Whately highway superintendent to retire after 45 years of service

KEITH BARDWELL
Published: 01-17-2025 8:51 AM |
WHATELY — With the upcoming retirement of the town’s longtime highway superintendent, the Selectboard has kicked off the search process for a replacement.
Keith Bardwell, the town’s highway and building superintendent since July 1986, is stepping away from the role at the end of the fiscal year in June, having served the community since he took a summer job with the Highway Department in 1980. After nearly 40 years at the helm, Bardwell said it is time to retire.
As Whately prepares for his departure, the Selectboard and Town Administrator Peter Kane laid out a roadmap of sorts for Bardwell’s successor.
“There’s this desire, hopefully, where we could find, secure and appoint somebody so that there is an overlap in their tenure,” Kane said Tuesday night. “What would be great is if we could get a month of overlap. … If we want to appoint by mid-April, we’d want to get [a job opening] listed relatively [soon], like February.”
Before the job is posted, though, the town needs to examine the job description and the responsibilities that come with the role. Over Bardwell’s decades of work, he has picked up numerous tasks for the community — Selectboard Chair Julie Waggoner noted he did this because “he’s a good guy” — and the town will need to determine what they want his successor to be responsible for.
“We also need to determine what are those things that are not in the job description that we will then have to either contract for or hire someone for,” said Selectboard member Fred Baron. “Keith does things that are not in the job description that, otherwise, we should be paying for. That’s part of the search for Keith’s replacement, is identifying those areas.”
Once the job is posted, there will be no deadline for applications, as Kane said rolling applications would be best for a position where the town isn’t sure how many applicants it may receive.
“It’s going to be an interesting process to find someone because the nature of the job is we want someone who’s geographically relatively close or is willing to move,” Baron added. “It’s going to limit the pool.”
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When Bardwell retires from the position, it will cap off a career that began in the summer of 1980. He said he joined the Highway Department as summer help following the closure of Consolidated Cigar Co., and he continued to help out during the summers while he attended Greenfield Community College and got an associate degree in electrical engineering.
Finally, he was appointed to an interim superintendent position in early 1986 following the Selectboard’s decision to not renew the previous superintendent due to an “uncooperative” working relationship, according to the Daily Hampshire Gazette’s archives. Bardwell was named to the permanent position in July 1986 at the age of 22, where he has served since.
Chris Larabee can be reached at clarabee@recorder.com.