RichardHowe.com – Voices from Lowell & Beyond

Lowell Politics: November 8, 2026

The stunning performance of Democratic candidates in the rest of the country in Tuesday’s midterm election has dominated the news. Still, there was also an election here in Massachusetts, so I’ll begin today’s newsletter with the results of the races beginning with our state legislators:

• State Senator
  • Vanna Howard (Dem) – 15,058 in Lowell; 27,422 in district
  • Sam Meas (Rep) – 4363 in Lowell; 12,435 in district
  • Joe Espinola (Unenrolled) – 2,612 in Lowell; 7072 in district
• State Representative – 16th Middlesex
  • Lorena Betts (Dem) – 4304 in Lowell; 7933 in district
  • Karla Miller (Rep) – 2020 in Lowell; 3693 in district
• State Representative – 17th Middlesex
  • John Drinkwater (Dem) – 7152 in Lowell; 8163 in district
  • No opponent
• State Representative (Dem) – 18th Middlesex
  • Tara Hong (Dem) – 5875
  • No opponent

Now back to the full ballot (showing major party candidates only):

• US Senate
  • Edward Markey (Dem) – 15,045 in Lowell; 1,632,326 (63%) statewide
  • John Deaton (Rep) – 5744 in Lowell; 826,552 (32%) statewide
• Governor & Lt Governor
  • Healey & Driscoll (Dem) – 15,019 in Lowell; 1,605,885 (62%) statewide
  • Minogue & Oliver (Rep) – 6249 in Lowell; 891,059 (34.5%) statewide
• Attorney General
  • Andrea Campbell (Dem) – 15,363 in Lowell; 1,674,279 (66%) statewide
  • Michael Walsh (Rep) – 6293 in Lowell; 877,110 (34%) statewide
• Secretary of State
  • William Galvin (Dem) – 16,774 in Lowell; 1,814,465 (71%) statewide
  • Anne Brensley (Rep) – 4906 in Lowell; 731,405 (29%) statewide
• Treasurer
  • Deborah Goldbert (Dem) – 15,229 in Lowell; 1,657,342 (66%) statewide
  • Elizabeth Dionne (Rep) – 6145 in Lowell; 856,022 (34%) statewide
• Auditor
  • Diana DiZoglio (Dem) – 17,599 in Lowell; 1,954,194 (84%) statewide
  • Al Ozonoff (Libertarian) – 2582 in Lowell; 376,706 (16%) statewide
• Representative in Congress
  • Lori Trahan (Dem) – 16,016 in Lowell; 167,849 (67%) districtwide
  • Gary Grossi (Rep) – 4856 in Lowell; 76,946 (31%) districtwide
• Governor’s Councillor (5th District)
  • Eunice Delice Zeigler (Dem) – 14,980 in Lowell; 196,222 (65%) districtwide
  • William Falcetano (Rep) – 5549 in Lowell; 108,060 (35%) districtwide
• District Attorney
  • Marian Ryan (Dem) – 17,647 in Lowell; x countywide
  • No opponent
• Register of Probate
  • Tara DeCristofaro (Dem) – 15,600 in Lowell; countywide TBD
  • Tara Martorella (Justice for All) – 3350 in Lowell; countywide TBD

Regional School Committee – Greater Lowell Regional School Committee candidates represent the city or town in which they reside but are elected district-wide. For this report, I only show the number of votes each candidate received in Lowell, not the entire district.

• Dracut
  • Matthew Seehan – 14,440 in Lowell
• Dunstable
  • No candidates
• Lowell (top two elected)
  • Ralph Hogan – 8818 in Lowell
  • Brady McCarron – 5694 in Lowell
  • Anthony Milisci – 3579 in Lowell
• Tyngsborough
  • Carol Chisolm – 12,149

Ballot Questions – There were nine questions on this year’s ballot. Below I’ve listed each by title with a short explanation followed by the winning response, the votes received in Lowell, and the statewide percentages:

Question 1 – Public Records – (make applicable to governor and legislature)

YES – 85.9% statewide; 17,549 votes in Lowell (85%)

NO – 14.1% statewide; 3154 votes in Lowell (15%)

Question 2 – Public Defenders Unionization – (allow or don’t allow to unionize)

              YES – 64.0% statewide; 14,440 votes in Lowell (71%)

              NO – 36.0% statewide; 6039 votes in Lowell (29%)

