Town Government
Boards & Commissions
What Boards & Commissions Are
Beyond the Select Board and the School Committee, much of Middleborough’s governing happens on volunteer boards and commissions. They approve new development, hear zoning appeals, protect the town’s wetlands and open space, weigh in on historic places, and guide services for residents. They are the rooms where an ordinary resident can have the most direct hand in a decision.
Middleborough elects more of these than most towns do. The ballot the town publishes for its annual election carries nine offices: Select Board, Gas & Electric Commissioners, School Committee, Board of Assessors, Moderator, Finance Committee, Planning Board, Park Commissioners and Housing Authority. Everything else is appointed, most of it by the Select Board, which the charter also seats as the Board of Health, the Water Commissioners, the sewer commissioners and the rent board. The Town Manager appoints the department staff rather than the citizen boards.
Key Boards & Commissions
- Finance Committee is seven residents, elected, and charter sections 4 to 6 make it the town’s money referee. It reports in writing at every Town Meeting on every article that spends or borrows, and every board and officer in town has to send it a detailed budget estimate by the twentieth of January.
- Gas & Electric Commission is five members, elected, and it runs a gas and electric utility the town owns outright. Charter section 3.A created it, and it is the reason the lights in a Middleborough kitchen answer to officials residents can vote out.
- Planning Board is five elected members plus an associate, and it reviews subdivisions, site plans, and major development.
- Board of Assessors is three elected members who value property and decide abatements and exemptions. Charter section 11 puts one seat on the ballot each year.
- Park Commission is five elected members overseeing the town’s parks and playing fields.
- Housing Authority is five members, four elected by the town and one appointed by the state.
- Zoning Board of Appeals hears variances and special permits. Appointed.
- Conservation Commission protects Middleborough’s wetlands, rivers, and open space, and the town staffs it with a Conservation Agent and a Land Manager.
- Community Preservation Committee recommends how the town spends its Community Preservation Act money on open space, historic preservation, recreation and affordable housing, and Town Meeting votes each project.
- Historical Commission works on the town’s historic places and sponsors preservation projects.
Middleborough posts agendas for more than ninety public bodies on one page, from the Charter Study Committee to the Herring Fishery Commission to the Town Manager Search Committee. For the full roster, current members, vacancies, and schedules, see the town’s Agenda Center.
How to Serve
- Decide whether the seat is elected or appointed. Nine offices are on the town ballot. For those, you pull nomination papers from the Town Clerk’s office, which has them from January 1st, and you need the signatures of 50 registered voters.
- For an appointed seat, find an opening on the town’s boards and committees pages and in the Select Board’s own agendas.
- Submit a letter of interest to the Select Board’s office. Requests go in writing with the supporting material by noon on the Wednesday before the meeting you want to be heard at.
- Serve: attend the public meetings and help make decisions for your town.
Here is the part worth knowing before you turn eighteen: a Middleborough resident who is not yet a voter can still walk into any of these meetings, and can still write to the board. The seat needs a voter. The room does not.
Serving on a board is one of the most direct ways to shape Middleborough.