SNAPSHOT
Town Counsel Paul DeRensis
BY MARY LANCASTER INDEPENDENT WRITER
"I'm merely a servant to the goals of other people," Paul DeRensis said after Town Meeting. DeRensis has represented the island in litigation and at Town Meeting for 21 years now, but he stresses that he wants to stay in the background of government functions. He says he is a private person, and for that reason declined to be interviewed about his tenure with the town.

He did say, however, that the island's recent Annual Town Meeting brought his total of town meetings to 1,051 since he began working in 1981 as town counsel to various communities that include Cohasset, Randolph and Canton.

His current three-year contract, which expires June 30, 2008, provides for a retainer of $80,000 per year in the first year, with an increase of $5,000 in the second and third years, and another retainer of $22,000 for handling of collective bargaining issues.

In addition to the flat retainers there is a provision for an hourly fee of $150 an hour when senior counsels in his firm are brought in to defend the town in superior court cases and other matters, a fee that increases by $10 an hour in the last year of the contract. (Examples of other matters include last year's arbitration between the town and Waste Options and, currently, negotiations between one of the firm's attorneys and a Boston lawyer representing Eric Shaw in the Madequecham Valley Road property settlement.)

DeRensis earned his bachelor's degree from Harvard College and degree of Juris Doctor from Harvard Law School. He is a partner in the Boston firm of Deutsch Williams Brooks DeRensis and Holland, which, according to its Web site, employs 18 attorneys including DeRensis.

His areas of expertise include public procurement, land use, environmental law, civil rights and ethics issues, contractural matters, municipal finance, special education and retirement issues and corporate governance and litigation. His three-year contracts with the town contain a provision for the town to undertake a performance review of his services each March, when the town has the discretion to terminate the agreement.

He is required to keep the selectmen informed on a regular basis of legal services rendered through monthly billing summaries and quarterly reports. He must provide prompt advice to the town throughout the year as to changes in law, court decisions or regulations that may affect departments, and review Town Meeting articles and recommendations as well as attend Town Meeting sessions. Sometime between October and November of each year he must also provide educational programs for department heads to identify legal problems that may arise and suggestions as to how to avoid legal entanglements.

His firm must carry a minimum of $2 million in liability insurance. The contract stipulates that "the legal intent of the parties is to make every effort to limit the total cost of legal services."

This year's town operating budget has costs for legal services at $330,000, the same amount as the FY07 total. An overview in the town's 2006 Annual Report listed legal services that included 11 suits relating to the town's title to parcels of land; four suits involving the selectmen; nine suits involving the Planning Board; 19 suits involving the Zoning Board of Appeals; three separate suits involving the Conservation Commission, the police department and the Airport Commission; four suits involving Nantucket County; five Land Court petitions; one case involving the Historic District Commission; two cases involving the Department of Public Works; one with the building department; one with Parks and Recreation and four instances that, as of the report, had not yet become lawsuits.

DeRensis has a home on Nantucket and property in

Sherborn, Mass. I