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New Castle adds a public works guy

Heidi RicePost Independent StaffGlenwood Springs, CO Colorado
Post Independent/Kelley Cox
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NEW CASTLE – The town is still without an official administrator, but a new position of public works director has been added to the staff list.That position has been filled by John Wenzel, of New Castle, who began his duties on Monday, Nov. 5.The position involves overseeing various departments, including streets, parks, water and wastewater, recreation and building. “We’ve never had a public works director before – this is a big step for us,” said Town Clerk Lisa Cain. “But as the town gets bigger and bigger, we’ve needed one. It’s a key position.”

Wenzel comes to the job from the town of Basalt, where he worked for more than four years.”Some of the objectives will be to keep up with growth – we have to have the infrastructure to keep up with growth,” Wenzel said.Wenzel has lived in New Castle for five years and said he’d been interested in working for the town for some time.”I wanted to contribute to the community I live in,” he said. “I saw some great things happening here, and I wanted to be part of it.”

Wenzel has a wife and three children.And while Wenzel starts his new job, Mayor Frank Breslin continues to fill in as town administrator following the resignation of David Blanchard in late August.Breslin said the town has not advertised for the administrator’s position and he has been taking over the duties in addition to being the mayor and running his own business, Heritage Woodcraft.”I enjoy doing the (administrator) job because I feel I have the business management skills and I enjoy our staff more than I ever have before,” Breslin said. “I like being there and giving direction to the staff.”



But Breslin said that he would prefer Town Council put out advertisements for the administrator’s position.”I enjoy working with the town and doing the work that I’m doing, but I’m not doing the full scope of the work and keeping up with the correspondence and the e-mails,” he said. “It’s a full-time job, and there’s a lot of work not getting done.”In September, council members began focusing on restructuring the operations of the town and getting more involved in town committees.For now, the new public works director will help take some of the pressure off Breslin’s town administrator duties.”He will reduce my workload substantially,” Breslin said. “But there’s still a lot of other things to be done.”


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