PARIS — The Board of Selectmen is expected to name Philip M. Tarr of Bridgton as the next town manager Monday, Dec. 28.

Tarr, who was formerly town manager of Skowhegan and currently works on the city of Westbrook’s new recycling program, said he will accept the position if the board formally votes to offer it to him.

“I have an interest in serving the town of Paris,” Tarr said when reached by phone Monday afternoon. He said that “until the contract is fully worked out and approved by town council and a vote is taken,” he can not comment further on his impending appointment.

Tarr said a “working” contract between him and the town of Paris is now in the hands of the selectmen.

Selectmen’s Chairman David Ivey could not be reached for comment, but Selectman Ray Glover confirmed that negotiations have been under way with Tarr for the past few weeks. Tarr is expected to be offered an annual salary in the range of $57,000. Glover said that until selectmen vote in public, “the paper the contract is written on is simply paper.”

Glover confirmed that at the end of the Dec. 8 interviews with two of three finalists, the board unanimously agreed, but did not officially vote to offer the position to Tarr. Instead, the board began negotiations with Tarr on Dec. 8. They then met again in executive session on Dec. 14 to review details of the negotiated contract.

One of the three unnamed candidates had already accepted a position with another town and did not appear for the finalist interviews, Glover said.

Glover said he would not talk about specific aspects of the negotiations that were discussed in executive session, but agreed the board should have taken a vote in public before negotiating the job with Tarr.

“There should have been an official vote in public session,” Glover said.

Tarr said that although he retired last year, he decided to return to public sector work.

“It’s a good thing for me at this time in my life,” he said of his decision to apply for the position in Paris after retiring from his previous post. “I … came out of retirement and wanted to do something good for the public.”

Tarr declined to discuss his previous positions until he is officially on board as town manager in Paris. But according to information obtained from the Bethel and Skowhegan town offices he served as Skowhegan’s town manager until July 2008 and worked as town manager in Bethel from June 1997 until May of 1999 when his contract was not renewed. According to town reports he was also town manager in Bridgton from 1984 to 1990.

According to a report on June 4, 2008, on the Web site of The
Sebasticook Valley Weekly, Skowhegan selectmen failed to renew Tarr’s
contract in 2008.

The Morning Sentinel reported in a 2007 article that Tarr faced some controversy during his long tenure in public service. This includes an unsuccessful citizens petition to remove him from his position as Skowhegan town manager in 2007, and a recall petition during a stint as community manager of Lake Arrowhead Community Inc., a homeowners association with 1,540 members in Waterboro and Limerick, in 2004.

Tarr told the Morning Sentinel in an interview published June 17, 2007, that as an employee and not a trustee of the Lake Arrowhead Community Association, the homeowners association did not have the authority to place his name on a recall petition. Four trustees and another employee were also named in the petition which claimed in part “arrogance and indifference to the expressed opinions and concerns of the membership,” according to the article.

Glover said he and Lloyd “Skip” Herrick both know Tarr and think well of him.

“Of all the candidates I think he’s the best,” Glover said. It is not unusual for a town manger to become the target of citizen’s unrest, he said. Since he became a member of the Paris Board the Selectmen, Glover said three or four town mangers have come and gone.

ldixon @sunjournal.com