Acting Gardner public‑health director candidate stresses staffing stability, transfer‑station fixes and clearer permitting

The Gardner Board of Health on March 12 interviewed Angela, the department’s acting director, as one of two final candidates for the permanent health director position. She told the board her immediate priorities would be stabilizing staffing, finishing budget reorganization for the solid‑waste account and addressing poor conditions at the city’s transfer station.

Angela described seven years with the department, including about three‑and‑a‑half years as assistant director and recent service as acting director, and said those roles convinced her she has the skills to run the office. “I really actually do have the skills and the knowledge and the … strength to run the department,” she said.

The candidate told the board she led an in‑depth public‑health tabletop exercise to test Gardner’s emergency response and worked with staff (named in the transcript as Sue, Emma and Paul Tapowski) on planning and inventories; she said she is still waiting for a five‑year supplies list from the regional preparedness office to complete an inventory. She also described a hands‑on administrative improvement: “I took our permitting and licensing software and I made a cash register out of it so that it timestamps all of the entries … you can print a receipt for them,” she said, adding that the change reduced reconciliation time from roughly two hours to about 30 minutes.

Budget and facilities are central to her pitch. Angela reported finding misallocated spending within the solid‑waste account and said she created a standard operating procedure and a chart to guide staff, the director and the mayor on correct charge lines to improve accuracy. At the transfer station she described a dilapidated scale‑house that is moldy and not weather‑tight and said a new permanent building estimate she was shown last year was about $300,000, which she called cost‑prohibitive. As an alternative, she said, the department is exploring portable office containers with interior finishes, HVAC and security that she estimated at about $15,000–$30,000 per unit (site work, foundations and electrical relocation were not included in that figure).

On recycling and capital projects, Angela said the department is pursuing a compactor for recycling and is awaiting details from an engineering consultant, and that she has contacted Keller Partners about possible grant funding to address erosion control on a capped landfill behind the transfer station. “I’m going to advocate for this project pretty heavily because I feel like the pump project got pushed off … and now I want to make sure we don’t get there with the land cap,” she said.

Angela emphasized staff training and retention as the top operational goal. She said recent turnover left the office short on administrative capacity, that vacancies have lasted roughly three to six months at times, and that she hired two administrative staff to be cross‑trained to cover functions. “My number one goal is to put out the fires right now,” she said, adding that once staffing is stable she wants to expand community programs and outreach, including public‑health fairs organized by staffer Veronica.

She described prior grant work, saying she has helped prepare the recycling‑dividends and sustainable‑materials grant applications annually, and noted administrative and legal coordination with building inspectors, purchasing staff and the city solicitor when code enforcement or court filings are needed.

Board members responded that they want the next director to focus first on stabilizing operations. One board member said retention and transfer‑station improvements are priorities; another (named in the transcript as Jeff) echoed the need for short‑term stability so the department can later focus on broader public‑health initiatives.

The interview closed without a hiring decision; the board planned to continue with the next candidate and then move to executive session. Angela offered to provide the board and mayor a bulleted summary of community projects led by Veronica to increase public visibility of the department’s work.