[Music] okay we're going to call the SE board meeting to order for today's Thursday February 20th uh please join me for
pledge allegiance I pledge to the flag United States America and to the Republic which it stands one nation under God indivisible liberty and justice for all thank you sorry it's
okay well first thing we have on our agenda actually the only thing we have on our agenda this evening is our interview um for the town administrative position so that said we'll get right into it
okay tell us about yourself well let me say my name is Glenn ston I'm one of the select board members I'm Dave leonti also select board member obviously and um one of our select board members is not here this evening Crystal do Frank she's on
vacation but uh sure she'll watch the uh the film on this and she has uh asked us to ask some questions on her behalf as well okay all right so starting off why don't you tell us about yourself sure U my name is Tammy Martin I have two
children ages 21 and 24 one's a nurse and one's going to Boston University and going to be going into law school um I'm also married on a professional side I started off in bankin I was a teller I moved up to within 16 years I moved up
to be in a assistant vice president for a branch Branch administrator with that being said I was in charge of all the branches underneath me and also went through a merge um in that job I was in charge of 49 plus people I did evaluations
performances um audits within all the branches there were seven branches that I was in charge of Maintenance facilities anything that pertained to any of those branches were under me um I did all the scheduling what sorts then did take a there was a little time when
a family issue had happened and I had to take a leave and then I my daughter ended up doing Public Access in a m in a municipality and I ended up driving her so I volunteered my time and started hearing everything that goes on within the town and I was like oh this is
really interesting maybe this is something I want to try out to you know maybe next you know so um after that happened I a cessor position cessor clerk came up in the town of Warren and I tried out for that position and I went for it and I learned a lot I learned
about chapter 61 61a 61b um baits exemptions so many good stuff a ton of good things and I couldn't you know originally I didn't know any of that stuff so you know going in there I was really excited to learn all that and
then um a board of health chair had come down to me and said hey Tammy you know there's a full-time positioning opening which would be something you'd be interested in but at the same time there's a town accountant position that was opening the same time so obviously considering my background and banking accting I felt would be more my league
so I wanted to go up with the accountant position so went up with the town accountant position I ended up getting that a little bit did I know that I was going to be the chief procurement officer at the safe so I was like what's procurement uh I learned that pretty quick because uh we ended up having to do Highway bidding and I had to go for
the bids on comes and Central register so I did all that and also when the meantime our down in the select board the executive secretary had left so we had a different secretary in there and I said that in the process until they found someone that was comforable I
would start doing the quaries and the I would do the quy checks and the physicals and I would set all that up then after about a year and a half we ended up getting a Town Administrator and I worked very closely with him he helped he came in and asked me a lot about financing and stuff like that and then next thing I was helping him he was
showing me like what he does like feasibility studies and he had gone out for ton of Grants and I was lucky to be part of it with him um so I learned a lot and I was like hm he gets to wear all the hats he gets to do everything I think I want to be a Town Administrator so I ended up flying and I
got a Town Administrator position and I I do I love being a Town Administrator because I get to wear all those hats and be part of the community and just I like to see things grow and partake in anything that I can within the community so
can you um you talk talked a little bit about it but can you share uh some of your leadership um some of the positive and maybe some of the negative things we've had over the years sure so when I was in start with the banking industry because I was um in charge of like I
said 49 people so you know the worst part of obviously HR is having to get rid of someone you know and I've had to do that that's not it's not fun um but with that being said I I was in charge of the employees I scheduled them they
reported to me um same thing where I'm at right now I have employees that report to me and I I do our day-to-day activities we do communication everything like that so um are you looking for my Approach or
just like just I mean well I guess a couple of different things I guess what is your style okay so my style you know some things that you've dealt with and a leadership type where you know was it was a pro you know and then then sometimes where it was a con where you
know you had to deal with a maybe an employee or an issue that wasn't going correct okay so I would say my my style is definitely more directive I do not micromanage I like to have transparency and let them let my team know exactly what we're looking for where we're going
like for example when we go and have our I have meetings every month with the assessor Treasurer and the accountant so we I know where the new growth is going and um I know so I I'm not sure I think yours is elected but mine are appointed except for the assessors so I am in
charge of the treasurer and the accountant so we do have our monthly meetings and we talk about all that and if we have any goals you want to talk about I'll let them know like our next meeting I'm looking for this this and that and then they will come prepared and bring all that to me as a a negative
um there are personel issues that I do have to deal with um again I usually do that so I always believe everything's in the way your approaches how you approach things you got to be kind but Stern too you know I um I always say you start off saying
