Former Framingham Planner To Become Director of Economic Development in Town of Natick

NATICK – The former Planning Board Administrator for the City of Framingham will become the new Director of Community & Economic Development in the Town of Natick.

Amanda Loomis resigned as the City of Framingham Planning Board Administrator in December 2019, after 6 years in that position to becomes the Town of Lexington Planning Director in January 2020.

Now, Loomis has accepted an offer from Town of Natick Administrator James Errickson to become the community’s next Director of Community & Economic Devlopment.

Errickson told the Natick Planning Board on October 27, that Loomis has accepted the community’s offer and will start around Thanksgiving.

Prior to this appointment, Loomis was rumored to possibly coming back to Framingham under a Sisitsky administration as Director of Community & Economic Development.

Sisitsky defeated Mayor Yvonne Spicer easily on Tuesday 8,283 to 3,909 votes. Spicer had more than 9,000 votes when she won in 2017.

City of Framingham Mayor Yvonne Spicer passed over Loomis and hired Kevin Shea to be the City of Framingham’s Director of Community & Economic Development in December 2019.

Shea retired from the position in June 2021, but that retirement came after the City Council voted 8-3 not to fund his salary in Fiscal Year 2022, which began July 1, 2021.

City Councilors felt the department was spinning its wheels and not making progress.

Erika Jerram, the deputy director of Community & Economic Development is the acting Director now.

In Lexington, Loomis was responsible for managing the operations of the Planning Office, and the short-term and long-range planning of land and development in Lexington. She also advised and implemented the Town’s Planning Board goals.

Loomis has experience in permitting, land use regulation, zoning by-law development, and neighborhood zoning and planning.

She holds a master’s degree in community planning and development from the University of Southern Maine, a graduate certificate in project management from Northeastern University and is credentialed through the American Institute of Certified Planners (AICP).

Natick Town Administrator Errickson served as the Natick’s Director of Community & Economic Development from 2015 to 2019, before taking a job as a senior vice president with MassDevelopment in June 2019. He left in June 2020 to become the Deputy Town Administrator in Natick.

James Freas, who had been the Natick Director of the Department of Community & Economic since November 2019, left this summer to become the Charlottesville Director of Neighborhood Development Services.

Prior to that, Freas worked for the City of Newton from 2012-2019 as the Chief Planner for Long Range Planning; and Acting Director and then Deputy Director of the Department of Planning and Development.

Photo of Loomis courtesy of Town of Lexington