DRACUT — Election night results brought good news to two retired firefighters but bad news to three candidates associated with Dracut Access Television, which has been mired in a long-running dispute with the Board of Selectmen over finances and accountability.
Incumbent Selectman Joe DiRocco — a frequent critic of DATV and a retired fire chief — won another three-year term on the board in a rematch with Phil Thibault. DiRocco called the campaign leading up to the election “the nastiest I can remember.”
In the three-way race for two seats on the school committee, newcomer Rebecca Duda topped the ticket and incumbent Joe Wilkie won a fourth term.
David Martin, who served with DiRocco at the fire department and is a former town moderator, won election as moderator of the Dracut Water Supply District.
Martin defeated two candidates, who have rival political talk shows on DATV. Martin received 688 votes. John Zimini, a former town selectman and host of Voice of Dracut, received 464 votes and George Boag, host of The Connection, received 329 votes.
Zimini formerly hosted The Connection but that was taken away from him last year during some in-house disputes. Thibault often appears on Zimini’s program. In recent weeks, Boag has featured DiRocco and Selectman Chair Jesse Forcier for his 90-minute time allotment.
DiRocco blames the tone of those shows for at least some of the nastiness during the campaign — “everyone just talks about everyone else” — and fears this tone will discourage people from running for office in the future. Otherwise, the incumbent, who was first elected in 2004, says he is happy with the results in the other contests as well as his own.
Thibault is a local architect and president of the DATV board of directors. He has run unsuccessfully against DiRocco several times in the past, but was thought to have momentum on his side this time.
Only 2,254 votes were cast in the selectmen’s race. Unofficial results showed DiRocco received 1,176 votes to Thibault’s 1,042. Thirty six ballots were blanks or write-ins.
Interest was higher in the school committee race where 4,508 votes were cast. Duda outpolled Wilkie by 55 votes, receiving 1,495 votes to Wilkie’s 1439. Rosemary Espinal finished third with 564 votes.
Duda’s plans for the immediate future are “to get back on track.” She says, “We owe it to the kids. Everyone did the best they could during the pandemic, but the kids lost. We need to determine how to make up for the learning they’ve lost.”
Duda is a former educator in the Dracut school system and currently an administrator in the Lowell school system.
Another goal for Duda is to restart the school improvement councils. These are groups elected at each school — because “each school is unique — that include parents, students, administrators and community members.
She said she will be in touch with Wilkie very soon to be brought up to date on issues before the school board. She’ll also be at the town clerk’s office this week to be sworn in.
Wilkie says he is looking forward to working with two new board members. In addition to Duda, the school committee and selectmen recently jointly appointed Linda Trouville to an unexpired term created when Betsy Murphy resigned to move to Florida.
Wilkie’s priorities for the months ahead are “school finances, school safety and COVID recovery,” he said.
Like Duda, Trouville is well-known as an educator in the Dracut school system. She also worked as principal of Saint Louis School in Lowell.
