One name on the election ballot — that of Turners Falls resident Jay DiPucchio — may ring familiar, especially when it comes to the Franklin Regional Council of Governments Executive Committee for which he’s running unopposed.
DiPucchio, who’s seeking a four-year committee seat being vacated by John Paciorek of Deerfield — one of two regionally elected positions on the five-member panel — hasn’t been directly involved in the COG since 1999, when he stepped down as its first executive director.
As administrator of Franklin County from 1988 until mid-1997, when it abolished itself, DiPucchio helped prepare the county government’s replacement with the Franklin COG that was designed by a charter commission. And he remained to steer the new COG until it could appoint planner Linda Dunlavy to the top post she continues to hold.
County government had existed here for 186 years under state government authority, with the court system, jail and deeds registry as its statutory raison d’etre. But through its regional planning agency, Franklin County government also built up a small core of regional services, including coordination of human-service programs and cooperative purchasing by towns and schools — even as state government began pushing for abolition of counties.
DiPucchio, who’d worked as one of the region’s first town administrators in Leyden while earning his master’s in public administration from the University of Massachusetts, recalls his early days as county administrator. “I realized, within a week of getting there, that our ability to continue delivering services to the municipalities, which was really at the core of what I found most interesting and valuable about what the county could do, was going to be at increasing risk as the result of budget demands of the other three traditional county functions.”
Working with selectmen, area legislators and other community leaders to brainstorm transitioning to a new form, DiPucchio helped map out a plan for a series of charter commissions to create the COG as counties shed “core functions.”
DiPucchio, part owner of Nutri-Systems Corp., which manufactures food-service equipment for the nation’s Meals on Wheels programs, hasn’t been involved in the COG since he stepped down, though he has been involved in its initiatives. He represented the Montague Board of Health in creating the COG’s regional health program, consulted with regional planners as a member of the Montague Economic Development and Industrial Corp., and most recently worked on a collaborative effort on the needs of fire departments around the county.
When he learned that Paciorek planned to retire after years on the COG Executive Committee, DiPucchio says “I thought I could be a help to the organization and its mission because of the pretty deep history I have with the COG. I had an opportunity to be there at the creation, but folks have taken it to the next level we’d hoped it would go. The scope of programs and services it offers is astounding, and it gives an incredible variety of opportunities and public tools to towns in the county: regional services, regional preparedness programs, youth advocacy, resource management, sustainability programs, transportation planning …”
He said he’s “excited to be getting back into it” because of the way the COG serves the county’s 26 towns “in way that pulls the communities together and recognizes that sense of identity we have is just unmatched. There’s no other organization like it.”
The 61-year-old DiPucchio adds, “I had the opportunity to work with a lot of bold, risk-taking community leaders to try to create something that really better served the county than the old mechanisms.
“Some folks say we abolished the county (government). We made the county stronger by changing the organization to the COG. All of it’s because of that incredible sense of regional identity we have both as individuals and municipalities in this region.”
DiPucchio expects to continue his membership on the Montague Public Works Building Committee and Turners Falls Fire District Prudential Committee, and chairmanship of the Montague Town Democratic Committee.