, wet leeks
will steam, rather than sauté,
Garten says. So chop the white
and light green parts, wash them
well in a bowl of water and then
spin them dry in a salad spinner.
Wondra, if you’re unfamiliar
with it, is basically an instant
flour. It’s precooked, dried and
so finely ground, it’s often used
to thicken sauces and gravies
because it dissolves so easily,
without clumping. You’ll find
it in a bright blue can on the
supermarket flour aisle. If you
don’t have Wondra on hand,
mix a similar amount of all-purpose
flour with a little water
or stock, and add the resulting
paste to the broth to thicken it.
And the key to using puff
pastry is to keep it very cold
until it goes into the hot oven.
Defrost frozen puff pastry overnight
in the refrigerator, then
roll it, cut it and bake it just before
serving.
— Jessica Yadegaran, The
Mercury News
3 chicken breasts, skin-on,
bone-in (2 1/2 to 3 pounds total)
Good olive oil
Kosher salt and freshly
ground black pepper
6 tablespoons (3/4 stick) unsalted
butter
5 cups chopped leeks, white
and light green parts (3 leeks)
4 cups chopped fennel, tops
and cores removed (2 bulbs)
3 cups (1/2-inch) diced
scrubbed carrots (5 medium)
1 tablespoon minced garlic (3
cloves)
1 tablespoon chopped fresh
tarragon leaves
1/4 cup Wondra flour
3/4 cup cream sherry, divided
use
7 cups good chicken stock,
preferably homemade
1 (2-by-3-inch) piece of
Italian Parmesan rind
10-ounce package frozen
peas
1 cup frozen whole pearl
onions
1/4 cup minced fresh parsley
Heat your oven to 350
degrees.
FEBRUARY 4, 2021
WEEKLYNEWS.NET - 978-532-5880 9
When will you feel safe to travel?
Five epidemiologists share hopes, fears, data, guess
BY CHRISTOPHER REYNOLDS
LOS ANGELES TIMES
LOS ANGELES — How do
you measure the risks of pandemic
travel, and when will the
time be right to go again?
We asked five infectious
disease experts, including one
who hadn’t left home in four
days, one who has taken two
Mexican vacations since March
and one who recently awakened
from a COVID-19/Disneyland
nightmare.
The first thing we must
do, they agreed, is stay close
to home for at least several
more months, get vaccinated,
and watch virus transmission
and ICU numbers closely.
Putting down the pandemic in
California and elsewhere, they
said, will depend on how faithfully
we use masks, keep our
distance and wash our hands
— habits that will remain vital
as authorities strive to vaccinate
300 million or more Americans
by summer.
“I will never get on an airplane
again without a mask,”
said Dr. Kimberly Shriner, an
infectious disease specialist
at Huntington Hospital in
Pasadena.
“Now is not the time to be
traveling. For leisure or business,”
said Dr. Luis Ostrosky, a
professor of infectious diseases
at McGovern Medical School at
UTHealth in Houston.
If you fly now, said Dr.
Krutika Kuppalli in Charleston,
South Carolina, “you can almost
guarantee that there are going to
be people on the airplane with
you who have COVID.”
These experts all are wary
of new variants of the virus.
None is flying now. Three have
spent recent months within 120
miles of their home, as authorities
urge all Californians to do.
(That advisory remains in place,
despite Gov. Gavin Newsom’s
loosening of many restrictions
on Jan. 25.) But their perspectives
vary:
The numbers he watches
Ostrosky, born in Mexico
City, has a lot of family there.
So when his grandmother died
recently, he thought about
making the trip south. Mexico
is one of the few countries
Americans can visit without a
mandated quarantine.
But after much talk, he stayed
put in the U.S. because of the
pandemic. Before he resumes
travel, he said, he’ll ask several
questions.
What’s the positivity rate? “I
would avoid traveling to any
place that has a positivity rate
over 5 percent,” he said. Above
that, “you dramatically increase
your chances of exposure.”
California’s seven-day average
positivity rate — the number of
COVID-19 tests that yield positive
results — was 12.4 percent
on Jan. 27.
How full and how capable are
the hospitals? Scores of U.S.
hospitals are at surge capacity,
with shortages of ICU beds.
Because most county governments
report COVID-19 information
daily, Ostrosky said,
“it’s actually pretty easy” to
find data. As for capability, any
hospital with a Level 1 trauma
center (the most comprehensive
trauma care) would satisfy him,
Ostrosky said. The American
College of Surgeons maintains
a database.
Does this destination require
testing to enter or leave? Many
travelers might hope for that,
but “I just don’t want to get
stuck somewhere,” Ostrosky
said. “People can test positive
for a long period of time
without being infectious.”
This is now a factor in any
flight to the U.S., including returning
round-trip flights. As
of Jan. 26, the U.S. Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention
requires all air travelers to show
a recent negative COVID-19
test result before they can board
any flight heading to the U.S.
What haunts a doctor’s
dreams?
Shriner, who also is a tropical
disease specialist and director of
the Pasadena Travel Medicine
clinic, has been vacationing in
Europe for years and has spent
more than 20 years making regular
visits to a medical project
in Tanzania.
But at Huntington Hospital,
ever since the holidays, “we’re
just absolutely getting hammered
with cases of people who
traveled,” she said.
Outside the hospital, Shriner
has done some driving around
California but hasn’t flown
since March. Like her colleagues,
she believes that
driving (especially if you bring
food and avoid public toilets)
is safer than flying and much
safer than cruise ships (most of
which are idle now).
Like Ostrosky, she wants to
see a positivity rate of 5% or
less at her departure point and
at her destination. For data, she
recommends the Johns Hopkins
University Coronavirus
Resource Center.
Shriner likes the idea of airlines
and destinations requiring
negative test results or vaccination.
Whether or not those are
required, Shriner said, people
should get vaccinated, wait at
least four weeks (to allow resistance
to strengthen), and consider
their age and immunity
history before making travel
plans.
In darker moments, she said,
she worries that “this could just
go on for another year or two
PHOTO | LOS ANGELES TIMES
How do you measure the risks of pandemic travel, and when
will the time be right to go again? Five experts weigh in.
if people don’t widely accept
the vaccine.” She also shared
a recent nightmare: She was
on the Pirates of the Caribbean
ride at Disneyland (which remains
closed) surrounded by
unmasked strangers.
On the brighter side, she’s
hopeful that travel might be safe
as soon as late summer or early
fall. “But it is all dependent on
human behavior,” Shriner said,
“and we know how unreliable
that is!”
What keeps Dr. Kuppalli
home
Kuppalli moved in August
from the San Francisco Bay
Area to Charleston, where she
is an assistant professor in the
division of infectious diseases
at the Medical University of
South Carolina. She grew up in
the Bay Area and had planned
to visit her parents there this
month.
Then the numbers surged. “I
decided not to travel,” she said
in mid-January. “I haven’t left
my house in the last four days.”
To assess risk, “you can’t
look at one particular piece of
information,” she said. “You
have to look at the entire thing.
... I totally get that this is hard
for everybody. But this is not
the time to travel. We all need
to be thinking not just about
ourselves, but everybody.”
Escaping the purple tier
Before Dr. Nancy Binkin
became a professor at the
Wertheim School of Public
Health and Human Longevity
Science at UC San Diego, she
lived for 12 years in Italy, doing
epidemiology training for the
Italian National Institute of
Health.
