by Valerie Hurley ·
Friday, May 22, 2026
The town will welcome a new director of economic and community development, a position vacant since Chris Ryan left that post in 2022.
Jenny Gingras, currently employed as the director of planning for Westborough, will start June 1 and be introduced to the Select Board at its June 2 meeting. Gingras previously served as a zoning administrator for Lexington and as the first town planner in Pepperell, where she lives.
According to the town’s charter, the job entails accomplishing community and economic goals “as envisioned by the Select Board,” serving as town planner, coordinating the activities of agencies with jurisdiction over development and conservation, and coordinating “all economic, land use, and community development planning in the town.”
“We interviewed three applicants and Jenny really stood out from the rest,” interim Town Administrator Dawn Dunbar said at Tuesday’s Select Board meeting. Dunbar told the Press that hiring Gingras was the unanimous choice of the town officials who interviewed her, including chairs of the Planning Board and Zoning Board of Appeals; a Select Board member; the building commissioner; and the DPW director.
Joining Gingras at Town Hall will be Tyler Morehouse. He will take the job of accounting assistant, filling the position recently vacated by Catherine Bowen. Morehouse, a recent graduate of UMass Lowell, who most recently interned at Acton Town Hall, will start work May 26. The role of an accounting assistant, Dunbar said, provides an important and perhaps underappreciated check-and-balance in the accounting department. “We are excited to have him,” Dunbar said, adding that he received “rave reviews” from colleagues in Acton.