Massachusetts: An Act authorizing the town of Natick to continue the employment of Police Chief James Hicks beyond the age of 65

What's changing

The Massachusetts legislature passed a narrow private act authorizing the town of Natick to keep Police Chief James Hicks employed past age 65. Under Massachusetts General Laws Chapter 32, § 90A, certain municipal employees — including some public-safety officers — face mandatory retirement age limits that would otherwise require separation. Individual towns can seek legislative exemptions to retain a specific employee beyond that cap. This bill is exactly that: a one-person, one-town exemption with no broader legal effect.

Who it affects

Practically speaking, this affects no staffing or PEO employer. The act is:

• Hyper-local: It applies solely to one named individual in one municipality.
• Public-sector only: It operates within the Massachusetts public employee pension and mandatory-retirement framework, which private employers and their staffing or PEO arrangements do not fall under.
• Not a policy change: It does not amend Chapter 32, the Massachusetts Anti-Discrimination Law (Chapter 151B), or any generally applicable age-discrimination standard.

If you staff workers into Massachusetts municipal or public-safety roles — which is uncommon and comes with its own legal complexity — you should already be aware that Chapter 32 retirement mandates can affect those placements. But even then, this specific bill changes nothing for you.

What to do

For the vast majority of staffing and PEO employers: nothing. No handbook updates, no policy revisions, no client alerts are needed in response to this act.

That said, if your firm does place workers in Massachusetts public-sector roles, use this as a prompt for a quick housekeeping check:

• Client contracts: Confirm whether any public-entity clients have mandatory retirement provisions baked into their workforce rules, and that your agreements appropriately allocate responsibility for compliance with those rules to the client.
• Age-related policies generally: Verify that your Massachusetts-specific handbook addendum reflects current Chapter 151B obligations — particularly that age 40 and older is a protected class — but this is routine maintenance, not triggered by this act.
• Public-safety staffing: If you staff into police, fire, or corrections roles in Massachusetts, consult counsel familiar with Chapter 32 before placing workers who are near or past mandatory retirement ages. That review should already be part of your onboarding process for those clients.

Bottom line: this is a narrow legislative accommodation for one municipal official, not a signal of any broader shift in Massachusetts age-discrimination or employment law.

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