So when that country’s fatalities
soared in the early weeks
of the pandemic, followed by
escalating U.S. numbers, “it put
fear into me,” Binkin said. “I
have not been out of San Diego
County since March.”
One pandemic number she
watches closely is the adjusted
case rate. That count measures
the seven-day average of daily
new cases per 100,000 people
(jails and prisons excluded).
Any number above seven per
100,000 puts a county in the
state’s most dangerous category,
the purple tier. On Jan. 27,
California’s statewide rate was
71.6 per 100,000. Before she
travels, Binkin wants to see that
number below seven.
When it comes to flying, she
worries about jet cabins and tiny
bathrooms, but perhaps even
more, she worries about the
lines of people and gathering
points at airports, she said.
“Would I feel comfortable
going down to Mexico? No,”
she said. “I wouldn’t.”
About that second trip to
Mexico...
Dr. W. David Hardy, former
director of Cedars-Sinai
Medical Center’s infectious diseases
division and adjunct clinical
professor at USC’s Keck
School of Medicine, has mixed
feelings.
He’s angry about “rampant
disregard for science” and inconsistent
messaging under
the Trump administration. But
Hardy sees great hope in the
vaccines.
When he was treating HIV
patients during the grimmest
years of the 1980s, Hardy recalled,
there was no such cause
for encouragement.
“To have a vaccine [that prevents]
90-95 percent of people
from getting sick is amazing,”
Snow Removal
and
Tree Removal
and
Dog Waste
Removal
Hardy said. He suggests that the
vaccines are “going to be the
final answer,” especially if the
vaccines thwart transmission
of the virus as well as block
symptoms.
Yet “the metrics for measuring
transmission are ever changeable,
and it may be difficult
planning travel based on those,”
he said. “They are going to be
fluctuating for a while. I would
say from six months to a year.”
Since March, Hardy said, he
has scrubbed trips to Europe,
North Africa and Hawaii. But
in September, after California’s
first surge had passed, Hardy
and his partner flew to Los
Cabos, in Baja California,
Mexico, for a vacation. It went
well. So in December Hardy
and his partner flew again, this
time to Cancún and Playa del
Carmen on Mexico’s east coast,
where they found “the local
people there were using masks
religiously.”
The other visitors? Not so
much.
“I would say 50-60 percent of
the tourists were completely ignoring
the mask requirements.”
Most of them were
Americans, Hardy said, and he
began asking people to put on
their masks — or if they had no
mask, “to step away from where
I was standing.”
“The whole experience was
“confusing and disconcerting,”
he said. “When I got home from
my second trip to Mexico, I
turned to my partner and said,
‘This is not a good time to
travel.’ … People are not adhering
to what they should be
adhering to.”
In some respects, Hardy said,
that behavior reminds him of
the 1980s when HIV was new.
Then as now, he said, “until one
of your friends, family or work
associates dies of this disease,
you still look at it as a sort of
distant thing that doesn’t affect
you.”
Low Rates
Call • 781-718-2364
$1.98
Senior Citizens’ Price
PAYLESS OIL
All Cities and Towns
No Minimum. Senior & Veteran Discounts.
877-688-7667
Price subject to change
10
WEEKLYNEWS.NET - 978-532-5880 FEBRUARY 4, 2021
Sports
FILE PHOTO | OLIVIA FALCIGNO
Reilly Ganter was one of five seniors honored by the Peabody/
Lynnfield girls hockey team tbefore Friday’s win.
Peabody/Lynnfield girls
hockey stays hot with
win on Senior Night
By Mike Alongi
The Peabody/Lynnfield girls
hockey team celebrated its
Senior Night in style Friday
evening, notching a 4-1 win
over Northeastern Hockey
League foe Beverly/Danvers
at McVann-O’Keefe Memorial
Rink.
Before the game, the Tanners
honored their group of five
seniors — Jen Flynn, Paige
Thibedeau, Reilly Ganter, Elise
Local news in the palm of your hand
Full digital access for only $9.99 per month.
50% off your first month of digital access
when you use coupon code itemlive
at checkout at www.itemlive.com
Offer available to new subscribers only
Staunton and Chloe Shapleigh
— for their contributions to the
program.
Staunton and Flynn scored
one goal each in the win, as
did sophomore Jenna DiNapoli
and freshman Catie Kampersal.
Junior Catherine Sweeney and
sophomore Hannah Gromko
each had one assist.
Peabody/Lynnfield (6-1-0)
plays on the road at Marblehead
Saturday afternoon (4).
PHOTO | SPENSER HASAK
Lynnfield senior Luke Martinho scored 22 points to lead the way for the Pioneers in a win over
Ipswich Friday.
Lynnfield boys basketball
pulls away late to win
By Mike Alongi
LYNNFIELD — In what was
a back-and-forth game through
three quarters, the Lynnfield
boys basketball team was able
to pull away late and cruise to
a 66-53 win over Cape Ann
League foe Ipswich at home
Friday evening. The Pioneers
caught fire in the first four
minutes of the fourth quarter,
extending a three-point lead to
a 12-point lead in a matter of
minutes.
“This win was a total team effort,”
said Lynnfield coach John
Bakopolus. “We really moved
the ball well and got great
shots, especially in the second
half. The guys really committed
to not allowing second-chance
points and they did a great job
of limiting Ipswich.”
Luke Martinho led the way
for Lynnfield with 22 points,
including five 3-pointers. Jack
Ford added 14 points in the
win, while Alex Gentile scored
11 points.
Despite Lynnfield getting
out to a 7-2 lead in the opening
minutes of the game, Ipswich
rallied back quickly and the
game was a track meet from
there. After three ties and four
lead changes, the score stood
knotted at 15-15 after the first
quarter.
The second quarter was much
of the same, with the two teams
battling through four ties and
seven lead changes throughout
the frame. After Martinho
knocked down a 3-pointer at the
buzzer, Lynnfield took a 36-34
lead into the halftime break.
The third quarter was still a
fight, but the Pioneers started
to pull away a bit. Lynnfield
managed to stretch its lead to
as many as six points in the
quarter, eventually taking a
49-43 lead into the fourth.
That’s when the Pioneers
turned it on. Behind some
timely shooting and solid defensive
play, Lynnfield got itself
on a run and never looked
back. In the blink of an eye,
the Pioneers opened up a 15-
point lead midway through
the quarter and took complete
control. Lynnfield was able to
cruise to victory from there,
holding its double-digit lead
until the final buzzer sounded.
“The guys responded well to
the challenge,” said Bakopolus.
“Ipswich made a run and got to
within two, but then our guys
really flipped the switch and
went on a run of their own.
We’ve been playing well lately
and it was nice to see us turn it
on like that when we needed it.”
Lynnfield (3-5) will play its
penultimate game of the season
Thursday evening (6) at home
against Pentucket.
“We have two games left in
the season and we’re happy
with how we’re playing, so
we’re ready to take on whatever
is put in front of us,” said
Bakopolus.
