Waldoboro’s Town Planner Leaves For New Job

Willa Antczak, Waldoboro’s planning and development director, has resigned from her position to accept a new job with the Cape Elizabeth Land Trust.

Antczak started with the town in the fall of 2013, replacing Bill Najpauer who resigned one year ago to take a planning position in Rockport. Antczak submitted her resignation

May 5; her last day with Waldoboro was May 16.

Her new position with the land trust will be as membership and development manager, a position Antczak says will include “a little bit of everything, it’s a pretty small

organization.”

Antczak said she expects to do work with membership development, conservation easements, fundraising, managing campaigns and events, and updating the organization’s website.

“It’s a new position so I’m not even sure they’re entirely sure what I’ll be doing,” she said.

Antczak said she has been well supported in Waldoboro and her decision to take the new job was a strategic career move.

“The municipal staff has been amazing in taking the time teaching me, showing me the ropes. It’s a great group of people here,” she said. “I don’t think I’ve every worked with a

more knowledgeable and dedicated staff than in this town office. Everybody really does go above and beyond.”

Antczak said it took about the entire time she worked for Waldoboro to finally feel comfortable in the position, and her duties as code enforcement officer kept her from getting

into the planning side of things as much as she would have liked to.

A lot of her time was spent dealing with code enforcement, “and that’s the stuff that comes across my desk more than anything: permits, calls, questions,” she said.

Antczak is hoping whoever replaces her will pick up on the momentum of development in town sooner than she did.

“I feel very sad to leave because we finally have this momentum and things are happening, amazing things are happening this summer like the farmer’s market, and the Village

Working Group that are working so hard on the downtown, and they’re just at the beginning of their existence and that group can do great things,” she said.

“There is a great energy downtown,” Antczak said. “I’ll be curious to see what happens.”

Town Manager Linda-Jean Briggs said she will be assuming Antczak’s planning and economic development duties, and the two of them have gone over the status of all Antczak’s

projects.

Any code-related issues will be handled on a case-by-case basis, and Briggs said she will reach out to certified code enforcement officers if necessary.

“I really hope to have this position filled sooner rather than later,” she said.