While raised voices and pointed fingers characterized public meetings in Chichester this past year, a new movement has taken hold aimed at spreading courtesy and consideration in town.
Following a particularly divisive Board of Selectmen meeting at the start of the year, a group of around a dozen residents who had been chatting informally decided to take more definitive action. The group coalesced into a single, cohesive entity called the Chichester Alliance for Responsible Ethics, or CAREs.
For lifelong seventh-generation resident Justine Hayward, who owns Trilogy Hair Studio, the formation of the group provided a sense of hope.
“We’re all from different political backgrounds,” she said. “We all have different views on things, but we decided as a group to have one core thing that we can all agree on and stand behind, and that was to restore civility, kindness, honesty and respect back into the town governing, and to have these same traits back into the community as well.”
The group members have pledged to promote a culture of respect at public meetings, community events and in everyday interactions around town.
“This isn’t the town I grew up in,” she said. “I grew up in a town that, even if you disagreed, it was still okay. You would smile and shake hands with them whenever you saw them out in town or at a town event. You could have the conversations of why you disagreed on maybe some things, but it was never grudges held against one another. It was never personal attacks.”
As part of its “kindness movement,” as Hayward put it, two members of Chichester CAREs stepped up to run for seats on the Board of Selectmen and received backing from the group.
Both candidates, Carrianne Wood and Corie St. Germain, have moved to town in the past decade. While their candidacies coincide and they hold common values, they’re running independently of each other.
Wood is vying for Selectman Frank Swirko’s one-year seat, while St. Germain has her eyes on the three-year seat held by Selectman Richard Bouchard. Neither selectman is running for re-election.
“It really is a grassroots effort by a group of citizens in the community that are like-minded and are looking for the same type of bringing that community-feel back to Chichester,” said St. Germain, who works as a nurse. She sits on the planning board and formerly held a seat on the Budget Advisory Committee.
Wood coaches youth soccer and baseball in town. Her decision to run happened after she took her 8-year-old daughter to a municipal meeting back in January where there was “a bunch of yelling and swearing.”
“She tugged on my shirt and was like, ‘Is this okay? Like, are we okay?’ And she was scared. And I’m like, ‘you shouldn’t be scared going to a political meeting.’ My eight-year-old daughter should be able to be there without seeing yelling and stuff.”
For her, that was a turning point. Someone asked her to throw her hat in the ring and she decided to step up. Her campaign slogan, “CARES,” stands for community, accountability, rebuild, empathy and stability.
If elected, Wood and St. Germain would add to the small number of female selectmen in town history. At least two women held the office previously: Virginia Ricker, who served from 1989-1994, and Evelyn Pike, who served from 1983-1985, according to town records.
Longtime resident Lori Jewett, for her part, wants to see new voices and perspectives represented on the board. Beyond that, she wants the neighborhood feel of Chichester to return to the forefront of town interactions.
“It’s been a great place. We’ve raised our kids here. Our grandson comes and visits every day too with us,” said Jewett, who sits on the Budget Advisory Committee. “It’s a place where you want to be able to take a walk and say ‘hi’ to people and not worry about whether or not you agree or disagree with who they vote for or what their beliefs are, or any of those things.”
Jewett helped form the CAREs group because she believes in the town and wants to see it blossom once more.
“I’m all for dissenting voices,” she said. “We can agree to disagree, but we don’t have to be mean or hateful about it, and that is disheartening to me, the manner in which the dissenting voices speak. It’s just not okay. And I think it just mirrors the national level of how we see other people treating other people.”
Next year, Chichester will celebrate its 300th anniversary. For Hayward, this milestone represents a goal for the timeline of change.
“I hope by then, the town is on a different path, and we can all really come together as a community to celebrate, our town, our heritage,” she said. “There’s a lot of people in town that have deep family ties as much as I have, if not more, so I think it would be really amazing if we can set the tone going into that.”
Until then, she and others will continue to model the behavior they hope to spread: Respectful counterpoints, calm voices, and warm interactions.
“I hope other towns and other citizens see a narrative of this being an idea that they can do in their own community,” she said.