FEBRUARY 4, 2021
WEEKLYNEWS.NET - 978-532-5880 11
HIGH SCHOOL SPORTS SCHEDULE
THURSDAY
Boys Basketball
Pentucket at Lynnfield (5:45)
Salem Academy at Bishop Fenwick (6:30)
Boys Hockey
Bishop Fenwick at Pope Francis (7:40)
FRIDAY
Boys Basketball
Peabody at Winthrop (6)
Bishop Fenwick at Austin Prep (6:30)
Girls Basketball
Winthrop at Peabody (7)
Boys Hockey
Danvers at Peabody (5:15)
SATURDAY
Boys Basketball
Salem Academy vs. Bishop Fenwick
(1:30)
Girls Basketball
Bishop Fenwick at Dexter Southfield
(2:30)
Boys Hockey
North Reading at Lynnfield (12)
Arlington Catholic at Bishop Fenwick (7)
Girls Hockey
Peabody/Lynnfield at Marblehead (4)
St. Mary’s at Bishop Fenwick (6:20)
Swimming
Salem, Swampscott at Peabody (4)
Gymnastics
Bishop Fenwick at Beverly (1:30)
Danvers at Peabody (5:30)
SUNDAY
Girls Hockey
Shawsheen Tech at Bishop Fenwick (9)
Gymnastics
Peabody at Gloucester (4)
MONDAY
Boys Basketball
Austin Prep at Bishop Fenwick (6:30)
Girls Basketball
Bishop Fenwick at Austin Prep (4:30)
Rockport at Lynnfield (5:45)
TUESDAY
Boys Basketball
Peabody at Beverly (6)
Girls Basketball
Beverly at Peabody (7)
Swampscott at Winthrop (7)
WEDNESDAY
Boys Basketball
Bishop Fenwick at Arlington Catholic
(6:30)
Girls Basketball
Arlington Catholic at Bishop Fenwick
(6:30)
Boys Hockey
Swampscott at Peabody (5:15)
Bishop Fenwick at Archbishop Williams
(7)
Triton at Lynnfield (8:15)
Girls Hockey
Peabody/Lynnfield at Winthrop (6:10)
Bishop Fenwick at St. Mary’s (7)
FILE PHOTO | SPENSER HASAK
Jack Ford (right) and the Lynnfield football team are looking forward to hopefully returning to
the field for practice starting Feb. 22.
Local football coaches looking
ahead to a season after all
By Mike Alongi
Following Friday afternoon’s
unanimous decision to approve
the safety modifications that
will allow for a football season
starting in late February, football
coaches across the North Shore
kicked their preparations into
high gear. With just 20 days until
practices are officially allowed
to begin, the time has come to
put the pedal to the medal. The
current plan is for football to
run during the “Fall Sports II”
season, which will take place
from Feb. 22 to April 25.
“Our guys couldn’t be more
excited,” said Bishop Fenwick
football coach David Woods,
who also serves as Fenwick’s
athletic director. “We’ve been
trying to prepare for this for
awhile now, but it was still uncertain
which way it was going
to go. Now that we know we
have a path forward, we’re ready
to hit the ground running.”
“The biggest positive in all
of this is that the kids are going
to get a chance to play, and for
that we’re all very grateful,” said
Peabody football coach Mark
Bettencourt. “It looks like we’ll
be able to play a seven- or eightweek
season, and as coaches
that’s everything we could’ve
asked for under the circumstances.
It’s going to be great
for the players, especially the
seniors.”
“This has been a long time
coming and everyone in our
community is so excited,” said
Lynnfield football coach Pat
Lamusta. “We’re fortunate that
here in Lynnfield, hockey and
basketball have gone really
smoothly and I think it’s giving
everyone confidence that we’ll
be able to safely have football as
well.”
While individual school districts
will still need to approve
football and other sports for
the “Fall Sports II” season, the
working theory is that schools
currently playing during the
winter season — including
schools in the Northeastern
Conference, Catholic Central
League and Cape Ann League
— will likely approve sports for
“Fall Sports II.”
Some programs, such as
Greater Boston League schools
Lynn English, Lynn Classical
and Revere, will have a delayed
start to football and other sports
due to the GBL’s adjusted sports
calendar. Those schools are
planning to start football practices
on March 1 at the earliest,
with games coming during a sixweek
season from April 12 to
May 15.
Unlike other fall sports such as
soccer and field hockey, football
won’t be seeing drastic changes
to its on-field rules. Many of the
modifications involve sideline
and bench procedures. Some of
the modifications that will be put
in place for this season are:
— Masks must be worn at all
times. Neck gaiter masks will
not be allowed for football.
— There will be no locker
room use for any teams.
— The “team box” on the
sideline will be extended to the
10-yard line to allow sufficient
space for social distancing.
— The maximum number of
players on a game-day roster
will be 45, and there will be six
coaches allowed per team.
— Timeouts will be held at
the 25-yard line.
— Indoor practices will not
be allowed under any circumstances,
including inside field
houses, bubbles or gyms.
“I think the biggest issue for
us as a team is going to be the
roster limits, because we anticipate
having 80 guys come
out for the team this year,” said
Woods. “But at the same time,
everyone has to deal with it and
we’ll adjust accordingly.”
At the end of the day, last
week’s news mostly just brought
relief and excitement that a football
season will be allowed to
happen after all.
“When I told my seniors, I
think some of them didn’t even
know whether to believe me or
not,” said Lamusta. “They were
strung along a bit in the summer
about the fall season and then
that was taken away, and I think
they really weren’t sure if they
were going to be able to play.
Now, our guys get a chance to go
out there and compete and leave
a legacy behind.”
“Now that we have this decision,
we can refocus ourselves
and really get moving on preparing
for the season,” said
Bettencourt. “You can deal with
snow or cold weather, but you
can’t deal with not being allowed
to play. Since we’ve gotten over
that hurdle, it’s time to get ready
to play again.”
“A lot of our guys have been
working out for football since
the day after the (2019 Division
6) Super Bowl, so it’s been
more than a year since we’ve
been on the field,” said Woods,
whose Crusaders finished as
the Division 6 runner-up that
year. “We have 18 seniors on
our team and a lot of them have
been playing since they were
freshmen, so to be able to give
them one final season of playing
with their brothers is a great
thing.”
FILE PHOTO | JOE BROWN
Grace Klonsky had nine points and four rebounds for the
Pioneers in a win over Manchester-Essex last Wednesday.
Lynnfield girls basketball
earns second straight victory
By Mike Alongi
MANCHESTER — The
Lynnfield girls basketball team
won its second game in as
many days Wednesday evening,
notching a 39-27 victory
over Cape Ann League foe
Manchester-Essex on the road.
With the win, the Pioneers move
back to an even .500 on the
season.
“It’s exciting that we’ve been
able to fight back to get to this
point where we can kind of reset
and take on the last part of the
season,” said Lynnfield coach
Jeannine Cavallaro. “We faced
a few powerhouses early in the
season and we weren’t playing
great, but lately we’ve really
started to come into our own.
We were a little flat at times
(Wednesday), but we came out
ready to play and we fought the
whole way.”
Senior captain Ava Buonfiglio
led the way for Lynnfield with
13 points and four rebounds,
while senior captain Grace
Klonsky had nine points and
four rebounds. Senior captain
Caroline Waisnor had eight
points and six rebounds, while
sophomore Isabella George had
seven points and three rebounds.
Juniors Abby Adamo and Riley
Hallahan each had six rebounds
in the win.
The Pioneers came out like
they were fired out of a cannon
in the first quarter, sprinting out
to a 13-0 lead in the opening
minutes of the game. After
taking a 15-2 lead into the start
of the second quarter, Lynnfield
looked to be in complete control.
While the Pioneers continued
to hold onto an eight-point lead
midway through the second
quarter, Manchester-Essex continued
to battle back. By halftime,
the Pioneers only led by
six points at 21-15.
