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06.11.2025 – Volume 3, Issue 29

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SPORTS

CURRENT EVENTS

Assa runs to another state title

IN THIS ISSUE

OVERLINE

Find out why these local sailors are celebrating

Reach for the stars at full moon yoga

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NONPROFIT ORG PRSRT STD U.S. POSTAGE

PAID

MARBLEHEAD, MA PERMIT NO. 25

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NEWS FOR PEOPLE, NOT FOR PROFIT.

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JUNE 11, 2025

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VOLUME 3, ISSUE NO. 29

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MARBLEHEADCURRENT.ORG

DECISIONS 2025

ON SOCIAL @MHDCURRENT

3A

Judge rejects lawsuit over MBTA law as town braces for vote

Get the latest results Marblehead’s Election Day was Tuesday, June 10, with several contested races and $14.35 million in debt exclusion overrides on the ballot. Early voting last week was brisk. For the latest on election results, visit MarbleheadCurrrent.org.

2025

BY WILL DOWD

CLASS OF 2025

MHS sends 239 into world with a simple charge: ‘Be kind’

CURRENT PHOTOS / GREY COLLINS

Graduates toss their caps high into the air on Piper Field, marking the joyful conclusion of Marblehead High School’s Class of 2025 commencement ceremony.

»List of graduates, Page 5

BY WILL DOWD Salutatorian Nicolas Regnault moved six or seven times before finding home in Marblehead during a global pandemic, but Friday evening he told his fellow 238 graduates that starting over again and again taught him the most valuable lesson of all: The courage to take that first step into the unknown. Regnault’s message about embracing discomfort and new challenges resonated throughout Friday’s graduation ceremony, where speakers consistently urged the Class of 2025 to carry forward the courage and kindness that helped them navigate their four years of high school.

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Valedictorian Olivia Goldwater draws on Hermann Hesse’s novel “Siddhartha” to describe life as a spiral path and urges her fellow graduates to chase dreams with purpose.

“Every once in a while you’ll stumble onto something that sticks, something or someone that changes

your life,” Regnault told his classmates, sharing how joining sailing during the pandemic’s most isolating days sparked his passion for engineering and led him to Georgia Tech for aerospace studies. “Life rarely follows a perfect path, but no matter where you go or how many times you start over, it’s how you choose to begin again that defines who you become.” While Regnault emphasized courage to step into the unknown, the evening’s dominant theme became kindness, woven through every speech from

A Massachusetts Superior Court judge on Friday rejected claims by nine towns that the state’s MBTA Communities Act constitutes an “unfunded mandate,” delivering a significant blow to municipalities seeking to avoid compliance with the controversial multifamily housing law. The act requires 177 cities and towns served by or adjacent to MBTA transit to create zoning districts where multifamily housing can be built “as of right” without special permits, with requirements varying based on each community’s size and transit access. The decision comes as Marblehead faces its own ongoing battle over MBTA zoning compliance. Town Meeting approved Article 23 in May by a 951-759 vote, designating three areas for multifamily overlay zones. However, attorneys John DiPiano and Yael Magen successfully petitioned for a special election to potentially overturn that vote, gathering more than 1,200 signatures in a single weekend. That vote will take place on July 8. Marblehead Select Board Chair Erin Noonan said the ruling vindicates officials who warned against seeking exemptions from the law. “This is the outcome we always expected and shows that calls to just ‘file a compliance exemption’ were never going to resolve this,” Noonan said. “I hope that voters will ratify the sensible plan adopted by Town Meeting so that we can turn the page, come together as a community and focus on the pressing issues facing our town.” The 40-page ruling by Superior Court Justice Mark Gildea denied preliminary injunctions sought by the towns of Duxbury, Hamilton, Hanson, Holden, Marshfield, Middleton, Wenham, Weston and Wrentham, while also dismissing their complaints challenging the law on constitutional and financial grounds. “This decision has confirmed once again that a law passed with bipartisan support, upheld as constitutional by the state Supreme Court and agreed upon at Town meeting by a wide margin does not need to be deliberated any further,” reads a statement from the Marblehead Housing Coalition. “This decision upholds the reality that voting yes on July 8 is the right path

GRADS, P. 3 MBTA, P. 7

GOOD DEED

Local teen saves elderly woman from apparent Bitcoin scam BY LEIGH BLANDER Eighteen-year-old Addy Mooney of Marblehead knew something wasn’t right with the older woman at Richdale on Smith Street. She was asking the cashier for help with the Bitcoin machine. “She was in her 70s or 80s, and she was holding her phone like she was talking to someone while this interaction was happening,” Mooney said. “It seemed kind of scammy.” Mooney walked home, but,

BLACK CYAN MAGENTA YELLOW

she said, “I felt deep down there was something up. I felt like this woman was in trouble.” So, she called Marblehead Police to report that an older woman at Richdale might be getting scammed. Mooney ran back to Richdale and found the woman sitting in her car. She explained to the woman that she might be a victim of a Bitcoin scam and asked to look at her phone. “I saw all these texts. ‘I love you; I’m going to take care of you,’” Mooney said. “It was very

obviously a scam. The guy sent her this whole step-by-step on how to get Bitcoin.” The woman admitted that the man, whom she had never met but had been texting with for five months, was asking for $19,000. Luckily, she couldn’t get the Bitcoin machine working. The police arrived, spoke with the woman and then contacted her adult daughter. “She was emotional,” Mooney said about the older woman. “I was giving her hugs and saying, ‘It’s going to be OK.’”

The police were so impressed with Mooney they presented her with a junior officer police badge sticker, which she placed proudly on her journal. “This can be my story,” she said. How did Mooney know so much about scammers? She and her family listen to the “Endless Thread” podcast. “They did a whole in-depth thing about scammers and scam busters,” she said. TEEN, P. 6

COURTESY PHOTO

Addy Mooney shows off her junior officer badge sticker.


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