Hawley Trust Earns A Little More Money

By Steve Bigham

There is good news coming out of the Mary Hawley Trust Fund these days. A switch to a more aggressive management of the $1.2 million portfolio is finally paying off.

Town Hall Board of Managers Chairman Edgar Beres reports the fund yielded approximately $45,000 in interest and dividends during the past calendar year. That figure is up from past years when the trust fund provided no more than $35,000 annually.

“We’ve been nipping at Fleet Bank’s heels to see what we can do with it. We’re meeting regularly now to keep abreast of the situation,” Mr Beres reported this week.

Mrs Hawley originally bequeathed a total of $250,000 to the trust fund for the maintenance of the building. The principal from that has since grown to $1.2 million.

However, the trust fund, made up of stocks and bonds, hardly provides the town hall managers with the kind of money needed to maintain the building year round.

“That’s why we’re renting rooms, showing movies, the whole bit,” Mr Beres said. “It’s still a conservative trust, but it’s not as conservative as it once was.”

Over the years, the trust fund has done well in both good and bad financial times.

“I’m not sure I understand it all, but when the stock market goes down, we get more money in dividends,” said Bill Honan, a member of the board of managers.

In recent years, Fleet Bank has revised its fee structure upon the request of town officials. Some government changes in baking rules and regulations have also helped the town secure more annual yields.

“We felt they were charging us too much for maintaining the trust. They did loosen up,” Mr Honan said.

Hawley School and the Cyrenius Booth Library also own Hawley trust funds. Those have also yielded more interest/dividends in recent years.

In 1930, Miss Hawley created the trusts with strict orders that the bank (Hartford National at the time) not change the way the money was invested. There were no mutual funds in those days and the money was invested very conservatively at the sole discretion of the bank. The banks were merged since then and the trusts are now in the hands of Fleet Bank.

Hawley School and the library each have trust funds worth more than $1 million.