something good like you know you're doing a real great job you know but this incident happened talk about the incident and then always leave it off so you're not they're not going away leaving on a negative side I I don't think that's a good Approach at all I always think you need to let them feel a little uplifted but also know that
they're not if something's wrong then you need to make sure that you tell them that something's wrong um the worst part like I said is when having to fire somebody I I've done it before and it's not you have to do it sometimes though right if they're not doing the right
thing you got to do it it's part of it absolutely um what would you consider the most difficult problems facing small towns like Ramy or Warren not such a big time um definitely the revenue we really
we don't have I know we're where I'm at right now 90% of our Revenue comes from Real Estate so where else are we going to get Revenue that's the big question right so if you're asking me that I would say you have to do grants you have to do Grant writings and bring in some
money from that that helps our towns out you can do it with the schools you can do it with um I for example I brought in a $100,000 Park fund Grant they wanted uh bar wanted a park so I looked at I went on the um vid website and I had the
representatives come in we talked about it and then I went out we went out for a park fund Grant got $100,000 and we had some arpa fund money that we use so we have a $200,000 fund Grant but the with the park fund Grant I had to wait for we got accepted I had to go to some mandatory complete workshops
to make sure that we ended up getting it and then they had to come out to the site so there's a lot of work you have to do within the grants but it's well worth it because it comes into the town and it helps the town grow I mean the park that we're replacing is like it's very old so they're very much looking forward to it down there and you know
it's going to be a good project so so based on your comments can I assume that you have experience with the grant writing yes I I love Grant's one of my favorite parts of my job so right we like those everybody likes GRS
I get very excited when I when I hear oh you get a awarded such and such I had an ear Mark gr and I I try to get a we need a fire station I try to get a fire station I got a fire pickup truck I was okay with that too so $70,000 fire ear Mark fire truck pickup fire trck so I
was like oh hey I'll take that that's just good yeah um and you kind of touched on this already and what would be uh if you give an example of uh an employee um that may have failed at
something someone that you that person's supervisor and had to deal with them and and him or her and how did that go if there was I'm assuming there there I'm sure there's probably plenty just thinking one on the spot um so let's see I can give you some
with definitely with banking um if for example someone comes in with a check you have to know the rules and regulations like GRE CC um during Christmas time we used to always say really make sure you pay attention to
you know the checks that are coming in because there's a lot of falsifying checks that are coming through because it's Christmas time um and there was this one check that had came through and the employee put it through and they really should have known it was not a legit check and it ended up bouncing and we had to go off with the money and I
had to talk to the employee and let them know that you know this I took out the memos because we had memos going out because it was a big deal especially in the banking industry you got to make sure you know this is money we're dealing with and it's lots of it so you need to make sure you're following the rules the rec CC's and make sure we're
following everything and I did had to um actually ended up giving an a oral and told them you need to stop making sure you're following the procedures and policies and when this comes out you need to pay attention to these checks because this was a you could tell it was
definitely a phony check so got to be very careful I gu I think can um so you've given us some of your strengths on in the conversation we've had uh what would you say a weakness of yours would be um so you might have to
work on to move forward so I'm going to say that my work life um balance for business and personal I tend to take on I very ambitious about my my my growth and my career and I take it very serious
and I if I'm on a project I can I really can get lost in my project like just focused and then I sometimes will end up staying a lot later and getting home is very you know get my husband poor husband but getting home is very hard you know I I put a lot of time
and I've always been like that so I always say I always say Tim you got to find a way to you know what what to do so I have been trying to work on this I take a list out and I do my priority what I'm going to do throughout the day but I don't know as a Town Administrator you can't really make up your day because every time you
make up your day someone's going to come in because like I said you wear a lot of hats whether it's um a resident coming in or an employee coming in or you got a Water breaker down the street that you have to make sure everyone's getting taken care of and everybody knows the ins and outs so you have to make sure that you're always you know up and on and then you're like oh well this grant
I need to get this in by April 14th well I'm not going home until I get that Grant in so so your weaknesses you work too much yeah but yes I guess yeah it's not a bad thing a lot of us do it I guess it
comes with the territory right sometimes it does and so as a Town Administrator you know you are in in the Public's eye um and even so that you know the the select board has a lot of saying what happens
in the town um sometimes the Town Administrator would come under criticism um for what's being done um so and fortunately unfortunately we live in an age of Technology in Facebook and
things like that so at times things might get you know posted on a Facebook page or something like that and um where you know might be a might be a a favorable favorable comment towards yourself or towards the select Board of