Question 3 – Combined Primary Elections – (all candidates from all parties run in a single primary with the top two advancing to the general election)

NO – 61.1% statewide; 12,681 votes in Lowell (58%)

YES – 38.9% statewide; 9382 votes in Lowell (42%)

Question 4 – Election Day Voter Registration – (allows registering to vote on day of election)

YES – 56.3% statewide; 13,996 votes in Lowell (64%)

NO – 43.7% statewide; 7920 votes in Lowell (36%)

Question 5 – Cap on State Revenue – (automatic rebates if tax collections exceed prior year per a formula)

NO – 52.0% statewide; 10,633 votes in Lowell (50.3%)

YES – 48.0% statewide; 10,524 votes in Lowell (49.7%)

Question 6 – Establish and Finance a “Nature for All Fund” – (existing taxes on recreational items devoted to nature conservation)

YES – 60.8% statewide; 14,169 votes in Lowell (65%)

NO – 39.2% statewide; 7659 votes in Lowell (35%)

Question 7 – Single family home minimum lot size – (single family home on 5000 square foot lots statewide)

TOO CLOSE TO CALL STATEWIDE

NO – 50.6% statewide; 8889 votes in Lowell (42%)

YES – 49.4% statewide; 12,470 votes in Lowell (58%)

Question 8 – Repeal legalization of marijuana – (YES would repeal marijuana legalization)

NO – 75.6% statewide; 16,003 votes in Lowell (74%)

YES – 24.4% statewide; 5563 votes in Lowell (26%)

Question 9 – Preserve the stricter gun control law passed by the legislature in 2024 – (yes retains the law; no repeals it)

YES – 67.1% statewide; 15,494 votes in Lowell (70%)

NO – 32.9% statewide; 6642 votes in Lowell (30%)

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At Tuesday’s Lowell City Council meeting, the council unanimously authorized the city manager to enter into a purchase and sales agreement for the entire property at 276 Broadway which includes the Lowell Senior Center. I’ve previously written about the Senior Center, the controversy over the city’s lease of the property and the recent agreement on purchasing the property, so this vote was a bit anti-climactic. Here’s the document that formed the basis of the council’s vote.

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Another matter that came before the council was the confirmation of a vote already taken by the council in executive session on October 6, 2026. The vote involved three things; all related to the Draper Labs development project in the Hamilton Canal District. Specifically, the vote included a Tax Increment Financing Agreement (TIF); the leasing of 100 parking spaces by Draper in the city’s Hamilton Canal District Parking Garage; and a Right of First Refusal by Draper on an adjacent lot now owned by the city. (The vote and the related agreements are on the city’s website).

When Mayor Erik Gitschier brought up this matter, Councilor Sean McDonough objected to the second reading of the vote which automatically delayed it to the next council meeting. After a brief exchange between Gitschier and McDonough which can be found at 11:56 of the video recording of this meeting, the council moved on to its next item of business.

McDonough cited Council Rule 27 as the procedural basis of this move. Here’s the text of that rule:

RULE 27 – STAGES OF LEGISLATION – All orders, votes, resolutions or ordinances of a legislative nature shall have two readings before final passage. The second reading shall be by title only, if at the same meeting as the first and if no member objects. For matters that require a public hearing, the second reading will not take place until after the public hearing has been held. (Emphasis supplied.)

The requirement for multiple “readings” of a matter proposed at a municipal meeting goes back to early England. Back then, bills before Parliament were handwritten so it was difficult for members to read them in advance of voting on them (and some members couldn’t read in the first place). So members would know what they were voting on, the clerk of Parliament would read the full text of a bill on three consecutive days so that everyone in attendance understood what was before the body.

Although we live in an age of near-universal literacy and proposals before government bodies are widely disseminated online, the procedural rule of multiple readings remains on the books and is more than an ancient artifact since it does give any one member of a legislative body – like the Lowell City Council – the power to slam on the brakes of the potential passage of a matter for whatever reason (or for no reason) that the objecting member desires.

However, in the more than 50 years I’ve been watching Lowell City Council meetings, it has been exceedingly rare for councilors to make use of this rule. I struggle to recall a half dozen times when a councilor objected in this manner, yet I believe this is the second time in his 10 months on the council that Councilor McDonough has utilized this tactic.