But in the third quarter,
Lynnfield started to pull away
again. The Pioneers locked down
on defense and pushed their lead
back to 11 points, eventually
taking a 10-point lead into the
final quarter before coasting to
a victory.
“We showed a lot of grit in
this win,” Cavallaro said. “Even
though we led wire-to-wire, we
still had to battle to get out of a
rut and hold on to win the game.
I really liked the mentality that
we came with.”
Lynnfield (3-3) travels to
Ipswich Friday evening (5:45).
“We’re excited for what we
can do the rest of the way this
year,” said Cavallaro. “We’re
starting to hit our stride and I
think we’re starting to gain some
confidence, and hopefully we
can continue to ride this positive
wave.”
12
WEEKLYNEWS.NET - 978-532-5880 FEBRUARY 4, 2021
PHOTOS | SPENSER HASAK
Skull Cliff is a 30-foot cliff located in the abandoned Kallenberg
Quarry in Lynnfield. Rocks located around the cliif are covered
in graffiti and art including colorful skulls and bones that
have stood the test of time after being painted by an anonymous
artist, “Ichabod,” in 2001.
Where the
writing’s on
the wall
By Daniel Kane
Thousands of cars drive
by the Kelly Jeep dealership
on Route 1 in Lynnfield everyday,
but the lot isn’t just
filled with new cars. Almost
hidden in the back is a
parking spot only big enough
for several cars at a time,
spaces for those heading
into the long abandoned
Kallenberg Quarry.
Lynnfield nature enthusiasts
may think of other spots
when they want to get away
for a hike or a walk, but
Kallenberg, also known as
Bow Ridge Reservation, is a
backyard spot good enough
to scratch the itch.
The reservation is certainly
no secret to local mountain
bikers. The rocky trails
lining the woods have been
known as some of the best
around, including some interesting
names like “Awesome
Sauce,” “Chicken Soup” and
“Wicked Hard Trail.”
Filled with blocks of
granite, once harvested to
construct buildings in the
surrounding area, the vast
woods is also home to the
town’s highest point in a 30-
foot tall mound of rock.
That point is remarkable
for a different reason as well
and you’ll know it when you
see it. The rock is tiered with
worn-down graffiti depicting
blue, green and red skulls.
Fittingly named Skull Rock,
the graffiti has been there for
more almost two decades and
while it’s been the victim of
some unwelcome additions
in the form of spray-paint
over the years, it’s become
an unofficial monument for
hikers.
On the other side of the
rock, the artist responsible
for the macabre mural calls
his or herself Ichabod — although
the signature has been
covered with spray paint over
the years. A quote on the rock
reads, “Take the knowledge
that you will someday be
these bones and enjoy now
all that is precious.”
The wall of bones is even
featured in the book Weird
Massachusetts.
Taking a path to the top of
the rock provides a few unlike
any other in town where
on a clear day you can see
the Boston skyline and the
tops of the apartments at
Lynnfield Commons.
FEBRUARY 4, 2021
WEEKLYNEWS.NET - 978-532-5880 13
Cancer treatment crosses a frontier
Harold Brubaker
The Philadelphia
Inquirer
PHILADELPHIA – As she
fights cancer, Lisa Oney is not
shackled to a hospital bed for days
at a time, stuck there while she is
infused with chemotherapy drugs.
She’s undergoing chemo at
home — even on the move. At
times, the life-saving medicine is
flowing into her as she drives to
make curbside pickups at Target.
Thanks to a new program at
Penn Medicine, Oney, 33, carries
her chemotherapy medicine in a
backpack with a small pump that
feeds the drug into her body. “I’m
able to walk around, and take care
of my kids,” she said. “I can go
places.”
Typically, her particular regimen
of chemotherapy would require
several five-day stays in the hospital
spread over 18 weeks. The
trouble was, Oney needed to be
home in Souderton to care for her
3-month-old son and 3-year-old
daughter.
“I couldn’t do that,” she said,
referring to the hospital visits.
“My husband wouldn’t be able to
work.”
Because of COVID-19, Oney
and her husband, Kevin O’Driscoll,
also can’t accept help from friends
and coworkers. The risk of her
catching the coronavirus or something
else is too great.
Chemotherapy at home is a
rising trend, driven by patient convenience
and the widespread fear
of hospitals during the pandemic.
But as much as patients love it,
antiquated health-care billing systems,
especially in Medicare, remain
a formidable obstacle to the
practice.
Penn’s shift of some chemotherapy
treatments to home started
on a small scale before the pandemic,
but then took off, according
to Justin Bekelman, the radiation
oncologist who directs the Penn
Center for Cancer Care Innovation
Under the at-home process, Penn
nurses drive to patients’ residences
to set up the complex lines and
do the injections involved in the
cancer treatment, which in Oney’s
case continues for days. After that,
the backpack-wearing patients are
free to go about their lives.
Bekelman said that Penn had
good reasons to launch the effort.
“It’s obviously patient-centric and
will enhance patients’ experience
of cancer treatment,” he said, “but
also our infusion suites were all full
up.”
Most experts see the move as
positive for employers and taxpayers,
who pay much of the cost
of health care. Insurers pay less for
patients who choose an at-home
option as opposed to infusion at
their main facility or even a specialist’s
office.
Aetna, a major health insurer
in the Philadelphia region, said
last year that a single infusion of
a specialty drug in a hospital, even
on an outpatient basis, costs more
PHOTO | PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER
Lisa Oney juggles her chemotherapy treatment bag on her right shoulder and three-month-old
Jack O’Driscoll in her left arm while daughter Fiona O’Driscoll, 3, has a snack in the kitchen.
than $20,000. The savings from
moving it to an independent outpatient
center can exceed 50%, it
said. Home treatments save about
the same, experts said.
But chemo in the home means
much less money for hospitals,
Bekelman noted, making it harder
to expand the treatments.
“We need a payment model that
keeps health-care providers whole
irrespective of where we deliver
the treatment,” he said. “That’s a
crucial incentive for health systems
to invest in providing more care at
home and other less expensive locations
— a shift that should ultimately
save insurers money.”
A more logical payment system
would promote changes such as inhome
chemotherapy. And there has
been some movement in that direction,
said Larry Levitt, a health
policy scholar at the Kaiser Family
Foundation. One approach would
be to uncouple insurance payments
from specific procedures, he said.
“The concept is to pay providers
a flat amount for certain patients or
conditions,” Levitt said, “and let
the providers figure out the best
way to deliver care, keeping any
savings they realize.”
He added: “The key is to build
in safeguards to prevent providers
from skimping on care.”
Not a new concept
Since at least the mid-1990s,
home health care companies have
talked about providing in-home
chemotherapy, but little has come
of it.
John Sprandio, an oncologist
with offices in Delaware and
Chester Counties, welcomes athome
chemotherapy, but cautions
that it is actually more costly to
provide than many realize.
“In terms of efficiency,”
Sprandio said, “it’s obviously more
cost-effective to administer these
drugs for the majority of patients in
a group setting where you have a
team of a dozen nurses and 28 or
30 treatment areas that’s equipped
to handle anything.”
Meanwhile, major trade associations
such as the American Society
of Clinical Oncology and the
Community Oncology Alliance
have formally opposed the practice.
In statements last year, they
cited a fear that patients might have
a bad drug reaction with no doctors
nearby.
Richard Snyder, chief medical
officer for the parent company of
Independent Blue Cross, said he
was convinced that the trend was
safe.
