Former Palmer Town Manger Charles Blanchard accepts interim town manager job in Williamstown
Updated Apr 14, 2021;
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His first day of work is Wednesday.
Williamstown Town Manager Jason Hoch announced in February that he would resign once an interim manager was in place.
His departure is partly related to allegedly not telling the Selectboard, in a timely manner, that a police sergeant had filed a complaint against the town’s police chief with Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination.
In August, Sgt. Scott McGowan then filed a federal lawsuit naming then police chief Kyle Johnson, Hoch, and the town as defendants.
The civil complaint alleged the police department “turned a blind eye to sexual assault and sex discrimination.”
Anne O Connor, who is a non-voting member of the interim chief advisory committee, told her colleagues on the Select Board that the search group has interviewed three applicants and is hoping to arrange a fourth interview. Outgoing Town Manager Jason Hoch asked the Select Board to form a search committee to make a recommendation to his office for the interim post after then-Chief Kyle Johnson resigned in December. After some initial uncertainty about the level of community interest in serving on the search committee, the town received 22 applications and appointed eight residents to the panel. O Connor said its work so far has been heartening.
WILLIAMSTOWN An interim town manager’s contract was finalized, and news of a fourth applicant for interim police chief was made known during Monday’s Select Board meeting.
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The names are confidential until the town decides to release them.
According to Anne OâConnor, the liaison from the Select Board, there have not been any responses to ads seeking applicants for the position. The three existing candidates had applied for the job before the advertisements ran in a variety of trade publications.
âThe whole goal is to help the [Police] Department â theyâre a little understaffed,â OâConnor said.
The Williamstown Police Department has been through a litany of issues since last summer, when Sgt. Scott McGowan filed suit against Police Chief Kyle Johnson and Town Manager Jason Hoch. McGowan alleged a series of incidents of sexual and racial harassment in the police station that, he said, occurred several years ago.