Important Legislation
Mutual Aid Bill - Update
On July 27, 2010 Govenor Duval Patrick signed into law "an act relative to Municipal Relief". As part of this law, there shall be established a statewide Public Works Municipal Mutual Aid Advisory Committee. This committee will consist of the Secretary of Public Safety and Security, or his designee,who serves as Chair of the Committee. The Secretary or his designee shall appoint one member from the following, all of whom shall be residents of the Commonwealth:
Mass Highway Assocation
Mass Municipal Assocation
American Public Works Assoc./N.E. Chapter
New England Water Enviroment Assoc.
Mass Water Works Association
Mass Tree Wardens and Foresters Assoc.
Each of the above mentioned will need 3 points of contact.
If a city of town chooses to participate in this agreement, the Mayor, Town Manager, Administrator or Board of Selectmen must act on behalf of their city or town by notifying the Chairman of the Advisory Committee in writing.
The Committee shall develop procedural plans, costs, protocols, and program for intrastate and interstate cooperation.
The Mass Highway Association must take the lead in getting this Committee started and when the guidelines are formulated, the County Representatives shall set up meetings for the puropse of educating their cities and towns on how to opt in to the Mutual Aid System. Time is of the essence in getting this program started, and it is essential that the representatives noted above begin immediately to put in place, the necessary tools and programs to insure that this Mutual Aid Bill will work to the advantage of the cities and towns within the Commonwealth.
It has taken six years to get this bill passed, keeping in mind that that there was no financial cost or consideration to this bill, and it still took this long. With that in mind, we cannot waste any time in advising the cites and towns of the necessity of implementing this practice. Let up give this our best efforts to make the passing of this bill the sucess we intended it to be, six long years ago.
** Note: The first meeting of the Public Works Mutual Aid Advisory Committee is scheduled for Thursday, October 21st between 1:00 p.m. and 3:00 p.m. at the training room of the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency in Framingham.
***Click here to view the Mutual Aid Opt-In Letter 8-17-11***
Any additional information will be posted as we receive it.