“Physicians and hospitals tend
to be creatures of habit,” Snyder
said. “We keep doing what seems
to work for us, and so we’re not inclined
to change our habit of giving
the medication in a hospital or a
higher-cost setting.”
Snyder described Penn as being
at the forefront of moving chemotherapy
to the home, where the patient
is probably as safe as possible
from exposure to COVID-19 and
other infections.
Penn’s Cancer Care at Home
program ramped up from 39 patients
in March to more than 300
within a month as patients were
eager to avoid hospitals. In all of
last year, nearly 1,500 Penn patients
received in-home chemo.
Currently, patients with breast
cancer, prostate cancer and lymphoma
are candidates for the program,
Bekelman said. Penn hopes
to add patients with lung cancer,
head and neck cancers, and others,
but that depends on higher reimbursements
and other changes to
insurance plans.
Bekelman said the goal wasn’t
to transfer all cancer care, but to
establish that it can be done safely
off premises.
He noted that there were some
limits because the risk of side effects
was too severe with some
chemo drugs.
Other Philadelphia-area providers
of cancer care are not as
active. Jefferson Health’s Sidney
Kimmel Cancer Center has helped
only 50 or so in-home patients in
recent years. Fox Chase Cancer
Center said it has no plans to join
the trend. Nor does MD Anderson
Cancer Center at Cooper hospital
in Camden.
Nationally, CVS Health has
joined Penn in trying to move
more chemotherapy treatments to
homes. This month, CVS, which
owns Aetna, announced that its
infusion unit, Coram, would work
with Cancer Treatment Centers
of America to do that, starting in
Atlanta.
The insurance problem
Limiting wider adoption of inhome
chemotherapy is a legacy
payment system that provides
much larger reimbursement
when the treatments are done at a
hospital.
Comparisons for such costs at
different sites are hard to find. But
a 2019 report showed that the average
claim for an injection of infliximab,
used to treat autoimmune
diseases, was about $3,100 in a
physician’s office, compared with
$5,800 in a hospital’s outpatient
department. Bekelman said that
the same pattern holds for chemotherapy
drugs and that reimbursement
at home is similar to in a physician’s
office.
Jefferson’s Sidney Kimmel
Cancer Center has received widely
varying reimbursement rates for
home infusion. Some plans reimburse
“on par with on-site infusion,
Offer available to new subscribers only
while others reimburse at very
low levels or not at all,” Karen E.
Knudsen, a top oncology expert at
Jefferson, said in an email.
Timothy Kubal, an oncologist
who directs the infusion center
at the Moffit Cancer Center in
Tampa, Fla., predicted that much
more cancer care could be provided
in the home within a decade,
“but in between now and then,
there’s going to be a lot of conversation
about what’s the right rate.”
The patient’s perspective
The bulk of the cancer patients
Penn has been treating at home —
instead of at an infusion center —
are receiving injections for breast
and prostate cancer. Penn Home
Infusion nurses work around the
patients’ schedules to they don’t
have to lose time at jobs, Bekelman
said.
Avoiding a hospital stay, as
Oney, the patient from Souderton,
is doing, is an even bigger deal
during the pandemic.
“We have generally seen
that being in the hospital can be
tough, no family, food is different.
Depression can set in, so overall
I think this is a good trend if patients
can manage at home,” said
Kelly Harris, CEO of the nonprofit
Cancer Support Community
Greater Philadelphia.
Oney was diagnosed with lymphoma
in November, just two
weeks after her son was born.
Before she began receiving steady
treatment at home, she was given
her first round of chemo in the hospital
to ensure that she didn’t have
an adverse reaction.
There was none. But on one later
evening, Oney, a neonatal nurse
at Grand View Hospital in upper
Bucks County, got a headache as
soon as the infusion started — possibly
because she had forgotten to
take the medication out of the refrigerator
ahead of time.
Oney got a quick response from
Penn’s on-call oncologist, who told
her to take ibuprofen. “It’s all very
connected,” she said.
Although being home doesn’t
head off the miserable side effects
of chemotherapy, she considers it
a blessing to avoid those overnight
hospital says.
Local news on your doorstep
Home delivery starts at only $4.50 per week.
50% off your first month of home delivery
when you use coupon code dailyitem
at checkout at www.itemlive.com
14
WEEKLYNEWS.NET - 978-532-5880 FEBRUARY 4, 2021
PHOTO | SPENSER HASAK
State Sen. Brendan Crighton is a strong proponent for climate
change legislation.
Landmark
climate change
bill awaits
Baker’s approval
By Guthrie Scrimgeour
BOSTON – The
Massachusetts State Senate
and House of Representatives
has passed legislation that,
if approved by Governor
Charlie Baker, would overhaul
state climate laws, drive
down greenhouse gas emissions,
create clean-energy
jobs, and protect environmental
justice communities.
“I am proud to have contributed
meaningful language
to the new law and
hope that other states look
to what we are doing here as
a blueprint for meaningful
action,” said Representative
Lori Ehrlich, D-Marblehead,
after the measure was passed
Thursday. “We owe a livable
planet to future generations.”
The bill, An Act Creating
a Next-Generation Roadmap
for Massachusetts Climate
Policy, was passed by the
legislature but vetoed by
Baker at the end of the last
legislative session due to disagreements
about building
codes and the timeline for
emission reductions.
“I hope that he reconsiders
his position, and we’ll certainly
review what he sends
over to us,” said Senator
Brendan Crighton, D-Lynn.
“It’s a strong bill. We want to
lead the country in emissions
reduction, and we stand by
the goals that we set.”
Notably, the legislation
would set a statewide netzero
limit on greenhouse gas
emissions by 2050 and mandate
emissions limits every
five years, as well as limits
for specific sectors of the
economy like transport and
buildings.
The legislation would also
increase the requirements
for offshore wind energy
procurement, require emission
reduction goals for
MassSave, the state’s energy
efficiency program, establish
the criteria in statutes that
define environmental justice
populations, increase support
for clean-energy workforce
development programs, and
improve gas-pipeline safety.
The focus on gas-pipeline
safety comes after a series
of gas explosions rocked the
Merrimack Valley in 2018,
killing 18-year-old Leonel
Rondon.
The National Safety
Transportation Board reported
that the explosion
came as a result of inadequate
management and poor
oversight that led to a castiron
pipe being improperly
abandoned by Columbia Gas,
which owned the pipelines.
The measures in the bill
include increased fines for
safety violations and regulations
related to training and
certifying utility contractors.
“(I’m) proud to join my
legislative colleagues to reenact
the climate bill that
would take swift and substantive
action to protect
our planet,” said Senator
Joan B. Lovely, D-Salem.