That said, McDonough is not alone in his norm breaking. Until just recently, the long-held practice of the Lowell City Council was not to place anything of substance on the agenda of a meeting that fell on the day of an election, whether city or state. Under our system, politics and governing operate hand-in-hand. On election night, it’s reasonable to assume that many who might otherwise participate in (or at least pay attention to) a municipal meeting would be focused on the election. A resident actively involved in the public life of the city should not be confronted with the zero-sum choice of campaigning for a preferred candidate or cause on election night or appearing at a municipal meeting to speak on an important topic.

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This week on richardhowe.com, Leo Racicot reminisced about the importance of the Lowell Sun in the life of the community.

In my Wednesday Seen & Heard column, I continued my coverage of the debate about whether more or fewer people are reading in the US today; I commented about a recently-released study on the high incidence of CTE among NFL players; and I noted that the Milwaukee Brewers won the World Series.

October Reflections

October Reflections

by Henri Marchand

Fall is little over a month old but well underway.  It officially began September 22 with the autumnal equinox, but for me fall began, as it always does, the first week of September, right after Labor Day.  After all, that’s when we return home from summer vacations and school traditionally re-opens.  And it just seems the more logical beginning of the season, making for a neat quarterly sectioning of the calendar—September, October, and November for fall; December, January and February for winter and so on.  Less than a month is sacrificed and except for the astronomical purists, who really worries about a couple of weeks or so?  Despite it being the start of school, autumn is my favorite season, October my favorite month.

In the cycle of the four seasons, fall is considered a time of decline and of final harvests but in many ways, it is also a time of new beginnings.  Except in school districts that have pilfered the final summer days of August, the season of learning and intellectual growth begins in earnest in September.  Come the week after Labor Day, new friends are made, new books discovered, new knowledge gained, and ageless sports rivalries are renewed.

A full schedule of cultural activities also begins in early fall.  Summer stock and outdoor concerts are pretty much over, but the traditional season of theatre, concerts and art exhibits begins in September, as does the new TV season.  In sports, there’s an overlap of seasons as the Boston Red Sox fade like garden annuals while the Patriots return to provide new hope to New England sports fans beginning the first weekend in September.  It is in autumn that Kerouac fans from around the world return to Lowell to honor the founder of a new literary expression.

November on the other hand, begins with the solemn honoring of the saints and seems a month of sudden stillness, of somber preparation for the long sleep of winter.  There are regular frosts and early snows might whiten the landscape, but mostly it’s the time when the last of the leaves, now matted brown and black, are gathered with iron rakes from lawns and swept from where they’ve huddled in windward corners and among low shrubs.  Oaks cling stubbornly to their leaves, rusting and rattling in chill winds.  Thanksgiving is a bright spot, arriving just in time to bid a final farewell to autumn and to officially kick off the holiday season, which now begins ever earlier and unofficially in late summer!  Thanksgiving is a day of feasting and spectacle, of traditions old and new—shared meals, the Macy’s Day Parade and the last of high school football.

But it is October that spellbinds and the month when autumn’s transformation seems suspended and most vibrant.  It is a month of mystery, acute in its effect on the senses.  First of all, the weather is perfect, especially so this year.  It is like a multi-colored May without the bugs.  Except for a late, short lived warm spell or an early flurry, the air cools to comfortable and the landscape glows with the saturated color of radiant foliage against blue sky and white clouds.  October ushers out the drift and drowse of August’s haze still loitering in September.  The Harvest Moon rises in early October when apples and the sweetest of corn are still being picked.  By month’s end Daylight Savings Time ends and lights come on at dinnertime when comfort foods make a return to the table and jack-o-lanterns stand guard by the front door.

Agricultural fairs like Topsfield remind us of New England’s rural past and of agricultural technology, fundamental but indispensable still.  Ancient rites converge with modern traditions on All Hallows Eve, in the fearful contemplation of the spirit world and the gleeful gathering of sweet tribute.

In memory, October is the month of endless after school pickup football games played until dark; of being showered by falling leaves; and of fireworks-like chrysanthemums bursting in a final garden display.  October stokes the imagination and conjures up images of Ichobod Crane being chased by the headless horseman.  In memory, October evokes Saturday mornings filled with sunlight flickering through jagged-edged elm leaves like candle flames, children’s voices blending with the tinny scratching of metal rakes on pavement; and the sweet incense of then legal leaf smoke rising from gutter fires.  In October memories, children gather fallen leaves, saving them from the fires, piling them higher and higher before diving headlong into the heap.

