Current list of candidates in 2021 City of Lynn Municipal Elections

Below is a list of all candidates who have taken out nomination papers so far for the School Committee, City Council, & Mayoral races for this year’s elections. We will be conducting informal interviews with Mayoral candidates before our more formal interviews this summer, & will be linked below.

This list is provided to us by the City of Lynn Election Office & is current as of April 12th at 11am.

• MAYOR – Darren Cyr (interview)  |  Jared Nicolson (interview)  |  Michael Satterwhite (interview)
  
• COUNCILOR AT-LARGE – *Buzzy Barton  |  Jose Encarnacion    |  *Brian Field  |  Marven Hyppolite  |  *Brian LaPierre  |  Nicole McClain  |  *Hong Net
  
• WARD 1 – *Wayne Lozzi
  
• WARD 2 – Elizabeth Figueroa  |  *Rick Starbard
• WARD 3 – **Coco Alinsug  |  George Meimeteas
  
• WARD 4 – *Richard Colucci  |  Natasha Megie-Maddrey
• WARD 5 – *Dianna Chakoutis  |  Sandra Suarez
  
• WARD 6 – *Fred Hogan
• WARD 7 – *Jay Walsh
• SCHOOL COMMITTEE – *Brian Castellanos  |  *Donna Coppola  |  Eric Dugan  |  *John Ford Jr.  |  *Lorraine Gately  |  Sandra Lopez  |  Tiffany Magnolia  |  Rocio Mora  |  Lenny Pena

 * denotes an incumbent     ** Currently on LCTV Board of Directors

Updates from state government

• As of Sunday night, DPH reported a total of 615,947 cases of COVID-19. The state reported 2,184 new confirmed cases. The state has now confirmed a total of 17,031 deaths from the virus.
• The House will release its FY 22 budget recommendations on Wednesday with amendments due on Friday afternoon. The House is scheduled to debate the budget the week of April 26th.
• Legislative leaders on Friday outlined plans to advance a $400 million bill funding the construction of a new Holyoke Soldiers’ Home but it’s unclear if their timeline will be fast enough to quickly secure federal funding. The House plans to vote next week on the bill, a formal session is planned on Thursday, and legislative leaders indicated they still plan to enact changes this session to reform how Massachusetts delivers and oversees veterans’ services. In a joint statement, House Speaker Ronald Mariano and Senate President Karen Spilka announced the House’s plans for next week and said Senate action on the funding bill will follow “in the coming weeks.”
• The number of cities and towns that meet the Department of Public Health’s criteria for the red high-risk category increased 40 percent from last week, has now climbed for four consecutive weeks and has more than doubled in two weeks. (EDITOR’S NOTE: Click here for a summary of last week’s numbers) There are now 77 Massachusetts communities “in the red,” meaning the state considers them to have the highest risk of COVID-19 transmission as the race between the ongoing vaccination push and the spread of coronavirus mutants intensifies. The red community designations remain well below the January peak when almost two-thirds of the 351 cities and towns in Massachusetts were considered high-risk. There were also 154 communities in DPH’s moderate-risk yellow category this week, 23 in the green category and 97 cities and towns that did not record enough cases to warrant a categorization.
• One of the two regional transit agencies contracted by the Baker administration to manage transportation for thousands of low-income and disabled health service recipients told its vendors in February that it will be at least a year before they’re required to comply with some required technology and vehicle upgrades touted in the new contract. The Montachusett Regional Transit Authority told the network of transportation providers across much of the state that they would not be required to rebid for program-based routes or install new technology, such as GPS and on-board cameras, until a full procurement can be done for the fiscal year starting July 1, 2022.
• The transit agency said in a letter it was “simply not feasible” to conduct a full procurement before its contract and the new fiscal year begins on July 1. The Montachusett RTA, known as MART, was one of two regional transit agencies awarded contracts to run the $275 million Human Services Transportation program as part of a consolidation that saw the number of regions across the state shrink from six to three. MART and the Greater Attleboro Taunton Regional Transit Authority won contracts in January to manage the program for the entire state, with the Leominster-based MART in charge of two regions from the Berkshires to Cape Ann.
• More than 77 lawmakers in March asked the Baker administration for a two-year moratorium on changes to the program, arguing that the middle of a pandemic was not the time to risk potential disruption to a service relied upon each year for 9 million rides to doctors appointments and other services. Rep. William Straus and Rep. Sarah Peake, who are spearheading the opposition, now say MART’s decision to delay some of the safety and efficiency reforms required under the new contracts underscores their point that the transition should be postponed.

Special thanks to MassAccess for providing us with these updates.

From Mayor McGee’s office: The Lynn Public Health Department has confirmed that as of today, the number of active, confirmed positive COVID-19 cases is 404 with 18 new cases today. 16,336 Lynn residents have recovered and 212 have died. The total number of confirmed positive COVID-19 cases in Lynn since March 21, 2020, including those who have died and recovered, is 16,952. Please visit the City of Lynn COVID-19 Data Dashboard which is updated daily.

COVID-19 vaccine appointments are available at Lynn Tech Fieldhouse for people who live or work in Lynn & Nahant or are Lynn Community Health Center Patients and meet state eligibility requirements (Massachusetts Phase 1 & Phase 2 Steps 1, 2, 3, 4 & 5: 55  year of age or older or with one or more chronic health conditions, Educators and certain workers. Residents age 75+ may be accompanied by one caregiver who can book an appointment themselves.) Please visithttps://www.lchcnet.org/covid-19-vaccine-scheduling to make an appointment online. Residents without access to the Internet can call 2-1-1 to make an appointment 7 days a week.