CONWAY — Town officials have shaken hands with the state and signed onto the Community Compact, an initiative put forward by the Baker-Polito administration to help state and local governments better work together.
During a signing ceremony Tuesday, town officials, along with Lt. Gov. Karyn Polito, added their names to the compact, making Conway the 227th town in the state to join the community program.
As a result, town officials will have the opportunity to attend educational sessions on ways to streamline the town’s governmental practices.
“This partnership develops mutual standards and best practices for both the Commonwealth and municipalities through the creation of clear standards, expectations and accountability,” said John O’Rourke, chairman of the Board of Selectmen, during the ceremony.
The Community Compact is specifically for smaller towns that might not have access to educational opportunities and subject-matter-experts larger towns might be able to work alongside.
“(The compact) provides better and brighter opportunities for our communities and schools,” he continued, “through the promotion of operating efficiencies in the major sectors of municipal governance and leadership.”
As part of the compact, the town had to select a few areas of governance that could use improvement from a list of improvement areas, called “best practices.”
Tom Hutchinson, town administrator, said the town selected cyber security and long-range financial planning as areas to improve on.
The next step, he said, will be to attend a few workshops sponsored by the state specifically targeting those areas.
“We should come out of there with a set of policies that create a structure for decision making,” Hutchinson said, adding that the financial planning workshops will be taught by Joe Markarian, a financial planning expert who knows the ins-and-outs of finance within the context of local government.
“We have all of our micro financial policies in place,” he continued about the town’s financial policies. “(But) we don’t do a five-year forecast.”
The workshops will be focused primarily on training, but will also help town officials create policies they can use for years to come.
“The Baker administration is big into making cities and towns run better,” Hutchinson said, “and this is their big initiative in that.”
You can reach Andy Castillo at: acastillo@recorder.com
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