During what she estimated was her 800th Select Board meeting as a town employee, Kate Fitzpatrick was uncharacteristically distracted.
Perhaps it was the march to the microphone by nearly a dozen longtime friends and colleagues, effusively praising her 35 years of service to Needham. Maybe it was the news that a poem had been written by Anne Nydam, the town poet laureate, or the trust fund created in her name to provide professional development opportunities for town staff. Or it could have been the proclamation designating June 26 as Kate Fitzpatrick Day in Needham.
More likely, it was the 4-year old boy sitting 5 feet from her — her grandson Teddy, who was making his first appearance in the Select Board chambers. He only had eyes for his Mamó — a Gaelic term for grandmother — and Mamó could not ignore his gaze.
Her Select Board swan song was one of many Kate-centric events that have been and will be taking place in Needham as the only town manager in town history counts down the days until her July 4 final day. One of her last acts will be serving as grand marshal of the town’s Fourth of July parade.
The June 24 Select Board meeting agenda set aside time to honor Fitzpatrick, who began her tenure in March 1990 as the town’s personnel director. She has been the town’s chief executive officer since August 2001, first as town administrator and since 2005 as town manager when Needham adopted a new charter.
The current Select Board members spoke first. Chair Heidi Frail said, “You are a legend,” and Vice Chair Cathy Dowd noted, “Kate can find a solution to the thorniest problem.”
Josh Levy noted the difficulties she inherited as personnel director when the town was in the midst of layoffs, with Fitzpatrick noting that the town has not had to do any layoffs since that period.
“Everyone in town sleeps easier at night because you’re in charge, you’re running the show,” added Kevin Keane. And Marianne Cooley said, “She has set all of us up for success going forward.”
Former four-term Select Board member Matt Borrelli recalled a trip he and Fitzpatrick took to China and offered his praise via a Chinese proverb: “One generation plants a tree, and the other one gets the shade. Kate has spent her career planning for projects for future generations, not just this generation.”
Longtime Town Moderator Michael Fee, who was a member of the Finance Committee during those 1990 layoffs, praised Fitzpatrick for her respect for the town’s formal and informal institutions.
“Over the course of those 30 or so years, and in my tenure as moderator, I have grown to harbor the greatest respect for Kate as a public servant, as a person, as an operator and a manager,” he said.
State Sen. Becca Rausch said, “When Kate is involved, I never worry because it’s always done right. Every single time.”
“We will miss your caring heart, your sense of humor, and your unwavering commitment to excellence,” she added.
And newly elected state Rep. Josh Tarsky noted as he’s gotten immersed in local and regional issues, “I’m seeing evidence of your footprint being just about everywhere.”
After Dowd read the proclamation declaring June 26 “Kate Fitzpatrick Day” in Needham, Fitzpatrick offered her thanks.
“Tonight, when I look back, so much of it … really involved building,” she said. “We did a lot of building of things, we did a lot of building of teams, and we did a lot of building of relationships in the community.
“Building is creating or developing something over a period of time. And that’s really what we’ve done.”
She noted the many school projects and other town facilities that were developed during her tenure, not always in conventional ways. “We bought a farm to put the Sunita Williams on.”
“We finally pulled the pool out of the lake and built the Rosemary Recreation Complex.”
She also mentioned “rebuilding the old, probably what I’m most excited about,” referring to the renovations of Town Hall, the library and the Emery Grover Building.
She thanked a host of town employees and noted, of the 400 or so current town employees, she had hired all but seven of them.
“I really want to thank those who took a chance on me in 2001— two-and-a-half weeks before 9/11 — when I took this job.
“And I think that you will be very well served by the next leadership, because new ideas will come forward and unnecessary things will fall off.”
Finally there was the poem, Home, Needham 2025, written and recited by Nydam who became Needham’s first poet laureate last year.
“I am tempted to attribute all of these fabulous things everybody has been saying about Kate to her love of poetry, or at very least correlated highly,” said Nydam.
By this time, Teddy had called it a night, and Nydam had Fitzpatrick’s undivided attention throughout her reading, which concluded with:
“And in this shared place
We are home to one another.
Our faces, our voices,
Our fears and joys, frustration and generosity —
Each of us the fabric of each others’ lives:
And each of us is home.”
“Fantastic!” said Fitzpatrick when Nydam concluded.
And with that, Select Board meeting 800 got back to business.
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