Good Morning Residents of Tewksbury,

We here at Tewksbury Families for Recreation need our neighbors' help. As you may have seen, there was a decision not to hire a Recreation Director or Recreation Coordinator in FY2025. We crunched some numbers last night, and based on the average salary of a Recreation Coordinator in MA at $52,000, plus overestimations of overhead costs to support said employee, our town is telling us that they are unable to accommodate approximately $105,000 a year to support our community. I’m perplexed by this, given our town has over $6 million in free cash allocated for one-time expenditures. Surely, we can allocate such a small portion of that budget to help keep our community thriving!

Here's what we need from our neighbors: if you support our town hiring a Recreation Coordinator to help our Town Planner bring more events into our community, and to support our Select Board Member Mr. Kratman’s efforts with our Town’s Holiday Celebrations, we need you to tell our leaders. You can phone the Town Manager’s office or email the Town Manager and the Select Board, and/or attend the Select Board meeting on Tuesday, January 23, 2024 to speak during the open session for residents.

We want to make it abundantly clear that we do not support any of our neighbors harassing our town staff. Harassment from our neighbors is counterproductive. We encourage one modality of communication in addition to in-person advocacy to the Select Board.

With that said, here’s how you can help:

The simplest way:

• Send a brief note or make a quick phone call to alert the Town Manager’s office that you fully support our town hiring a Recreation Coordinator for FY2025.

Additional ways:

• In an email, alert the Town Manager and the Select Board of your personal struggles with our community not having a dedicated Recreation Department.

• Perhaps you are disheartened to learn that Billerica is expanding their Rec-division by building a Community Center to fulfill their town’s needs.

• Maybe you are frustrated with the lack of affordable options for summer camp.

• You love the town celebrations and think a Recreation Coordinator could help broaden our celebrations to be more enriching.

• You would be willing to pay a nominal fee for recreational activities that a new Recreation Coordinator could facilitate.

These are just suggestions as to why our Advocacy group is pushing so hard to hire a Recreation Coordinator based on responses from our community.

We don’t believe it is appropriate for us to provide a template email since each person’s situation is different. The more unique responses our Town Manager can mull over, the better the chance of our success.

Emails should be sent by January 31, 2024, to ensure there is time for the previously proposed warrant by our Town Manager to work with the Select Board and Finance Committee to make this happen.

We are also exploring an avenue for Tewksbury Families for Recreation to put forth a resident warrant to direct the Town Manager to create this position and fill it. More on that coming soon.

Best,

Kate, from Tewksbury Families for Recreation

Town Manager’s Phone: 978-640-4300

Mr. Montuori, Town Manager: <rmontuori@tewksbury-ma.gov>

Mr. Kratman, Select Board <MKratman@tewksbury-ma.gov>,

Mr. Johnson, Chair of Select Board <TJohnson@tewksbury-ma.gov>,

Mr. Mackey, Select Board <JMackey@tewksbury-ma.gov>,

Mr. Holland, Select Board <PHolland@tewksbury-ma.gov>,

Ms. Wellman, Select Board <jwellman@tewksbury-ma.gov>,