The Martha’s Vineyard Commission (MVC) last Thursday signed off on a contract for Adam Turner of New Saybrook, Conn., picked to be the regional planning and permitting agency’s next executive director.
The two-year contract is effective August 1, 2015. Mr. Turner will earn a salary of $107,454 per year with benefits.
Mr. Turner will replace Mark London, executive director since 2002, who will retire on August 1. Mr. London earns $128,224 annually. Mr. Turner’s professional career spans 30 years, and includes extensive coastal management work in island environments that include the Florida Keys and Northern Marianas.
Contract benefits include 15 days of paid vacation leave during each 12-month period from July 1 through June 30, plus an additional day of paid vacation leave per year for each additional full year of service up to a maximum of 25 days of vacation leave per year; 15 days of paid sick leave during each 12-month period, with the option to accrue 60 days of sick leave; and 11 paid holidays.
The MVC will pay Mr. Turner $10,000 “to help defray the expense incurred by the executive director in relocating to Martha’s Vineyard.”
Mr. Turner will also receive $50 monthly for cellphone telephone expenses.
He will be eligible to enroll in a Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts group health insurance plan and a Delta Dental group dental insurance plan, under which the commission pays 75 percent of the premium and the employee pays 25 percent.
Mr. Turner would be entitled to 13 weeks of base pay should the MVC terminate his contract other than for cause, which includes illegal or unprofessional activity.
For the past seven years, Mr. Turner has been town planner for Colchester, where much of his focus has been on land-use regulation.
His contract stipulates that he not engage in any other business activity during the term of the agreement, with the exception that he may complete a project he is currently engaged in, which is the removal of the Norton dam and restoration of the Salmon River in Colchester, Conn. That project is expected to conclude no later than Oct. 31, 2015. He has agreed to work on the project on his personal time.
The new executive director will preside over an agency with an operating budget of $1.5 million. Salaries and employee benefits, which include the cost of funding retirement benefits, lay claim to the largest share, $1.1 million of the MVC budget. The commission has 10 staff members. The bulk of the MVC’s income comes from Dukes County taxpayers, through town assessments based on property tax valuation. All seven towns in Dukes County, which includes Gosnold, share the cost of planning, according to their relative property valuation.