“Thank you to Senate
President (Karen) Spilka,
House Speaker (Robert)
Mariano, Senator (Michael)
Barrett and Representative
(Thomas) Golden for their
LEGAL NOTICE
MORTGAGEE'S SALE OF REAL ESTATE
By virtue of and in execution of the Power of Sale contained in a certain mortgage
given by Senka Huskic and Nidzad Huskic to Mortgage Electronic Registration
Systems, Inc, as mortgagee, acting solely as nominee for Mortgage Master, Inc.,
dated February 27, 2004 and recorded in Essex County (Southern District)
Registry of Deeds in Book 22443, Page 495 (the "Mortgage") of which mortgage
U.S. Bank Trust National Association as trustee of Tiki Series IV Trust is the present
holder by Assignment from Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, Inc. to Ixis
Real Estate Capital Inc. dated July 15, 2010 and recorded at said Registry of
Deeds in Book 29606, Page 359, and Corrective Assignment from Mortgage
Electronic Registration Systems, Inc. to Natixis Real Estate Capital, Inc. f/k/a Ixis
Real Estate Capital, Inc. dated May 16, 2018 and recorded at said Registry of
Deeds in Book 36766, Page 432, and Assignment from Ixis Real Estate Capital,
Inc. to Homeward Residential, Inc. dated August 14, 2012 and recorded at said
Registry of Deeds in Book 31755, Page 220, and Corrective Assignment from
Natixis Estate Holdings LLC, successor in interest by merger to Natixis Real Estate
Capital, Inc. f/k/a Ixis Real Estate Capital, Inc. to Homeward Residential, Inc.
dated August 8, 2018 and recorded at said Registry of Deeds in Book 36965,
Page 373, and Assignment from Bank of America, N.A., successor by merger to
BAC Home Loans Servicing LP f/k/a Countrywide Home Loans Servicing, LP to
American Home Mortgage Servicing, Inc. dated May 29, 2012 and recorded at
said Registry of Deeds in Book 31806, Page 86, and Assignment from Homeward
Residential, Inc., FKA American Home Mortgage Servicing, Inc. to Nationstar
Mortgage LLC dated November 3, 2015 and recorded at said Registry of Deeds in
Book 34792, Page 373, and Assignment from Nationstar Mortgage LLC to MTGLQ
Investors, L. P. dated January 18, 2017 and recorded at said Registry of Deeds in
Book 35812, Page 38, and Assignment from MTGLQ Investors, L. P. to U.S. Bank
Trust National Association as trustee of Tiki Series IV Trust dated February 11,
2020 and recorded at said Registry of Deeds in Book 38274, Page 173, and
Assignment from MTGLQ Investors, L. P. to U.S. Bank Trust National Association as
trustee of Tiki Series IV Trust dated April 28, 2020 and recorded at said Registry of
Deeds in Book 38618, Page 473, for breach of conditions of said mortgage and
for the purpose of foreclosing the same, the mortgaged premises located at 20
Beacon Boulevard, Peabody, MA 01960 will be sold at a Public Auction at 11:00
AM on February 17, 2021, at the mortgaged premises, more particularly described
below, all and singular the premises described in said mortgage, to wit:
The land in said Peabody, with the buildings thereon, being all of Lots 153 and a
ten foot strip of the southeast side of Lot 152 on Plan of Thomas Villa, C.A. Thayer,
Engr., May, 1907, recorded with Essex South District Registry of Deeds, Book of
Plans 16, Plan 7.
Said premises are more particularly bounded and described as follows:
Northeast by Beacon Boulevard, sixty (60) feet;
Southeast by Lot 154 on said plan, eighty seven and 14/100 (87.14) feet;
Southwest by Lot 174 and 175 on said plan, sixty (60) feet; and
Northwest by the remaining part of Lot 152, about eighty six and 72/100 (86.72)
feet.
Said premises are conveyed subject to and with the benefit of easements,
reservations, restrictions and rights of way of record so far as the same are now in
force and applicable.
For mortgagor's title see deed recorded with the Essex County (Southern District)
Registry of Deeds in Book 22443, Page 493.
The premises will be sold subject to any and all unpaid taxes and other municipal
assessments and liens, and subject to prior liens or other enforceable
encumbrances of record entitled to precedence over this mortgage, and subject to
and with the benefit of all easements, restrictions, reservations and conditions of
record and subject to all tenancies and/or rights of parties in possession.
Terms of the Sale: Cashier's or certified check in the sum of $5,000.00 as a
deposit must be shown at the time and place of the sale in order to qualify as a
bidder (the mortgage holder and its designee(s) are exempt from this
requirement); high bidder to sign written Memorandum of Sale upon acceptance of
bid; balance of purchase price payable by certified check in thirty (30) days from
the date of the sale at the offices of mortgagee's attorney, Korde & Associates,
P.C., 900 Chelmsford Street, Suite 3102, Lowell, MA 01851 or such other time as
may be designated by mortgagee. The description for the premises contained in
said mortgage shall control in the event of a typographical error in this publication.
Other terms to be announced at the sale.
U.S. Bank Trust National Association as trustee of Tiki Series IV Trust
Korde & Associates, P.C.
900 Chelmsford Street
Suite 3102
Lowell, MA 01851
(978) 256-1500
Huskic, Nidzad and Senka, 12-009570
Item: January 21, 2021 and Weekly News: January 28 and February 4 2021
The Leonard Co.
Residential Window
& Screen Cleaning
Yard clean-ups
Gutter cleaning
Power Washing
Comp. Clean-outs
Graffiti removal
theleonardco.com
Call 617.512.7849
for a FREE estimate
or email: fondinib@aol.com
If you need it clean,
we’re on the scene...
• CARPENTRY • TILE
• PAINTING
978-314-4191
LICENSED & INSURED
amoutsoulashomeimprovementservices.com
Follow us
on Facebook
978-979-4071
Removals, Pruning,
Stump Grinding
Fully Insured
Paul DeNisco
Mason Contractor
Brick • Block • Stone
Concrete • Tile
978-532-4066
Repairs - Big or Small
Another great way to place
your Item classified ad...
Bring
it in!
110 Munroe St., Lynn
Open Monday-Friday 8-5
leadership in creating a path
to a greener and more sustainable
future.”
“As a member of the
House Green Recovery
Task Force, we heard the
demands of constituents,
businesses, and environmental
groups throughout
the Commonwealth to fight
climate change and create
much-needed green employment
opportunities in the
wake of Coronavirus,” said
Representative Daniel Cahill
(D-Lynn).
The bill would create new
jobs in renewable energy by
providing incentives to install
solar technology and
requiring additional wind
power.
“I was proud to vote with
the state delegation on a bill
that addresses the terrible
effects of climate change
we have been enduring,”
said Representative Peter
Capano, D-Lynn. “And that
also provides workforce
development provisions
for workers that will be
needed as these changes are
instituted.”
The bill now sits on
Governor Baker’s desk,
awaiting his approval.
FEBRUARY 4, 2021
Christopher Borrelli
Chicago Tribune
CHICAGO — “I still have
to face these people,” Christie
Tate says, tugging her pandemic
mask into place, then sinking
her head into the pillowy folds
of her long black parka. “Twice
a week!”
Wind runs off the lake and
across Hyde Park; it’s colder
than expected, grayer and flatter.
“The problem is,” she continues,
“I’m a people pleaser.
And I want everyone to always
like me, and when you write a
memoir, that’s just, uh — that’s
not the standard, I suppose. Then
again, this is a unique book,
about a unique process. So there
was no standard.”
We found a park bench near
her home, the chill ebbed.
Tate, a Chicago-based lawyer
for the federal government, and
now bestselling author, is casual,
easy to talk to, accommodating.
She feels like someone
you could confide in. She’s
far from the hot mess depicted
in her memoir, “Group: How
One Therapist and a Circle of
Strangers Saved My Life.” It’s
a portrait of Tate as a flailing
young lawyer, unsure if she deserves
love, eager to be loved,
self-pitying, haunted by imposter
syndrome, a loose canon
primed for bad decisions, going
from bad boyfriend to worse
boyfriend. Reese Witherspoon,
who picked “Group” for her online
book club, tweeted: “Have
you ever read a book that made
you want to hug the author?”
