SOUTHWICK — Randy Austin was appointed by the Select Board as the town’s director of assessment during the board’s Aug. 25 meeting and will be taking over for Sue Gore who is retiring after serving 32 years as the town’s assessor.
“I’m happy to be closer to home,” said Austin about his appointment, adding that he worked in Southwick before training to become an assessor.
“It’s a community I’m very familiar with, and it will be a little less stress than working with a city,” he said.
Select Board member Diane Gale thanked John Cain, the chair of the Board of Assessors, for recommending Austin to the position.
Austin grew up in West Springfield, graduating from West Springfield High School in 1982, according to his LinkedIn profile.
He began his career working as the principal assessor for the town of Dalton before taking a similar part-time position in Montgomery, where he worked for 17 years.
While still working for Montgomery, Austin took a position in the Assessor’s Office in West Springfield in 2013 and was there until 2022 when he accepted the position of chief assessor in Greenfield.
In 2015, he earned accreditation from the Massachusetts Association of Assessing Officers.
According to the town’s Assistant Chief Administrative Officer Nadine Cignoni, he was by far the best candidate who was interviewed for the position.
He starts on Sept. 8.
The Select Board and Southwick-Tolland-Granville Regional School District School Committee hosted a joint meeting to fill the Southwick seat on committee vacated by Erika Emmelmann last month.
School Committee Chair Robert Stevenson said there was only one person that applied for the appointment, Russell Fox, who only left the committee in May after serving out the term of Patrick Jubb who resigned.
The appointment continues Fox’s service to the town, which began over 40 years ago after graduating from Babson College.
When he was 23, in 1981, he was appointed to the Select Board to complete the two-year term of a board member who resigned, and he won reelection four times, ending his tenure in 1990. He then ran and won a seat on the Select Board in 2011 and held that seat until 2023.
Fox will serve out Emmelmann’s term which ends next May.
The board also hosted a dangerous dog hearing related to a German Shepherd owned by Arthur Matsuk.
Matsuk had been cited numerous times since 2020 for the dog being unleashed, unlicensed and attacking another dog.
Matsuk said he had taken steps to keep the dog from leaving the property.
It was decided to continue the hearing until the board can tour Matsuk’s property to see what steps were taken to keep it contained.
At the board’s meeting in early August, it got an update from Pioneer Valley Planning Commission’s Erica Hill on the Community Block Development Grants the town has been awarded to help fund the Our Community Food Pantry and rehabilitate Bungalow Street and North Lake Avenue by installing drainage, extend sewer lines and repaving each.
Hill told the board there was $130,297 left over from the Bungalow project and wanted to know where they might want the money spent.
During the Aug. 25 meeting, it was decided to use the surplus grant money on the North Lake Avenue project.
The board also approved allocating $24,500 to have the town’s roads surveyed by BETA, the engineering firm the town has used for the survey for over a decade.
In addition to the survey, BETA will make suggestions on what applications might be applied to increase the life of the roads, offer suggestions based on importance or degradation, and provide advice on borrowing.
BETA’s assessment of the roads should be prepared by October.
The board also appointed Charles Darling as the assistant director of the town’s Emergency Management Agency.
Former assistant, Iain White, was appointed director to replace Select Board member Russ Anderson who resigned as director after being elected to the board.