towards the town and I'm not asking how you'd answer that but how would you deal with that though so I have learned in being in the political eye you just cannot take things personally you have to let it I hate to say this but let it roll you have to let it roll and um
realize that sometimes I know in my mind that obviously not all this stuff is facts or factual some of the things that you see on Facebook and online are not they're not real they're not true um so that's how I deal with that and I
continue on with my day I try not to I actually I don't I will not let Facebook or or anything out there take any away from me when it comes to my current position because I know in my mind that I'm doing 100% the right thing for the town and I know the select board also
has the right interest for the towns and I always say um in my town Administration report I will make comments you know if you ever want to see me you can I have an open door policy so anyone can come up and see me if they have any discussions or they want to ask I would never ever write anything on Facebook because I think
that's unprofessional and I would never put that out there so I think that's how you handle that when you just have to to realize that people are going to talk on social media they're going to say things and you just got to make sure that in the select board meetings that transparency is being held and you're
trying to do everything we can to make sure that we are doing the right you know by um informing the residents of what is really going on there we go
D um yeah going goe right now I'm s we um as you may know and U it's budget time yes we start to deal with our our um departments and their budgets um how would you deal with an
employee that had a a budget problem and and uh you know he or she may have lacked the I think maybe the communication necessary to let you know what was going on in the budget so I I will tell you with my department heads I I talk with all my
department heads even before they usually get to fincom um so if they were to come to me and tell me they had a budget issue I would ask them I'm very big on communication it's very key to me uh I would ask them why is there a problem and what is the problem now if
it's if we don't have the funding then we just don't have the funding right so I'd have to understand what type of problem they were having with their budget okay and work through it with them because if there's a problem we got to find a solution so
[Music] yeah so give me a um a scenario obviously um in any place of business whether it's private public um there may be some employees that just tend to uh
if you will bump heads on that case and that you know something like that comes to you where um an employee happen to complain about another employee um and maybe that employee is that person's superviser how would you deal with that well I actually I've actually dealt with
that recently so I take them both in the room and I have them basically say it in front of each other and we talk about it and we I let employee a say what's going on and what they feel is going on if they're feeling like they're not being appreciated or
what not and then I let the other employee explain what they are expecting or maybe they're saying that they're expecting this person to do more than what they're supposed to be doing and then we come up with a solution and we figure it out and it's all it's all in the room just bring them both both the parties in and usually by the time
you're done you can solve it out and get on the same page and I hate to say playing the sandbox nice we playing the sandbox and let's all get along because we all here for the right reason I've never really had an issue once we get everyone together they always usually can solve their problems okay
so um so in your cover letter I noticed you uh made a comment in regards to ensuring a transparency and and effective govern governance can you just give us examples of how you would step into that role and move
forward on it put transparency in the governments well I believe everything should be transparent and like I said open book if somebody comes into my office and they want to look at something as long as it's not a confidential being like an employee issue whatnot right there it's right there it's pure access
um and you're talking like my role in like how I would start off or yeah uh what's your thought process and um in managing Town departments and things of that nature yep so um what I do right now is I have meetings with my
department heads and we meet um usually on a monthly basis like I said my Finance on a monthly basis and I talk about everything they're doing what are they doing where are we at do you need any assistance from me I'm very open and
I'm very my communication is very like I said that's key and I think your approach on what you're doing you all have to know what you're doing so we're all getting the same want our town to grow we want it to thrive right so if there is any issues or any problems we need to make sure we're resolving them I need to make sure that I know what's
going on in the loop because I'm the the person that deals with the day-to-day activities and then I need to make sure that you as a select board know what's going on because that would be awful if someone came up to you know the chair and was like you know hey did you know this was happening and you're going to look at me and say Tammy why didn't you
tell us about this I just got blindsided so I think it's very important that me communicating with the staff knowing what's going on dayto day and also me communicating with you as well letting you know what's going on and keeping the public informed as well there it's very important the public knows what's going
on and being transparent thank you what do you find some of the challenges and I guess and what do you know about Randy as of now and and not to really put you on the spot but uh what do you see some of our challenges
being and how can you impact those challenges in a in a positive manner so I did notice that you were close to your levy on your finances so that's always something to make sure you always want to make sure you look at make sure you're in a balanced budget but that