Tate’s only anchor in “Group”
is the ongoing group therapy
session she joins in the Loop,
run by a Dr. Jonathan Rosen.
Before joining, she imagines the
newly divorced doctor’s heart as
“a red grammar school cutout for
Valentine’s Day with hash marks
etched across the surface .... But
then a twist: a second chance
at love with a new wife.” Tate
comes off as needy, and even
pathetic at times, and the book,
at first, reads like a treatment for
a darkest ever Hallmark Channel
movie. But then, it gets darker.
By the end of “Group,” Tate is
phoning Rosen at all hours and
screaming messages into his
voicemail, lashing out at the
group — and slowly improving.
But here’s what doesn’t
happen: The expected moment
where Tate leaves the group,
healed.
In the book, Tate changed the
name of her therapist (his name
is not “Dr. Rosen”), and she
changed the names and some
of the details of the members of
her therapy session. But as ugly
as “Group” gets — and it gets
nakedly, frothing-at-the-mouth
uncomfortable — Tate is still a
part of this group. That therapist
she writes about — at times with
a slight sexual longing — is still
WEEKLYNEWS.NET - 978-532-5880 15
Christie Tate talks “Group”
her therapist. They all meet on
Zoom these days, but they are
still together, twice a week.
The literary memoir genre
— nay, the explosive-memoir
genre, the sort of tell-all that’s
full of revelations and unsightly
personal details, the kind where
every bridge behind the author is
burning — often comes with an
assumption of distance between
author and main characters.
Someone’s dead, someone’s
history, someone’s left, someone’s
never spoken to again.
Otherwise, how does an author
go on living?
The answer is, very carefully.
The great Chicago essayist
Megan Stielstra, who has written
extensively about her family
and friends, told me: “A lot of
memoirists live by that famous
Anne Lamott line that ‘If people
wanted you to write warmly
about them, they should have
behaved better,’ but for me at
least, there are relationships that
are sacred. And I am just not interested
in putting it all out there
into the world. The only thing
we owe anyone in the world is
to be a good person, and telling
every detail about my life isn’t
necessary to that goal.”
The group therapy sessions
Tate recounts in “Group” have
been going on a couple of decades
now. She’s a lifer, she said.
Despite having written about
them, she has no plans to leave
them.
Still, again, you have to
wonder: How do you write so
freely about the people with
whom you share your ugliest
self — and who share their
lowest points with you — when
you still have those relationships
and see each other all the
time? Tate’s answer was unusual
for a memoir writer: Soon after
starting “Group” in 2015, she
allowed everyone in her group
— including her therapist — to
read drafts and request changes.
Anything in those drafts they
didn’t want in, she took out.
Which cuts to the foundational
heart of a memoir:
Whose story is it anyway?
One group member asked not
to be included at all in Tate’s book
— disguised or otherwise — and
Tate agreed. “So other members
of the group confronted me:
‘She gets a pass and I have to
be in your book?’ Which is fair.”
In the end, none asked her to
change a thing — only the wife
of a member, who had access to
a draft and requested two details
come out. (Tate agreed.) It could
have been worse — the group
could have decided they didn’t
want to be written about after
all, and likely, Tate might have
pulled the book entirely. Before
publication, when she attended
writing conferences and workshops
and told teachers about
this deal, they mostly flinched.
Tate had, as she explained it herself,
“promised away my right to
tell my own story.”
“I made a lot of mistakes,” she
says now, “and I got lucky.”
Still, she adds, “I’ve talked to
so many writers who are like ‘I
can’t do this kind of writing — I
can’t write what I want to write
until my parents die.’ I understand,
I couldn’t do this if (the
members of the group) didn’t
have veto power. But a friend of
mine is writing a book about her
son’s suicide and she’s worried
about betraying him, and he’s
dead. It’s not that I think artists
should do whatever they want
whenever, but they should have
more choices. I could be wrong.”
Writers of memoirs, indeed,
rarely agree on questions of
privacy and propriety. Each
approaches writing about the
people in their lives somewhat
differently than the next.
“I don’t give people veto
power over my work,” said Kim
Brooks, a Chicago writer whose
2018 book, “Small Animals,”
recounted the fallout of a splitsecond
decision to leave her
4-year-old son alone in the car
while she ran into a store. “You
don’t have to try to be hated if
you write about your life, but depending
a situation, you do have
to be willing to be hated.”
Brooks teaches a memoir-writing
class for the
Ravenswood workshop
StoryStudio. “The most
common question I hear is,
‘How do I write this if I know
it will kill my mother?’ My answer
is, ‘It’s hard.’ When I was
writing ‘Small Animals,’ near
the end of the process, I went
through it with a lawyer. You
stop at every place you mention
someone: Is there anything they
might find objectionable? At one
point, she asked: ‘Are you sure
your mother won’t sue?’ And my
mother is one of the most fun
characters in the book! But see,
our stories are subjective experiences.
Your story interacts with
others, so you have an ethical
responsibility to consider how it
affects them.”
When a memoir upsets, the
result can rival whatever fireworks
are found in the book
itself.
Karl Ove Knausgaard, the
Norwegian bestselling author
of the six-part “My Struggle”
books (published as fiction,
but a thinner-than-thinly veiled
autobiography), was threatened
with lawsuits from family
members, many of whom refuse
to talk to him now. Augusten
Burroughs settled a $2 million
lawsuit brought by subjects in
his bestseller “Running With
Scissors.” Mary Karr, whose
1995 memoir “The Liars’ Club”
is often credited with popularizing
contemporary memoir, understands
so well the fickleness
of memory and perspective that
whenever she teaches memoir
writing at Syracuse University,
she stages a fight inside the
classroom between herself and
an instructor; then asks students
to write about what happened.
Karr sends drafts to anyone she
writes about; she’s doesn’t trust
her memory.
When Pulitzer Prize-winning
critic Margo Jefferson was
writing her acclaimed 2015
memoir “Negroland,” about
growing up as a member of
Chicago’s Black bourgeoisie, “I
made a decision that I would not
use the names of people who I
went to elementary school and
high school with. Their names
belong to them. But their stories,
those are part of my story.
I approached this question a
bit differently based on degree
of closeness and intimacy. My
mother, she knew she was a
character in it and would periodically
say she’s a private person
— she preferred the sanctity
of her Chicago life. She had
reservations, so I showed her
portions of the book where she
appeared, to set her at ease. You
have to consider with great care
what might be an emotional violation.
You do get some degree
of license with family, but it’s
tricky.”
“The Survivors: A Story of
War, Inheritance and Healing,”
the 2019 memoir by former
Barack Obama speechwriter
Adam Frankel, was partly about
Frankel’s discovery that his father
was not his biological father.
But he made a decision not to
publish while his grandparents
(whom he assumes did not know
this) were living. Other family
members ”expressed concern
about what I was writing about
and called and lobbied not to
include certain details and facts
of our family — things I thought
were important. I was grappling
with secrets, knowing they have
repercussions.”
He didn’t give them the option
of changing anything.
