Session Laws

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives in General Court assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:

SECTION 1. There is hereby established in the town of Pembroke a department of public works, hereinafter called the department, which shall be under the jurisdiction of a board of commissioners to be elected as provided in section two. The department shall have all of the powers and duties now vested in or exercised by any of the following departments, which are hereby renamed divisions and included within said department of public works: cemetery, tree, highway and water. No contracts, obligations or liabilities in force on the effective date of this act shall be affected hereby, but the department shall in all respects be the lawful successor of the departments now included as divisions in the department of public works.

SECTION 2. The board of commissioners shall consist of three members being each elected to serve three year terms as hereinafter provided. The initial members of said board shall be elected by the voters at the regular town election on election day, on May second, nineteen hundred and ninety-two. The candidate receiving the highest number of votes shall serve for three years, the candidate receiving the second highest number of votes shall serve for two years, and the candidate receiving the third highest number of votes shall serve for one year. Thereafter all terms shall be three year terms. Upon the election of a board of commissioners the elected positions of highway surveyor, tree warden and board of water commissioners shall be eliminated and the appointed cemetery commissioners shall become cemetery trustees and shall control the care and expenditure of perpetual care funds as provided in section twenty-five of chapter one hundred and fourteen of the General Laws.

SECTION 3. The board of commissioners shall appoint a director of public works, whose qualifications, as outlined by the wage and personnel board, powers and duties shall be determined and prescribed by said board of commissioners, and who shall be responsible to said board. The director shall have authority to carry out the policies of said board and over the operations of the department. The director shall appoint and remove such staff assistants and employees as he deems necessary, subject to appropriation, with the approval of said board. Such staff may include a working foreman for each division. The director shall hold office subject to the will of the board and shall be appointed for a three year term.

SECTION 4. The town of Pembroke may, after the expiration of three years from the effective date of this act, vote at an annual town meeting to revoke this act and the question of revocation shall be submitted to the voters in the form of the following question, which shall be placed on the official ballot used for the election of town officers: "Shall an act passed by the general court in the year nineteen hundred and ninety-one, entitled 'An Act establishing a department of public works in the town of Pembroke', be revoked "

If a majority of the votes cast in answer to said question is in the affirmative, then at the next annual town election held after said vote of revocation, the town shall elect such officers as are necessary to exercise and perform the powers, rights and duties transferred to the department of public works by this act. Such action shall not affect any contract or liability then created or existing. All General Laws respecting town administration and town officers and any special laws relative to said town, the operation of which has been suspended or superseded by this act, shall then be in full force and effect. Any by-law inconsistent with such general or special laws shall be revoked thereby. Any subsequent vote to revoke this act shall not be taken more often than once in three years.

SECTION 5. Section one of this act shall take effect on May second, nineteen hundred and ninety-two. Sections two, three and four shall take effect upon their passage.