Oak Bluffs selectmen voted Tuesday night to accept a contract with Robert Whritenour for the position of interim town administrator.
The town has been negotiating with Mr. Whritenour, the former Falmouth town manager, since the board of selectmen named him to the temporary post on August 9. Oak Bluffs has been without an administrator since Michael Dutton’s resignation, which was effective July 31.
Selectmen went into a half-hour executive session on Tuesday at the close of their regularly scheduled selectmen’s meeting and reconvened to vote to approve the contract. The vote was not unanimous.
“I oppose and I oppose specifically for the reason that I just can’t accept in good conscience a temporary employment contract for 13 weeks that allows for somebody to get up to 13 days of paid sick, vacation or other time,” said selectman Gail Barmakian. “Otherwise I’m for it.”
Board chairman Kathy Burton would not disclose any other details about the contract until it had been accepted by Mr. Whritenour but she said that if he does accept she expected him to report to work in the next day or two. Board members hope to have a permanent replacement for Mr. Dutton by this fall and Mr. Whritenour has expressed his interest in that position as well.
A full report about the selectmen’s meeting and the interim town administrator will appear in Friday’s edition of the Gazette.
This article appears in August 30, 2011.
Good for you Gail! No temporary contract should have such benefits. I would guess that a permanent position with OB would ony give 1 or at most 2 weeks of vacation time in the first year. A day for each week worked is absurb. Why not just advertise a 4 day workweek?
Given the gravity of OB’s financial & other problems, how could there be any paid full days off? Why does the Gazette quote Selectman Barmakian as saying the leave is 13 days, while the Times says 9 days? Either way, essentially, the Town has just hired a part-time interim administrator during a crisis… that’s irresponsible…and, as a professional administrator, Mr. Whritenour should know better and not have asked for paid leave…wrong message to the taxpayers.