being said um I do know you're really the town has a lot of open space and and uh there's a lot of farming and agriculture so there's really not a lot of room probably for Revenue so again I would go back to I hate to say but I don't know how many grants do you have a lot of grants that come in to this town
no we do not yeah so grants are a big key I think that's important look at what's out there for taxes and um make sure you're really capturing all your new growth to help bring in also Revenue that's huge your tax title foreclosures how are those
those you don't have any of those or I mean there may be some but the fuels I mean limited limited to okay that's good so now to where we get into you know that based off of you know tax leans or something like that so yeah yeah um I did notice you had some
businesses around here we can always bring in businesses and see where we can go from there I'd have to really get into obviously when I if I came over I'd have to really get into the history and the background as to what has happened in the last 5 to 10 years so I can see exactly like a picture of the town of
grand to move forward but obviously I would do anything I can to help us grow and bring in as many grants as I can and just Thrive to bring in that revenue revenue is key because you know schools is also a big um big budget right but also that's schools and the police and
fire and you know Public Works CPW that's what makes people want to come to the town agreement we don't want a a feeling school or feeling Police Department you want to make sure everything stays up because that helps us as a town continue to grow and it makes people want to come to the town of
grany grany want to be a destination we want some we want people to come and say oh I want to go to grany because of I don't know if you do concerts and stuff like that in the summer how your parks and Rex is and but you know you got to look at all that stuff what can we do to bring people into to our town and you
know make this like I said a destination for people not just to pass through right and and I think that's you know a lot of people uh may feel that way too in town that we're just a a pass through you know whether you you know you going to you want to work in Springfield or
you're going to Northampton or you going to Amis depending where you live it's almost that that you know bedroom community if you will and that's what kind of people look at but on the same part some people like that piece about
vamb that's why they move here so but with the same as you said uh I think he talked about Warren and about what their percentage is taxes are based on residential that's the same way in grany U right around the same figures
really okay um if not gramby may be even be a tad it higher thank you guys are higher than than War so um can you tell us a little bit about procurement laws maybe what you've been involved in with that end of things yep
uh recently I just did um the assessors needed a reclass uh valuation the state makes you do it every five years so we went out for bid on that um and that was one of the ones I've done that was that was one that I did recently um in Warren I always did the
highway biddings the bines concrete and we also had one for Windows project that we had done I did one for plumbing we had uh the kazac money we had Plumbing we had done all like the hean free so we did all the bathrooms um I've done many done a lot
of I've done feasibility studies for procure so I'm very familiar with rfps and invitation for bids um right now I will say in um Barry where I'm at we're doing furog um they don't usually take uh wher
but um chapter 90 the representative had said he suggested us go out that route so we did and and that's it's not a lot of money but it's really good to make sure you're doing you know like the OSHA you need to have the uh bonds and the bids you have to have everything in
order you need to make sure that you are to the tea when you're doing procurement so nothing comes at at us so and I do have my certificate the mcppo certificate well yes I guess one of the big questions you know why do you want to be the Town
Administrator in grany and you know what do you see if so your future in grany being so the town of grany I believe the town where I'm at now in town of gramby I believe gramby has more of the vision that I have in my frame of mind I also
love the fact that you are Agriculture and open space and the farm stands I love that I love this town it was an opportunity that came up I'm not wasn't necessarily looking to move but when I saw this come up I was like this this once in a lifetime right like Chris has been here for 23 plus years and you've
been very fortunate to have a Town Administrator you know that has been so long and honestly if I am fortunate enough to get this position I'm hoping to be the same way 15 plus years I want to stay a long time I I I don't want to be doing [Laughter]
this um Warren has a select board as well yes Warren does so um and just how as many select boards um gravy is on a a three-year rotation um but every year
they going to be a different person representing the board and I think actually for the past eight years it's been that way there been the has been the same board um and just you know moving forward too
it it won't be uh our our chair Crystal defrain um has already said that you know she won't run again uh for her upcoming election in the spring so it means that there'll be a different member on the board as well and U and
I've I've made it known too so to that you're aware of but this is my eighth year as a select board member and I won't be running again the following year but with that said I think it's it's it's you know it's good information um for someone that who is considering
uh To Be Our Town Administrator and my question is you know how do you deal with that when there's you know sometimes there just that turnover and you and you got to work with different people you know it could be every year so I'm going to say that I think anytime a board of Select comes and runs I think
it's a it's a pleasure and you're volunteering your time so thank you for that right that's a very great thing in a community and you know what I don't have a problem with people changing the boards it's going to happen you know we're all here for the same reason right
