Board Begins Town Administrator Search

North Hampton has an immediate need to select an interim Town Administrator to take over until a permanent replacement can be found for outgoing administrator Steve Fournier, who will begin his new post as Newmarket’s town administrator after Labor Day.

Fournier has spent five years as North Hampton’s town administrator.

After a nonpublic meeting of the Select Board Thursday night with Fournier, the Select Board openly discussed the next steps in the search process.

Chairman Jim Maggiore said he had been in contact with Newmarket Town Councilor Al Zink and asked if the council could share some of its applicants’ resumes with North Hampton.

“That is one option for our search,” Maggiore said.

Select Board member Larry Miller said he didn’t want the process for selecting a new town administrator to spread out over nine months, as the Newmarket search did.

Select Board member Phillip Wilson said he suggested looking at three factors when weighing a new candidate.

“The first is competence,” he said. “Second is character. We need to look at leadership skills, community skills and attitude.”

The third thing he said he would look for is a true “calling” to the role.

After some discussion, Maggiore said the board will come back to the Select Board meeting on Monday, Aug. 13, prepared to talk about the challenges and characteristics they would look for in a candidate. They are also considering using a recruitment company to help with the search

They also said Monday would be the target date to come up with an ad to look for an interim town administrator.

Fournier said he would help to identify recruitment companies as well as prepare an ad for the interim administrator based on his own job description.

One 30-year resident attended the meeting last night. He thanked Fournier for a job well done and also suggested the town look into changing the role of town administrator to town manager.