In leaving Arlington, Mazzola is moving to a smaller operation. He gives up oversight of technology for a town of 42,000 people as well as seven elementary schools, a middle school and a high school. Belmont, with a population of 24,200 people, has six schools.

Holland said the position in Belmont opened up as the current tech chief is moving to a position in Weston.

Holland said Belmont would like expand its tech-management role to include town and schools, as Arlington has done, in fiscal 2010 but faces fiscal issues that rule that out. He noted that it would require an override, and Belmont voters recently rejected an override to fix the town's roads.

Holland said he is pleased to get Mazzola and noted that as Mazzola arrives in town, the superintendent will be retiring, after 20 years serving Belmont.

Selectman Annie LaCourt, who was a prime mover behind creating the position Mazzola has held, wrote in an e-mail July 1:

"It's a huge loss. Steve has accomplished an amazing amount of work this year, including a new email system for the town and a long-overdue restructuring of our servers that increases our efficiency and effectiveness considerably. He will be very hard to replace."

Alan Jones, a member of the Information Technology Advisory Committee (ITAC), a group of volunteers who help oversee IT developments in town government, wrote June 30:

"In what could have been an extremely difficult transition, Steve seems to have just stepped quietly and confidently into the job and pulled his organization together. In his short tenure, he achieved a number of important goals which will benefit us all for years to come. We will be very fortunate if we can find a replacement who will do as well."