The Town Administrator Workgroup will conduct a public hearing from 6 to 6:30 pm Monday, May 15, in the Municipal Center’s Council Chambers. The hearing will follow the workgroup’s regular meeting at 5 pm, where it will be interviewing Wilton’s First Selectman Lynne Vanderslice.

The workgroup has been engaged in the last few months with interviewing town officials from towns with government structures similar to the ones the workgroup is considering. The group has been charged with considering a change in government to ease the burden on the town’s chief elected official, the first selectman.

“The job of the first selectman has become more complex and dense,” said workgroup chairman Maureen Crick Owen. “We’ve been asked to look at options.”

First Selectman Dan Rosenthal credited the hiring of Matt Knickerbocker as town administrator by Wilton for giving him the idea of potentially creating a town administrator position. Previously, Rosenthal thought he would have to charge a Charter Revision Commission with looking at a town manager position.

While very similar, a town administrator is a position that is in addition to and complements a first selectman, while a town manager would largely replace a first selectman’s position — or at least a significant amount of a first selectman’s duties — and would locally require a change to the Town Charter.

The workgroup is not solely considering a town administrator or town manager; if, in the end, they feel that leaving things as they are is the best move for the town, then that will be its recommendation.

“We need to consider all the options, and one of those options is to make no changes,” said Crick Owen.

If they recommend a town manager, it will be handed off to the First Selectman and Legislative Council for a potential Charter Revision Commission to consider. If they recommend an administrator, it would be handed off to the first selectman, and it would be “up to the existing first selectman or the next first selectman to create that position.”

There would also need to be a line item added to the budget, so it is unlikely such a position could even be considered for hiring until at least 2024.

The workgroup has received correspondence from the public wishing to weigh in, and has heard plenty from former town officials, but wants to offer an easier opportunity for the general public to weigh in by offering the hearing at a later time.

“I hope people will come out,” said Crick Owen.

Associate Editor Jim Taylor can be reached at jim@thebee.com.