Gina Frangello, a Chicago
novelist whose infidelity to her
(now ex-) husband is the backbone
of the upcoming memoir
“Blow Your House Down,” said
circumstances helped: Her parents
are dead, she has no contact
with her former husband (a character
in the book), her children
“kind of don’t care” and her current
husband (a character in the
book) is a writer himself. She
offered her kids (”to the point of
annoyance”) a chance to weigh
in. Her husband, also given the
option, told her to tell the story
she intended to tell. “He understands
if you’re trying to please
everyone, it’s not an honest
book. At the same time, I was
willing to look just as harshly at
myself as at everyone. The one
person who should be cringing
the most because of a memoir is
the memoirist.” But just before
the divorce was finalized, her
ex-husband introduced a curveball
to the settlement: Frangello
could never write about him,
their marriage or children. She
refused.
“In the end,” she writes, “our
divorce went through without a
caveat.”
The irony of Christie Tate allowing
the subjects of “Group”
such significant veto power over
her writing is that, a couple of
years ago, for the Washington
Post, Tate wrote an essay about
her daughter, who had asked
her mother not to write about
her anymore. Tate expected this,
but she still didn’t know how to
respond. Eventually, she agreed
to show her daughter what she
was writing, but she refused to
avoid motherhood or having a
daughter as a subject itself. The
essay — partly because of subsequent
online anger towards
Tate’s decision — became a
viral smash.
Privacy, she says now, reflecting,
“is a conversation that
lacks nuance.”
And yet privacy — specifically,
invasion of privacy — was
the natural concern while writing
“Group.” According to Amy
Cook, a Chicago lawyer who
works often with writers, defamation
and invasion of privacy
lawsuits are the biggest fears of
memoirists. The latter, though, is
particularly hard to prove: Any
irritated character in a memoir
must show that the contested
material in a book is outside of
the “public concern,” and yet
judges have ruled that proof of
public concern can include publication
of the book itself. Cook
said it’s rare for anyone to win a
lawsuit against a memoir writer,
but still, the risk “makes a lot of
people not even want to try.”
Tate, however, was so cautious
and thoughtful about
privacy, she didn’t even ask
the group or her therapist to
sign waivers. (Her publisher,
Counterpoint, still had a lawyer
read it anyway.)
The outcome, Tate says, since
publication, the group is probably
closer than it has ever been.
Soon after the book came out
last fall, she got a phone call one
night from one of the women
in the group who told Tate that
she finally read the book. Tate
braced for bad news — she had
thought everyone had all read it
already? The woman said, no,
no, she hadn’t read it, because
she did not want to relive every
harrowing episode that Tate had
already gone though with them.
“She told me she couldn’t believe
how much I loved them
and how much of that came out
in the writing. And so I thought
to myself right then, I should
probably just show it more in
person.”
16
WEEKLYNEWS.NET - 978-532-5880 FEBRUARY 4, 2021
Lynnfield
Offered at $1,899,000
Marblehead
Offered at $1,595,000
Boxford
Offered at $1,185,000
Topsfield
Offered at $1,049,000
Unique property has 2 extra lots—total 2.99 acres
for privacy, space or family compound. Elegant
brick 5-bedroom, 5-bath home with finished
basement. Heated in-ground pool, 3-car garage.
Cricket Sperry
Antique style home c.1713 with over 4,400 sq. ft.
of living space in downtown area. Au-pair apt. or
guest suite. 6 beds, 3.5 baths, formal living and
dining room, large yard and plenty of parking.
Stephanie Moio & Nancy Peterson
Spectacular home on 2 acres with in-ground pool.
Custom marble foyer, stunning tiger wood floors,
birdseye maple woodwork. 4 fireplaces, 4 bedrooms.
Phenomenal eat-in kitchen. 3-car garage.
Josephine Mehm Baker
Just Renovated 4-bed mid-century Contemporary
on 4 acres. Main level white oak floors, master
suite, new chef’s kitchen. Lower level fireplaced
family room, home office. New heating system.
The Lopes Group
Boxford
Offered at $969,900
Beverly
Offered at $839,900
Danvers
Offered at $720,000
Winthrop
Offered at $684,900
Room for everyone in this stunningly renovated
Colonial on 2.5+ acres. Quartz kitchen with
Miele & Wolf appliances, 2 bonus rooms on 1st
floor, loft area, 2 garages. 4 bedrooms, 2.5 baths.
Jackelyn Enslow
Impeccable, stylish Montserrat 4-bed, 2.5-bath
2015 Colonial has commanding hilltop presence.
2021 master bath. Flexible floor plan. Central air,
custom closets, finished walk-out basement.
Shelly Shuka
Beautiful 4-bedroom 2.5-bath Cape borders St.
John’s Prep school campus. Fabulous home, granite/
stainless kitchen, 2 fireplaces, 1st floor master,
mudroom. Great room, office in basement.
Josephine Mehm Baker
Great Investment Opportunity. 2-family barely 1
block to Winthrop Beach, meticulously-maintained.
2 renovated 2-bed units delivered vacant. Laundry
hookups in each. 2-car garage, large yard.
Salzillo Realty Group
West Peabody
Starting at $995,000
West Peabody’s premier new community of single family homes by CC &
Sons Builders offering quality craftsmanship and rich architectural details
throughout. Featuring versatile floor plans equally elegant and functional
for today’s lifestyle. Ideally located in a country setting on the Middleton
line yet convenient to shopping, restaurants and major routes.
Maria N. Miara
Revere
Offered at $624,900
Revere
Offered at $599,900
Beverly
Offered at $599,900
Everett
Offered at $494,900
Wow! 3 levels of living space. Finished basement
has full kitchen, bath, fireplaced living area, yard
access. 1st floor updated kitchen, mudroom,
fireplaced living room. 4 bedrms, 4 baths.
Joyce DiLiegro
Meticulous Raised Ranch in Point of Pines!
Moments to private beach. 5-bedrooms, 2 full baths
with open floor plan. Finished basement with 2nd
full kitchen. Gas heating system, vinyl siding.
Denise Lake
Beautiful corner 2-bedroom, 2-bath, open-concept
unit at Elliott Landing near the train, downtown,
Route 128. Every cook will love the amazing
kitchen. Assigned parking. HOA covers heat/AC.
Nancy Peterson
Opportunity calls! 2-level, 2-bed, 2-bath penthouse
at Seville Condos. Cathedral ceilings, spacious
open floor plan, 2 decks, and 2-car parking. Inunit
laundry. Near bus, MBTA, highways.
Joyce DiLiegro
Boston
Offered at $489,900
LAND
Danvers
Starting at $369,900
Peabody
Offered at $364,900
LAND
Gloucester
Offered at $200,000
New Construction in East Boston! Chic modern
townhouse with quality craftsmanship throughout!
Contemporary custom granite/stainless kitchen, inunit
laundry hookups, pet friendly. Near MBTA.
Maria Salzillo
WATERFRONT LOT! 10,130-sf lot, once
approved for a new 1,805 sf single-family dwelling.
Stunning views. Rare opportunity! Chain link fence
for safety. Please do not walk lot unaccompanied.
Holly Baldassare
Time to own a home! 2-levels, 1,173 sf in one
family for 70+ years. 2 bedrooms, 1 full bath, eatin
kitchen, 2 enclosed porches. Space for home
office, 1-car garage. Some upgrades needed.
Kathleen Fabrizio
East Gloucester lot near Good Harbor Beach.
Property needs Conservation/Planning Board
approval for road/sewer extension. Owner will take
offers subject to approval. Documents need updating.
The Militello Team
The North Shore’s Premier Real Estate Agency
100 Cummings Center, Suite 101K • Beverly, MA 01915 • 978.922.3683
& COMPANY
www.jbarrettrealty.com