A Middlesex Superior Court judge heard arguments yesterday on whether a state agency has the right to replace the embattled Timothy Bassett as chairman of the Essex Regional Retirement Board.
Judge Thomas Murtaugh will determine whether the state can select the board's chairman after the board failed to re-elect Bassett when his term expired on Dec. 31, 2008.
Massachusetts law grants the state's Public Employee Retirement Administration Commission the power to appoint the chairman if a board fails to act within 30 days. But Essex Regional Retirement Board attorney Maria Durant argued the law is meant to break stalemates if a vote reaches an impasse.
"It's a safeguard," Durant said. "It's there for practical reasons ... so you don't have a period of time where the board is not functioning."
Durant also argued the state created retirement boards to be self-governing, allowing them to adopt their own bylaws and hire their own staff.
Assistant Attorney General Maryanne Reynolds, representing PERAC, argued the authority to choose the board's chairman transferred to the state once the board failed to act within 30 days of the expiration of Bassett's term.
In court documents, the retirement board blamed the failure to re-elect a chairman on an oversight by an unnamed staff member while Bassett's son was ill.
However, Reynolds noted that Bassett had attended the December 2008 meeting and two other meetings in January 2009.
"There was a window of opportunity for this board to make an appointment," Reynolds said.
"I can assume that somebody forgot to do it," Murtaugh said.
Bassett's chairmanship on the retirement board is now the subject of debate in at least two branches of state government. While both sides await Murtaugh's court decision, state legislators are considering two bills that would drastically reform the Essex Regional Retirement Board and specifically bar Bassett from serving as both chairman and executive director.
Earlier this week, PERAC appointed Swampscott Town Administrator Andrew Maylor as the new chairman of the Essex Regional Retirement Board, pending the outcome of the lawsuit.
Bassett, who did not attend yesterday's arguments, will remain chairman until Murtaugh reaches a decision.
However, if he sides with the state, Murtaugh indicated he would allow Maylor to take over as chairman even if the retirement board decides to appeal his decision.¬
The botched election came to light during a PERAC audit. The retirement board moved to correct the error by retroactively reappointing Bassett to the job, but that, too, appeared to be mishandled. The district attorney's office sued the board, arguing it had violated the Open Meeting Law.
At the same time, PERAC started interviewing candidates for chairman of the board, prompting the retirement board to sue the state.
Now, Murtaugh will decide the lawsuit and determine Bassett's future on the board.
Staff writer Chris Cassidy can be reached at ccassidy@salem news.com.
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