HANOVER — Former Select Board Chair Rhonda Nyman presented feedback about Hanover’s possible mismanagement of applications for almost $1.2 million in Covid relief funding in a recent Select Board meeting, sparking a tense discussion about who was responsible for Hanover’s failure to obtain the funds.
Hanover was eligible for federal funds through the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) in 2024, but received none of the money due to missed, canceled and rejected applications. Town and county officials have pointed fingers at each other for missed deadlines, and Nyman’s presentation is the most recent argument in a years-long debate—one that placed blame squarely on the town of Hanover, not on Plymouth County.
Nyman came to provide feedback for Town Manager Joe Colangelo and focused entirely on the unrealized funds, claiming that the town missed multiple application deadlines due to a breakdown in communication between Colangelo and the Select Board when she was chair.
She said that documents she obtained from a law firm that assisted Hanover with ARPA applications showed that the town filed 17 applications, eight of which were approved and nine were canceled or rejected. She claimed that seven were missing invoices, procurement information, or reviews of documentation and two requested advance funds despite being designed for reimbursement. The nine applications she described had deadlines in September and October 2024.
“It’s clear to say that the [Plymouth County] commission did not inadvertently try to not fill the deadline. They were looking for information that they weren’t provided,” Nyman said.
Colangelo did not dispute Nyman’s information, but argued that she mischaracterized some of it. He said that Hanover canceled some of those applications because it pivoted to apply for funding through different avenues, and called her presentation “quite the cheap shot.”
“There's like 10% of the story that she recited about ARPA,” he said. “I'm not really sure why we're re-litigating this. This is from two years ago. I mean, it's time to move on, Ms. Nyman.”
Nyman is currently running for a position on the Plymouth County Commission, and Colangelo accused her of trying to garner publicity for her campaign three times.
“I guess now I understand why Ms. Nyman wanted this to get moved up on the agenda for maximum publicity,” he said.
Nyman said that Colangelo failed to respond to her questions about the ARPA funds when she was chair, and she was told at the time that Hanover never missed a deadline.
“If we missed it, we missed it, we have to own it,” she said. “And how do we do better that it doesn't happen again for the taxpayers and the residents of this town? Because $1.2 million is a lot of money to me.”
Colangelo said that Nyman never “dug in” about the funds until her recent presentation, and Chair Greg Satterwhite said that “Joe [Colangelo] has answered those questions in the past. The questions have been asked more than once and I think that I've received an explanation.”
Colangelo and Select Board members took issue with Nyman discussing the ARPA funds during the time set aside for town manager feedback, and Satterwhite ended the discussion after less than 20 minutes with no objections from the Board. He said he was open to scheduling a separate forum to further discuss the issue with Nyman.
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