Pepperell Selectmen Extend Town Administrator's Contract Three Years With Pay Raise

PEPPERELL — December 14, 2015 — Pepperell selectmen extend town administrator's contract through 2018 and file pipeline intervention at FERC. The Board of Selectmen voted unanimously Monday to extend Town Administrator Mark Andrews's contract through November 30, 2018, and to award him a 2.5 percent pay raise of $2,588 effective July 1, 2015, citing a first-year performance that generated roughly $3.37 million in grants, back-tax collections, water and sewer recoveries, and debt-refinancing savings. Selectman Melissa Tzanoudakis called the result "staggering" and said she does not normally award top ratings in a first evaluation cycle but made an exception, while Selectman Michelle Starvish credited Andrews with securing more than $2.26 million across 14 grants and achieving the town's earliest free-cash certification in recent memory. The board also voted unanimously to file a motion to intervene before the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission in docket CP16-21-000, the Kinder Morgan New England Direct pipeline proceeding, following a special town meeting vote of 434 to zero against the project. In other business, LexVest President Eric Shapiro presented plans to convert the 180,000-square-foot former 1A Auto facility at 5 Chapel Place into a multi-tenant small-business center modeled on the firm's Phoenix Park project in Shirley, which now houses 60 businesses employing roughly 300 people.