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Mayor outlines first‑term priorities: public safety building, new high school planning and Central Street project
Summary
Mayor Ted Bettencourt told a Peabody candidates forum he would spend his first six months focused on managing major capital projects — a new public safety facility, planning for a replacement high school and the long-running Central Street reconstruction — and on zoning discussions tied to several large development sites.
Mayor Ted Bettencourt said his first six months in a new term would be spent managing a slate of long‑running capital projects and near‑term zoning decisions that he and other officials see as crucial to Peabody’s future. The mayor described work on a new public safety building, the next steps in planning a replacement Peabody Veterans Memorial High School and the multi‑year Central Street reconstruction as top priorities.
The mayor said the city is meeting weekly on the public safety project and remains on schedule and “on budget.” He described the plan as an upgrade in facilities, training and technology for police, fire and emergency management so they can “combat 21st‑century crime” and provide better emergency services.
Why it matters: the public safety building and the high school are multi‑year capital commitments that shape operating budgets, staffing and construction activity; Central Street reconstruction is a core downtown project that officials say will be transformational for safety and the business district.
Bettencourt said the high school project has completed the feasibility stage and that the city expects to choose an owner’s project manager and architect in early 2026 to begin design work. "We're still about 3, 4, maybe even 5 years away, but we've completed the feasibility stage of that process," he said.
On Central Street, the mayor urged patience from residents and businesses, calling the work “a monster” and “very difficult” but saying it will “make it safer, make it more aesthetically pleasing, and it's gonna make a difference for our businesses and residents in that area.”
Bettencourt also flagged zoning as a near‑term item tied to redevelopment potential at former industrial sites, saying the city needs to decide allowable uses for the Analogic (Analogic) property, the Russo site and parts of Centennial Park to shape future revenue and traffic outcomes.
Rochelle Agneta, the other mayoral candidate at the forum, said she planned to spend the first six months getting to know department heads and to improve outward transparency, including a new, user‑friendly city website showing how tax dollars are spent. "I would like to build a new website, a user friendly website, that would show where all of our tax dollars are being spent," she said.
The two candidates’ responses underscored a shared emphasis on infrastructure and downtown revitalization, while differing in immediate administrative priorities — management of capital projects on the mayor’s list and public information and permitting process improvements among challengers. The city’s next steps for the large projects are largely managerial and design decisions rather than votes, and each project carries standard construction and permitting risks and multi‑year timelines.
