Commission
recommends
staffing changes
WESTFIELD – The city’s Parks and Recreation Commission has formally recommended to Mayor Daniel M. Knapik that changes be made to the professional staffing of the Parks and Recreation Department.
Commission Chairman Kenneth Magarian sent a letter to the mayor Jan. 26 reporting that a personnel sub-committee of the commission had met and recommended to the commission that the positions of the director and program coordinator be both funded and filled.
Magarian said in an interview “The most important thing is that the director’s position be funded” and explained that it has not been filled since the departure in 2008 of former director Anne Marie Heiser. He said that James Blascak, who had been the program coordinator, was named the acting interim director and has been doing his best since then to do both jobs.
Magarian said “Those were two full-time positions” and went on to say that the commission has been talking about how to fund both positions since the summer of 2011.
At their most recent meeting, the members of the commission approved a motion, 5-2, which recommends that the mayor include funding of the director’s position in the city’s FY2013 budget and that the position be filled by Blascak, the current acting interim director.
Magarian’s letter to the mayor calls funding the director’s position “pivotal” and says filling both positions “is strongly recommended.”
The sub-committee also reviewed and updated both job descriptions. The commission accepted those revisions at their meeting and the chairman’s letter also recommends that the mayor also approve the revised job descriptions.
