Meetings Ahead
Tuesday, Oct. 10
- Cape Cod Commission Pro-forma Hearing-Virtual, 10 a.m.
- Wellfleet School Committee-Virtual, 5 p.m.
- Wellfleet Cultural Council-Hybrid, 5:30 p.m.
Thursday, Oct. 12
- Wellfleet Commission on Disabilities-Virtual, 4 p.m.
- Zoning Board of Appeals-Hybrid, 7 p.m.
Conversation Starter
2 Roles: Health and Conservation
Town Administrator Rich Waldo sought approval from the select board on Sept. 19 to reorganize the health and conservation dept. The board unanimously voted to split the health and conservation agent’s job into two separate positions.
The town will also expand the department’s administrative assistant role to a full-time position. Part-time administrator Jeanne May retired last month.
Wellfleet has been without a health and conservation agent since Hillary Greenberg-Lemos became director of health and environment in Eastham last April. Assistant health and conservation agent Meredith Ballinger took a job in Harwich in September, Waldo told the Independent.
Waldo hopes splitting the position in two will help with recruitment. “We are getting applicants that either have a strong sense of health but not conservation or a strong sense of conservation but not health,” Waldo told the board.
The health agent will earn the same salary that the health and conservation agent earned, $87,517 to $118,406, and the conservation agent will make what the assistant health and conservation agent made, $60,615 to $82,008, Waldo said.
Waldo said that the increased expense of making the administrative assistant a full-time position will be between $17,000 and $30,000.
Waldo added that regionalization between the Outer Cape towns “has to stay on the table.” But that strategy adds complexity because each town has its own internal regulations for health, he said. Regardless, “a strong working partnership between all four towns is how we have been able to keep operating,” Waldo said. —Sam Pollak
Editor’s note: An earlier version of this article, published in print on Oct. 5, erroneously reported that Dareen Davis had retired. It was another administrative assistant, Jeanne May, who retired.
