March 2, 2020

“he moved to enter into negotiations for a contract for them to provide search services. Seconded by Mtr. Ford. Mr. Ford said that two of them had indicated the cost, however, a third one did not. Mr. Ballantine said that they did. He said that they had sent it to him and had scanned it in and included it in the packet. He said that they are all in the same ballpark. Mr. Ford confirmed that the number is at the low range of the proposal, and that is a good thing. He said that he was underwhelmed by at least one of the proposals, and maybe even two of them. He agreed with Mr. McManus and thought Paradigm had the best proposal, most comprehensive, and has the most recent experience on Cape Cod with Bourne, Brewster and Provincetown. He said that he had spoken with people from those towns, who said their experience was excellent. He said the only concern he had relative to that, and the other proposals was while they said they've worked with Selectman, they would work with the Selection Committee extensively, taking guidance from them as to how they wanted to set up the interviews and so forth. He said there were some proposals to do open public meetings and have anyone that wants to come talk, and he thinks that the reason they selected this committee was to do that. He does not think that would be a useful use of their time. Mr. Ballantine said that he agrees and that two of the three made a point of saying that they will have some sort of community input. He is not sure what that entails. Mr. Ford said that he thinks that the Search Committee will make a decision about if they feel it is helpful. Chief Clarke said that they had spoken quite frankly about their feelings about the agendas and will most likely have an open session before they go into executive session to allow folks a brief conversation. Mr. Ballantine said that he agrees that Paradigm has worked in Brewster recently, and Provincetown, and he wanted to be sure that they had a broad enough network and would be able to do the grunt work to elicit candidates. He said that he was disappointed to have some discussions, because they seemed to rely almost solely on advertisements, rather than networking. He said that his sense with this endeavor is that it will take calling people up and doing the hard work. Mr. Howell said that he agrees with what Mr. Ford said. He said that they may want to speak with them before they go off with the committee. He said that the committee are part of the community and they have been part of the community for many years and they understand that is needed in the position. He said that the search firm needs to understand that this is not what they typically do, but what they are asking is for them to cast the widest possible net, and aggregate as many people that that they can find, and turn them over to the committee. He said that he would like them to hear this from their mouths, and that they are going to do more than just throw a couple of ads in the paper, because they could do that. Mr. Ballantine said that they will proceed. He said that Mr. MacAskill had sent an email and his preference was Paradigm, as well. He said that this is going to be a process and said that the search committee is meeting next on March 25", so they will keep in touch. He said that they want to move forward as quickly as they can, but they have an Interim Town Administrator and they have great Town staff, so they can take some time to be sure that they do it right. the other factor that they are all worried about is coming to Town Meeting, but whoever they hire will not be in place in time to affect Town Meeting. So that should not be a concern. All in favor, motion carried by unanimous vote.” (Motion: McManus)

Read it in the official minutes, page 12 (PDF)