Longtime Selectman Wasserman, of Needham, loses battle with cancer

Needham Board of Selectmen Chair Gerald Wasserman, a former president of the Massachusetts Selectmen’s Association, died on Feb. 28, four months after being diagnosed with cancer.

Wasserman, 65, had served as a selectman since 1999. From 2007 through 2011 he was a member of the MMA Board of Directors and the Local Government Advisory Commission. He was president of the MSA in 2008, a year of deep economic uncertainty.

“This is not an easy time to be a selectman,” Wasserman said at the MSA’s Annual Meeting in January 2009. “We do not yet know how long and how severe this economic downturn will be.”

He added, though, that selectmen “are willing to face difficult problems and work hard for our communities because we care and because, clearly, we like a challenge.”

In an interview with the Needham Times, Natick Selectman Josh Ostroff, the current president of the MSA, said Wasserman was committed to public service.

“He cared deeply about the people he served,” Ostroff said. “He always combined his absolute commitment for the people who elected him with the hardheaded realism of what you need to do to be successful.”

Wasserman narrowly lost a run for state representative in 2010.

An accomplished guitar player, he headed a folk/blues band called Jerry and the Great Experiment, which recorded a live album in Needham last summer.

Services and a memorial were held on March 3, 4 and 5.