It's Official: Lancaster Town Administrator Resigns Effective January 10th

 

Photo by Brian Wangenheim on Unsplash

It's official:  Town Administrator Kate Hodges has delivered her notice and will resign effective Friday, January 10th, 2025.   Her first contract with Lancaster was due to end on June 30th.

 

Town Administrator Kate Hodges delivered her resignation notice to the Lancaster Select Board on Friday; she expects her last day to be Friday, January 10th.  

Her first contract with the town ran March 28th, 2022 to June 30, 2025.  She'll serve a total of two years, nine months before she leaves.

On October 31st new articles surfaced reporting that Hodges was one of two finalists for the Town Manager position in Dracut.   She interviewed in a public meeting with their Select Board on November 7th.

Bellingham's Town Administrator Search committee also announced Hodges as one of four remaining finalists at their November 4th Select Board meeting.  She never appeared to interview, presumably because she was negotiating with Dracut.

Dracut's Select Board met on November 21st in an executive and public session to vote on a contract for Hodges.

 Hodges two years in Lancaster were tumultuous.

The average single-family tax bill grew from $7,570 in FY2022 ($7,151 and $7,325 in the two years prior to that), to $8,534 for the year ending in July.   The tax rate for the current year should be apparent after the tax hearing at the December 2 Select Board Meeting, but it will reflect bond payments on the district High School building project.

Early this year the town pushed out its Fire Chief after a long period on leave, without a public explanation.  

The Select Board has been meeting regularly this year to strategize a lawsuit against the town's Historical Society, and began meeting last month to handle a lawsuit from two EMS employees who were improperly terminated.   (Prior to leaving her previous role in Concord, the town settled with town employee who accused Hodges of terminating her in retaliation.)   Concord paid $230K.

The town iterated through several clerks and dealt with the resignation of the IT Director. 

Last year Hodges created a new budgeting role within the Finance and Budget department.  The analyst hired quit after less than a year, and Hodges stated in her budget presentation last week that the position will be discontinued.

At Special Town Meeting in October, Hodges requested a vote to alter the Finance Director's position, which was defined in special legislation accepted by the town in 2002.   The changes would have removed the statutory role of Procurement Officer and Town Accountant from the Finance Director, removed budgeting authority, and changed the role from an independent contract position to a position appointed by Select Board's designee. (Presumably, the Town Administrator.)

The town voted against the changes.

Lancaster's Select Board voted it's intention to work on a new contract with Hodges in September, and assigned member Jason Allison to work with her.   If he ever made any progress he never reported it publicly.