NORTHAMPTON — After her first day in the city clerk’s office as a 20-year-old, Wendy Mazza thought “I’m not gonna be here long.” Now, about 45 years later, she announced Tuesday she’s retiring from the office.
Mazza recalls being “a nervous wreck” at first, but grew into the job. When she leaves her post as city clerk on June 30, she’ll take with her a wealth of institutional knowledge.
“I lost my youth in this office,” she said Tuesday, laughing. “I’ve done my tour of duty.”
Mazza, who turns 65 at the end of April, apologizes to voters for not completing her term, which ends in the fall, but she must leave to attend to “personal issues.”
“I can’t be here and take care of those issues,” she said, declining to elaborate.
From ballot boxes to vital statistics, the Northampton City Clerk’s Office is the nervous system of the bustling city. Managing elections, taking city census data and other vital statistics, the clerk and her staff are what Mazza calls “the gateway of information.”
Her favorite moment on the job, she said, came when Massachusetts legislators legalized same-sex marriage in 2004.
“That was a high point in my career — seeing all those couples come into council chambers,” she said. “It was a wonderful time.”
Former Mayor Clare Higgins vividly remembers that day. She said then-governor Mitt Romney had asked clerks in the commonwealth to verify that each couple coming for a marriage license would remain in Massachusetts. Mazza looked at the line of couples streaming out of her office and the overflow in chambers, Higgins recalled, and decided that was a request she would not honor.
“‘I don’t have to ask anybody else that. Why do I have to ask these couples that?’” Higgins remembers her saying. “For her it was about equality and dedication to service. Watching Wendy do that was amazing.”
Higgins, who worked with Mazza for 18 years, said there’s another Mazza moment that will go down in history — the time Mazza was so angry about staffing cuts to her office that she replaced an empty staffer’s seat with a blowup doll.
“She was mad, but she was, as I said, a fierce advocate for what she thought the office needed,” Higgins said. “She’s been anchoring that corner of City Hall for decades.”
Mazza started in the office as a junior clerk in 1971. James Faulkner was city clerk at the time, when laws allowed him to puff cigars all day long in the office.
After Faulkner collapsed and died in front of the staff in 1976, Adeline Murray took over the top job and Mazza moved up the chain to senior clerk. About 14 years later, Murray retired and her second-in-command, Christine Skorupski, took over. And another 13 years later, when Skorupski retired, Mazza ran as a sticker candidate and won. That was in 2004.
“I loved my job, and I still do,” she said. “I think it’s time for new blood to come in.”
Moving up the ranks, Mazza said, was “the natural progression.” Unfortunately, none of the staffers who work for her now could take the same path because they don’t live in Northampton. City residency is a requirement for the office.
Her staff, she said, is the office’s crown “jewel.”
“It was harder for me to tell my staff I was leaving than anything else,” she said.
The City Council now has to appoint someone to fill the position until Election Day on Nov. 8, at which time voters will choose their candidate.
“I hope I’m leaving it in good hands,” she said. “There’s going to be a huge learning curve.”
Council President Bill Dwight said Tuesday that he and the Council have big shoes to fill.
“Wendy is an institution,” he said. “The fact is that she bears significant weight, here, in municipal government. This one’s going to be hard to make an adjustment for.”
Finding someone to do her job, he said, “won’t come without a struggle.” And no one will do it quite like her.
“She’s tough. She’s no-nonsense,” he said. “No one ever got into a conflict with Wendy and walked away not scorched.”
Mazza will take her leave just as the city’s election season heats up. Handling city elections, she said, remains among the most stressful parts of the job. But getting to announce the results is the silver lining.
“That was the fun piece of it — walking out there and seeing the anticipation,” she said.
In her time as city clerk, Mazza has continually maintained her position should remain an elected one. She said Tuesday her opinion on the matter has not changed.
“I don’t think the mayor or City Council should have a say in this office,” she said, asserting that executive supervision of the city clerk would pose a conflict in the handling of elections. “I’m a strong advocate for keeping this an elected position.”
In the future, Mazza said she’d like to run for City Council.
“Down the road, if my life straightens out, I very well could run for office,” she said. “But that would be down the road.”
Meantime, Mazza said: please hold the parties.
“I just want to go out quietly, like I came in 45 years ago,” she said.
Amanda Drane can be contacted at adrane@gazettenet.com.