Foxborough Selectmen Say It's Time to Look at Charter

Looking at the strong manager act is something the Foxborough selectmen are prepared to tackle.

Foxborough Town Manager Kevin Paicos says he welcomes a review of the strong town manager act, which he refers to as the charter.

"I really applaud the board for doing this," he said.

Paicos said the topic of how town managers conflicts with boards is a subject topic at their conferences, but he says he doesn't feel it's a problem in Foxborough.

"In almost the two years, I've been here that has been remarkably absence issue," said Paicos. "From my point view, that's great, because that is a type of substantial source of conflict in the two areas."

Selectmen want to look at the strong town manager act and provide education on how it works.

"It's very much the case that the general public is not aware of what the strong town manager does," said Paicios. "There is a great deal of misinformation and it is not t really understood."

The board of selectmen said they would look into having sessions to educate the public how the town manager and the boards operate.

Selectmen Ginny Coppola proposed a series to educate the town on the different roles of the boards in town.

"It would be very beneficial to educate the town," said Paicos.

Selectmen chairman James DeVellis said he put the item on Tuesday's agenda, because of questions of what the town manager can do under the strong town manager act. He said he went back over the bylaws to look at the role selectmen play in the town and hears a lot about what the roles are.

"I have heard a lot of confusion about the strong town manager act," said DeVellis.

He said he wanted to know if this was something the board wanted to look at and possibly change now with the advice of a consultant.

Selectman Lorriane Brue suggested also having the group that made the recommendation for the strong manager act come before the board. 

Paicos supported looking at charter at this time.

"Five or six or seven years into the document a great time to review it and decide if you want to alter in some way as you look forward to the next 10 years," said Paicos. "If you manage to put a charter in, and didn't tweak and you got it dead right, you'd be one of very towns that ever managed to do that"

Selectmen will be looking at the Massachusetts Municipal Association for how to accomplish a plan to look at the charter.