Jack Kerouac, who imagined a new American viewpoint but was acutely sensitive to his roots and home, wrote at the end of “Part I” in On the Road, “I was going home in October.  Everybody goes home in October.”  He might have been speaking not only of the literal journey home but of the metaphorical journey of memories, back from a wild summer season towards new beginnings and a time of reflection from the stable source of his inspiration.

Sun Up, Sun Down

Sun Up, Sun Down

By Leo Racicot

Part of the everyday fun of home life in the 1960s was having the city newspaper, The Lowell Sun, arrive afternoons around 3 or 4 o’clock. The paperboy would tuck our copy between the porch doors, safe from weather and wind. In those days, before the Internet, the glut of current television news channels like CNN, Fox NEWSMAX, etc.  long before news items would flash instantly on the computer screen mere seconds after they happened, the town or city newspaper was the only source of news, weather, sports people had.

My favorite paper day was The Sunday paper, usually bulkier than the daily one, filled with extra everything. I especially liked the Comics section, being able to follow the serial adventures of B.C., Johnny Hart’s satirical strip about cavemen, Chic Young’s Blondie featuring the title wife, her husband, Dagwood, his grumbling boss, Mr. Dithers. Other cartoons I always liked to follow: Beetle Bailey, The WIzard of Id and the one my friend, Priscilla and I still reminisce about, Walt Kelly’s beloved Pogo for its deluxe artwork, political satire, witty wordplay, and its humanist bent.

A column I always looked forward to was Charles Sampas’ long-running Sampascoopies, Running daily for nearly 40 years, it was far more than a typical news column; it was a mainstay capturing the distinct personality, neighborhood flavor, everyday rhythms of what Sampas lovingly dubbed Lowelltown. Filled with local politics and city shenanigans, bits of gossip, the occasional forays into the national and world scene, it became a part of Lowell chronicles for nearly four decades. On the other side of the journalistic spectrum was Sampas’s wife, Mary, whose columns also ran daily, at first under the pen name, Girl Friday then under a new pseudonym, Pertinax, which Sun owner. George Costello, suggested she use. Pertinax was the pen name used by the French journalist, Andre Geraud, and Mary preferred the mysterious quality the name conjured.  Her columns functioned as a mix of a traditional society page, lifestyle chronicles and civic commentary. Joe and I liked following her features, especially reading about the latest gossipy antics of her world traveling society pal, Cookie Vrouhas. One memorable quote of Cookie’s reaction to a trip she made to Rhodes an island off the coast of Greece, has stuck with us all these years later –  “All Rhodes is, is a ruin.” Clearly, Cookie was not impressed with Rhodes!

As movie lovers, Joe & I also kept a close eye on The Sun’s entertainment critic, William Sarmento. His glib, witty summaries of current films could get us chuckling, as when he tagged a new John Wayne movie, Rio Lobo with the caveat to audiences: RIO LOBO IS A REAL BORE-O. If he didn’t care for a movie, he was likely to warn readers, “Don’t forget to bring a retch bag with you to the theater.”  One could at times detect a touch of pretension behind his reviews. After all, he wasn’t Kenneth Tynan. Sarmento’s personal, quirky style of writing gave locals a peek into the cultural world beyond the confines of Lowell. And I loved the sketch of him accompanying his columns, his trademark bowtie and pork pie hat.

Modern day technological shifts in how people access the news led to the eventual downfall of the hardcopy newspaper. I think The Lowell Sun is still in operation but today’s generations much prefer having their news and culture delivered to them digitally, online, where they can see everything instantly with the click of a button. High production costs and a low readership have combined to make newspapers prohibitively expensive. This summer, deciding to treat myself to a Lowell Sunday Sun, I nearly fell over when the cashier girl rang up the price.

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Paperboy, 1960s

Charles Sampas

Mary Sampas column

Pogo

William Sarmento

Seen & Heard: Vol. 44

A weekly report on things I’ve read, heard and seen since last Wednesday. 

