Bucksport’s long-serving town manager will be replaced by her assistant when she leaves her post at the end of June.
The Town Council on Thursday unanimously approved a three-year employment agreement for Jacob Gran, currently the assistant town manager and registrar of voters, to take the place of Town Manager Susan Lessard, who two weeks ago announced she will resign after a decade on the job.
The choice should provide uninterrupted, knowledgeable leadership as Bucksport continues to deal with complicated issues in the coming months, councilors said during a meeting on Thursday night.
Gran has been training for the position with Lessard, and she has offered to continue advising the town at no cost as it navigates the closure of a landfill and the potential abandonment of dams owned by the company that bought the shuttered local paper mill.
At the meeting, Lessard recalled that when she interviewed Gran for his previous position as town clerk, he said his ultimate goal was to be the town manager.
“He has done everything possible to meet that goal,” she said.
Gran, a 2015 graduate of Hampden Academy, got started in municipal government at age 19 as deputy town clerk in his native Winterport. Three years later, he was hired as Bucksport’s town clerk and registrar of voters.
He left the town in late 2023 to manage Pittsfield and returned to Bucksport in January as assistant town manager. While it wasn’t a given that he would replace Lessard, Gran said in an interview, the council knew her resignation was ahead and wanted a smooth transition plan in place.
Along with addressing dam and landfill issues, he has been focused on the challenge of putting together a “reasonable” budget in the face of increasing costs Maine communities are facing across the board.
Bucksport officials, staff and community are able to work together respectfully to address big problems like these and make progress, he said, which motivates him to stay in the town. Lessard characterized it similarly when she announced her resignation, calling it a rarity today.
“Everybody wants what’s best for Bucksport, and that’s the same for me,” Gran said. “That’s why I want to manage it.”
His base salary is $120,000 with cost of living adjustments in the second and third years of employment, according to the contract.
