The Peterborough Select Board appointed former member Ed Juengst to serve the last months of Karen Hatcher’s term, following her formal resignation at a meeting Wednesday night.
Select Board Chair Tyler Ward said the board received great recommendations for an appointee following Hatcher’s resignation on Aug. 16, and ultimately decided that appointing a former Select Board member w ould be best due to the length of time a public search would take, and the steepness of the learning curve for a new member, just as budget season begins. The position Juengst will occupy will be up for election next year. The appointment puts finding someone new into voters’ hands for next March [???], Ward said, and he encouraged anyone interested in running for the position to attend as many Board meetings as possible to familiarize themselves with its function.
Juengst said he was humbled by being asked to serve, and is excited and happy to take up the role in an interview on Thursday. “I’m going to give it my 100 percent,” he said. “People can expect me to be fair, to listen carefully to everybody, and when I have to decide, that will go into … my decision.” At 78, he said his character has remained unchanged. “People that know me know I don’t usually make enemies or say stupid things,” he said.
The budget might be the biggest issue facing the town in the upcoming months, Juengst said, even if people haven’t thought much about it yet. He also acknowledged the ongoing local conversation surrounding police and racism, which he framed as a national issue. “I want to be fair about that. I want to support our employees including police and fire, but on the other hand if there are things we can do better, [such as] provide better guidance or training, I’m open to listen to any specific claims that people might have,” he said. Finally, there are a number of municipal positions the Select Board will need to fill this fall, including hiring a new Town Administrator after Rodney Bartlett retires.
Overall, Juengst said he’s prepared to give his views on issues and be an active participant along with members Ward and Bill Taylor. State and federal funding will likely be lower this year due to the pandemic, and Juengst said he’s prepared to make tough budgetary decisions if they come. When asked what he’d say to the community members who were dissatisfied after the community listening sessions in June where residents and police discussed the future of policing in town, Juengst said he’d followed the conversations and it seemed to him that residents were listened to properly and answered, but said he could be missing some information. “I want to be involved in the solution so people feel listened to,” he said. Juengst said he’s already circulated articles to the Select Board regarding the presence of institutionalized racism and is looking forward to reading forthcoming police reform plans and proposals at municipal and state levels. He said he wants to make sure any town employee is treated fairly, but believes they need to be called to task when they’re not meeting expectations. “I don’t think you can do enough educating and training of people,” he said.
Juengst moved to Arizona after serving on the Select Board from 2000 to 2004, and returned to Peterborough in 2014. He acknowledged his extensive experience on various municipal boards as a factor behind his appointment. Juengst currently serves on the Capital Improvement Plan committee and as an alternate to the Planning Board, as well as all three TIF committees. He was unsure whether he’d have to abandon any of those roles, and has yet to discuss which of Hatcher’s liaison roles he’d fill.
In her letter of resignation, Hatcher cited the difficulty in simultaneously fulfilling the expectations of her role as Select Board member and Community and Economic Development Coordinator, a job she took in April, and said she would continue with the various volunteer roles she fills in town upon her resignation from the board. “I have appreciated the high level of trust placed in me by members of the community and by fellow Select Board members… I am proud of the work we have done together and will do my best to support the board and our community as part of the town’s administrative staff,” she said.
“Stepping down from the Select Board is probably one of the most honorable things I’ve seen someone to do,” Taylor told Hatcher at the meeting, adding he was “real sad to see you go.” Ward also said he hadn’t wanted to lose Hatcher as a Select Board member, but understood how essential her role as the Community and Economic Development Coordinator was to the town in the moment.
The meeting was rescheduled from Tuesday due to an outage that left Select Board members unable to broadcast their meeting via Zoom.