Article: “Books Everlasting: The startling renaissance of reading, from the shop floor up” by Nathan Heller, New Yorker, October 26, 2026. In last week’s Seen & Heard, I wrote about a podcast featuring James Marriott, a London Times columnist, who argued that the amount of reading done by people has greatly diminished in recent years. This New Yorker article provides a counterpoint, taking the position that reading is more robust than ever, especially if you include e-books and audio-books, which is how many people consume books these days. (I’m not sure the earlier article disregarded that; it may be an issue of how reading is measured.) This article serves the secondary purpose of profiling James Daunt, the current CEO of Barnes and Noble. Daunt launched his own bookstore in London in his twenties, expanded it to several branches, and then was hired to run the fiscally failing Waterstone’s bookstore chain (which is to the UK what Barnes & Noble is to the US). Daunt’s formula for chain store success is to allow the local staff to treat each store as if it’s a small independent shop. Rather than have templates for book orders and displays sent down from corporate headquarters to be implemented without alteration by each store, local managers order the books they believe will be most welcome by the readers of that community. By all accounts, Barnes & Noble is doing pretty well these days which is a relief to book lovers, even if they rarely go to a B&N. I recall a decade or two ago when B&N morphed into a toy store that happened to sell a few books. Those days are gone now and the store is doing well. I come down somewhere in the middle of this debate. Today there are more distractions and demands on our time than ever before. If you’re tired and it’s at the end of the day, it’s much easier to start scrolling through the attention-high of TikTok or BlueSky than it is to pick up that 300 page biography of some famous person. However, those same distractions are used by “influencers” to promote books. So called “BookTok” drives the sale of many books. In the end, life is complicated and reading a complicated book (or article) helps put events in the proper context as opposed to rapid fire social media that just plays on the emotions. 

Article: “In study of ex-NFL players, 75% had CTE” by Allyson Chiu and Aaron Leibowitz, Boston Globe, October 29, 2026. CTE or chronic traumatic encephalopathy is a brain disease only detectable after death that is thought to be caused by repeated head trauma. An article from August that I’ve previously cited reported that 95% of the brains of 235 NFL players who died between 2016 and 2021 that were studied post-mortem for CTE had the disease. This new article is about another study that is broader in its scope. It studied all NFL players who died during the past 15 years and concluded that 75% of them exhibited symptoms of CTE. Because there has been more attention given in recent years to protecting players who have suffered head injuries, the article states that this does not necessarily mean that 75% of today’s NFL players will have CTE (but it doesn’t say they won’t either, since the jury is still out on the efficacy of these protective measures). When it comes to this issue, I always go back to the old saying, “It’s hard to get a person to understand something when their paycheck depends on them not understanding it.” There is so much money being generated by the NFL that no one wants to walk away from it. I’ve seen it that way for five or even ten years and have felt guilty because I kept watching football. I’ve stopped this year, though walking away from football fandom is not solely caused by concerns over CTE although that’s part of it. That most of the billionaire team owners are big supporters of the current regime has been a factor, as has the domination of gambling in the football story today. I have no problem with someone betting, but I don’t and have no interest in it, so hearing endless talk and commercials about betting on games is offputting. Finally, there’s no lack of other things to do in life so not watching the NFL hasn’t created any kind of void in my entertainment menu. 

Article: “World Series 2026: For Milwaukee Brewers, finally winning a title is a celebration decades in the making” Yahoo Sports, October 29, 2026. The Milwaukee Brewers defeated the Tampa Bay Rays in five games to win the team’s first-ever World Series. I was happy for the Brewers for several reasons. First, having experienced the regional thrill of a home team winning a championship, it’s nice that Milwaukee was able to experience it. Also, the Brewers were born in 1969 as the expansion Seattle Pilots of the American League. That was in the midst of my prime baseball card-collecting years so I still have some Seattle Pilot cards and feel almost like I was there at the beginning. (The Pilots moved to Milwaukee as the Brewers in 1970 and played in the American League until 1998 when the team switched to the National League. I also found this outcome amusing in a couple of respects. First, neither team has a big payroll with the Brewers ranking 17th and the Rays 21st. Also, whichever network owned the rights probably lost money since (1) the series only went five games; and (2) neither team comes from a big media market as would be the case if the Dodgers or Yankees were involved, so I assume viewership was not great. I confess to being among the many who did not watch any of these series. In fact, other than a few innings in April, I didn’t watch any baseball this season. Staying away from baseball was neither philosophical nor political; it was more about priorities since there were so many other things I preferred doing with my time.