to make cramb be the best place it possibly can be and you know I I don't I try I even right now we have one that's leaving one that's coming on and I well I don't know if he's going to come on or not you know there's no competition right now but he's great too I get along
with everybody for the most part so honestly that's I understand that people change and they go through it and I been dealing you know when I was in well actually in Warren I I actually had different boards and they were all great they're all great members so they never had a problem with the select board and
they were always my boss so okay good um so you mentioned if you were to get this position then you'd like to stay on for a prol long period of time so with that said if
you were sitting in the chair making the decisions now where would you like to see the Tom of grabby in five years um I would like to see the town of gramy continue to grow um see where the towns people want it I mean because you said that they a lot of people do like
the open space and I like the open space as well um see if they want to still continue in that way but um I believe we need to also probably every town needs to bring in more revenue and maybe there's a park you guys want you know what are we looking for what are your I
guess what are your wants for the town of gramy what do the resident want for the town of gramy that's important to me um what does the school maybe need I don't know but something that we would work on together make a plan just like how you do a capital plan maybe we do a forecasting plan as to see where we want
what do we want to see happen in five years and we make that come come through you know there a lot of hard work and dedication but in the end it's so worth it um if you if you given the opportunity to be um the Town
Administrator I guess uh what would be your time frame to start so so I do have a contract and I have to give a 90-day notice and I would obviously want to honor that and plus being budget season I would not want to leave them in any binds because I would never do that so
any days you are full-time in your position currently yes I mean I'm Fridays I I do I do I could come here if you need me on a Friday for me to get going on it I could do that in the process so you'd be
open to a little bit more time bu absolutely absolutely if you need me to do that I could definitely do that I think you kind of touched on this in beginning of your interview uh but uh what brings you Joy brings me joy
uh Joy um have a place that I love to come to work brings me joy my family brings me joy I like to be a happy person I'm optimistic about a lot of things I don't like negative I don't like drama so that's what bring me that's what brings me joy
I'm sure you know or maybe you don't know um we our assistant Town Administrator is retiring as well um within the bribe the next month or so MH so um you know eventually we'll be
looking for a replacement for for her as well so just again this is just information that that well I don't know if you're aware of but I want to make sure that you are aware of that though okay thank you there's a lot of changes going on it happens in town so we're in the we're in
the process of hiring a new fire chief okay uh Building Commissioner so uh as a select board we we have hands full right now I was looking for a Town Administrator too so else well I think I've covered most of
that I think I've heard everything I need to hear and you've been very direct thank you for answering all the questions thank you very much I appreciate you coming in too thank you thank you for having me do you have any questions for us um I do have a few of them I guess uh what are you looking for
in a Town Administrator well everything that we've asked obviously um you know we want we would like to see the town move forward also yes um not at a rapid speed because small
towns obviously go a little slower than a lot of larger cities and towns um but I like your idea of sitting down and coming up with say A Five-Year Plan of moving forward one of the things that always comes to the Forefront is um our
water and sewer which we have here on 202 but it stops and we also have it to Morgan Street to a certain point stops there so that's something that always comes up because we're always looking to possibly bring more business in yeah but it's difficult
to say we'll take your business on but we're going to put you on a septic system in a well exactly you know they want that running water and sewer so so that's something that has been on our plate that's been discussed uh Glenn's
probably been discussing it for years me not so much because I'm the newest board member but um we did go AC over some things you know recently and tried to make something happen we just were short on time so that's something else
we would you know possibly like to look for grants for say maybe there's some grants out there for that that we can find yeah so yeah I mean really for myself you know I I tend to focus a lot on U experience and knowledge for the
position also I think someone who's a good communicator very helpful in this position um as well as you know I look for someone that is a leader but can work well with other people uh but understands the importance of being
being the leader is taking on that responsibility and not shying away from it exactly all any other questions no that's it all right well again thank you very much we I know we both appreciate it in um I know U we have sent I think we
wait till our meeting um when Crystal's back and we can discuss this further I know she's going to take the time to review um the recording uh and we did say U you know if Crystal had any
followup questions um on her part so we we would um have another interview just so um we're being fair but um I was very pleased with a lot of her respon that that she had so it seems as though
she has a quite a bit of experience in the municipality and things so so I I was pleased also so again I think we'll uh we'll wait till U Chris's back in our next meeting and we'll put that on our agenda to discuss that so with that said
um that's the only thing we add on our agenda so I will entertain a motion to adour I will make a motion to adjourn the meeting and me being the other person I will second that motion is there any further discussion
at this time no discussion all favor I I anybody opposed no good thank you