Town offices to close on Thursdays for staff to catch up

March 17, 2026  |  By Lisa Scagliotti

Photo by Lisa Scagliotti

Starting this week, the Waterbury town office will be closed to the public on Thursdays until further notice.

Interim Town Manager Bill Woodruff announced the schedule change on Monday, saying that staff will be working five days a week, with Thursdays being a dedicated administrative day with no public hours starting March 19. 

“These days will be full work days for town staff to complete time-sensitive materials that keep critical municipal services running smoothly,” Woodruff said of the Thursday closures. “Staff will be able to manage the heavy workloads that have accumulated during the past several months while the town has been short-staffed.”

The announcement notes that the new schedule is meant to be temporary until staffing levels return to normal. The schedule only applies to the municipal offices. It will not affect hours at the Waterbury Public Library, which were scaled back slightly in December. 

Woodruff acknowledged that the Thursday office closure may be inconvenient. “We appreciate the community’s patience and understanding as we move forward,” he said.  

The town offices will remain open to the public Monday through Wednesday and Fridays from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

Staffing transitions continue

The municipal staff is still in transition following multiple departures since the fall. Recent hires have brought on new staffers responsible for recreation, zoning and  finance duties. New staff are catching up on a backlog of tasks that accumulated when those positions were vacant, Woodruff explained. 

In addition, Woodruff himself is filling two key roles as interim municipal manager in addition to his public works director duties. He pointed out that staff members have been assisting him during this transition since Tom Leitz stepped down as municipal manager at the end of January. 

Another key area still in transition is the town clerk position. Beth Jones has been in that role since early January following the resignation of Karen Petrovic Jan. 2. Jones formerly was the town’s part-time assistant town clerk and is now working full-time without an assistant. The municipality recently hired a temporary assistant clerk, former Barre City Clerk Carol Dawes, who joined the staff through the March election. Dawes completed her contract last week.

Select board meets tonight

The Waterbury Select Board at its meeting tonight, March 17, will discuss multiple staffing topics including the town clerk and treasurer positions. Both are elected roles in town government. 

On Town Meeting Day, voters wrote in and elected Petrovic to those offices despite Petrovic not being a declared candidate for either. Petrovic has not yet publicly said whether she will accept either or both of those roles. State law gives elected candidates 30 days after an election to take their oath of office to assume the office they win. 

Just as Jones has been serving as interim town clerk, Bill Shepeluk was appointed as interim town treasurer in early January. Under state law, both would remain in those interim roles until a new town clerk and treasurer are sworn in. 

At the March 5 board meeting, Select Board Chair Martha Staskus was tasked with contacting Petrovic to discuss the unusual election outcome and the next steps. 

Meanwhile, a job opening is posted on the town website for a full-time position that would combine assistant town clerk, treasurer and other administrative duties.  

The board also will begin discussing steps regarding filling the municipal manager position permanently and they expect to hear tonight from the library commission on progress toward filling the library director position. Former Assistant Library Director Michelle Willey was named acting library director in December after Rachel Muse stepped down. 

Tonight’s meeting is scheduled for 7 p.m. as is the board’s April 7 meeting. After that, the board will continue to meet on its new Tuesday night schedule beginning at 6:30 p.m. 

The select board meets in person in the Steele Community Room at the municipal building and via Zoom with the online link on the meeting agenda posted on the board’s website. ORCA Media records select board and other municipal meetings and posts them online here. 

Town government updates are posted on the municipal website homepage at waterburyvt.com. Subscribe to town news emails online at waterburyvt.com/news/subscribe.