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MGL 128:40-45 County Extension Services

Chapter 128: Section 40. Trustees for county cooperative extension service; accounts; director of accounts; annual report.

Section 40. In each county, except counties maintaining vocational agricultural schools, there shall be an unpaid board of nine trustees to be known as trustees for county cooperative extension service. The county commissioners of each such county except Suffolk, and the city council of the city of Boston in Suffolk county, shall annually appoint three trustees, qualified as hereinafter provided, to serve for three years from April first of the year of the appointment, and shall fill any vacancy in said board for the unexpired term. All of said trustees shall be residents of the county where they are appointed, one shall always be a county commissioner of said county or, in the county of Suffolk a member of the city council of Boston, and four so far as is possible shall be taken from the directors, chosen as provided in the following section, of such cities and towns as have appropriated funds toward carrying out sections forty to forty-five, inclusive. No trustee, except a county commissioner, shall serve more than two consecutive full terms. The accounts of the trustees in each county except Suffolk shall be audited by the director of accounts and in Suffolk county shall be audited by the auditor of the city of Boston in the manner in which other county accounts are audited under general law. The trustees shall annually submit to the county commissioners or the city council of the city of Boston as the case may be, a report for the previous year with a statement of receipts and expenditures in such form and at such time as is required by them, and they shall cause the said report to be printed as part of their regular annual report.

Chapter 128: Section 41. Selection of directors; terms.
Section 41. Choice of the directors mentioned in section forty shall be made in such towns by the board of selectmen, and in such cities by the mayor, not later than fifteen days following the vote authorizing the appropriation specified in section forty. The directors shall serve for such terms as the mayor in cities and the town meeting in towns shall determine.

Chapter 128: Section 42. Receipt of grants; expenditure of money; power of trustees.
Section 42. For purposes specified in sections forty to forty-five, inclusive, the trustees may receive on behalf of the county money appropriated by any town or by the federal government, or grants made by any individual, trustee or trustees, association or corporation, and may expend the same together with any money appropriated by the general court for any county for county aid to agriculture, either solely or in conjunction with representatives or agents of the commonwealth or of the United States or of any department, commission, board or institution created under the statutes of this commonwealth or under any act of congress. The trustees may enter into any agreements, arrangements or undertakings with any such department, commission, board or institution relative to extension work with adults and with boys and girls in agriculture, homemaking and country life.

The trustees may expend each year an amount, not exceeding one per cent of the appropriation for county aid to agriculture, to pay the expenses, including the cost of meals, of unpaid volunteers at official meetings called for the purpose of furthering the organized educational projects or programs of the county extension service.

Chapter 128: Section 43. Instructors in agriculture, homemaking and country life.
Section 43. The trustees shall maintain one or more agents or instructors in agriculture, homemaking and country life, who shall meet the residents of the county individually and in groups for the purpose of teaching and demonstrating better practice in agriculture and homemaking, the benefits to be derived from co-operative efforts, better methods of marketing farm products and the organization of communities to build up country life.


Chapter 128: Section 44. Preparation of annual budget.
ection 44. The trustees, except in Suffolk county, shall annually prepare and submit to the county commissioners, not later than the first Wednesday in December, a budget containing detailed estimates of all sums required by them for carrying out sections forty to forty-five, inclusive, during the ensuing fiscal year, as defined in section sixteen of chapter thirty-five. The trustees, except in Suffolk county, in preparing their budget shall indicate estimated expenses for the agricultural, home economics, resource development and youth programs and shall record their expenditures in like manner in their annual report. The county commissioners shall include in their annual estimate of county expenses to be appropriated by the general court and raised by the annual county tax levy at least one half of such sums as they deem necessary to carry out said purposes.

Chapter 128: Section 44A. Suffolk county annual budget and report; tax assessment.
Section 44A. The trustees in Suffolk county shall annually prepare and submit a budget containing detailed estimates of all sums required by them for carrying out sections forty to forty-five, inclusive, during the ensuing fiscal year. Said trustees in preparing their budget shall indicate estimated expenses for the agricultural, home economics, resource development and youth programs and shall record their expenditures in like manner in their annual report.

To meet the expenses incurred there shall annually be expended from the state treasury, subject to appropriation, sums equal, in the aggregate, to seven cents on each one thousand dollars of the equalized valuations of the town of Winthrop and the cities of Boston, Chelsea and Revere, as most recently reported by the state tax commission to the general court under the provisions of section ten C of chapter fifty-eight of the General Laws, and the state treasurer shall issue his warrant requiring the assessors of said town and cities to assess a tax to the amount of the sums so expended in proportion to their said valuations, and such amounts shall be collected and paid to the state treasury as provided by section twenty of chapter fifty-nine of the General Laws; provided, that such town or any city may in any year anticipate in whole or in part its assessment, and appropriate, raise and deposit the amount thereof with the state treasury, and any sum so deposited shall be credited against such assessment. There may also be expended for the purpose of this act voluntary contributions for such purposes deposited in the state treasury.

Chapter 128: Section 45. Acquisition of land by towns for demonstration work in agriculture and homemaking.
Section 45. Any town may require, by purchase or otherwise, in the manner in which land may be acquired for school purposes, real estate for the purpose of carrying on, under the direction of the agents or instructors of said trustees, demonstration work in agriculture and homemaking, and may appropriate money to be expended by said trustees under sections forty to forty-three, inclusive, or for the purpose of enabling the trustees to acquire necessary real estate, or for the support of demonstration work, under the direction of the agents or instructors or of the trustees, on land owned by the town or by any resident thereof.