NEW HAVEN — New Haven is having a hard time hanging on to zoning administrators lately. Three have resigned in the last two years.
The 25-hour-a-week position comes with no benefits, but the New Haven Planning Commission has asked the selectboard to change that, hoping that more robust compensation will lead to less turnover.
One option the selectboard has begun to explore is creating a new position — town administrator — that would combine the duties of the zoning administrator with other duties that are shared by an increasingly overburdened staff, some of whom work on a volunteer basis.
“We have a small subcommittee that is investigating the issue right now,” selectboard chair Steve DuPoise told the Independent. “There are other (small Vermont) towns that have combined zoning administrators and town administrators.”
That subcommittee will meet next week, he added, but it’s premature to start talking about specific job duties or advertising for the position. At the moment they’re assessing the possibility of a 40-hour-per-week job.
The town could use the extra help, anyway, DuPoise said.
“A lot of people do a lot of work that’s above and beyond what the statues call for. With new rules and laws, things get more complex every day.”
Other options under consideration include creating a town administrator position that would be shared by three towns.
But DuPoise emphasized that everything is still in the planning stages.
Whatever proposal the subcommittee comes up with, if any, would then go to the selectboard for consideration, and the planning commission would still be required to review and recommend candidates for the job.