Josh Kelly is ready to come home to southeastern Connecticut to practice the administrative skills he has used in central and far northwestern towns, and if he has the time, sing in an opera or perform in a community theater production.

Kelly, 28, a 2013 Waterford High School graduate, was named this past week as the new CEO of the Thames Valley Council for Community Action, the regional agency that provides services ranging from affordable child care and senior nutrition to energy assistance and navigating government bureaucracies.

After a sharp career change in college, Kelly has been working in municipal government for the past several years. He has been town manager and CEO in Winchester, a distressed municipality in the northwest corner of Connecticut since 2021. Prior to that, he served as town administrator in Bolton for two years after serving as a graduate assistant analyst for the town of Windsor.

“I’m enthusiastic about the opportunity to come back to my home corner of the state and contribute in this way,” Kelly said Wednesday. “I think what I’ve been working on in Winchester is going to transfer well over to what TVCCA’s future needs and immediate needs are.”

Kelly will start at TVCCA on Oct. 24, succeeding long-time CEO Deborah Monahan, who will retire Nov. 10 after 50 years, half that time as CEO. Monahan celebrated her golden anniversary Sept. 5, having started Sept. 5, 1973, as an early childhood specialist in the basement of the agency’s headquarters in a stately former mill owner’s home at 1 Sylvandale Road, Jewett City.

On Wednesday, she offered to show Kelly that basement space, as she also invited him to redecorate her larger second-story office in the same building.

Kelly said he was grateful for the transition time he’ll spend with Monahan as his mentor. Kelly was selected by the TVCCA Board of Directors from an initial field of 50 applicants.

“Josh is talented and engaging, a great team leader who is passionate about helping people,” TVCCA Board Chairwoman Tammie Hullivan said in a news release announcing the selection. “We are also so grateful to Deb for all she has delivered during her 50 amazing years with TVCCA, and for her willingness to stay connected to TVCCA in her retirement.”

Monahan had planned to retire at the end of 2022, but said she stayed on to ensure progress on the agency’s new child care center in Groton, a project she had worked on for several years.

After high school, Kelly attended Ithica College to pursue his passion for music, studying opera and vocal performance. He also became active in Waterford town government, serving as chairman of the local Green Party and serving on local boards and commissions and on the Representative Town Meeting,

He said his passion for helping people in need took over, and he transferred to Wheaton College in Massachusetts to major in political science and earned a master’s degree in public administration at the University of Connecticut.

Kelly said his entire background will serve him well at TVCCA. He is familiar with TVCCA’s expansive service territory in eastern Connecticut. As a town administrator active in the Connecticut Conference of Municipalities, he already knows some local city and town leaders and state legislators. He worked for a summer in U.S. Rep. Joe Courtney’s office, which works with TVCCA on funding for its services.

Monahan said she knew Kelly was the right choice as soon as she interviewed him, based on his resume, eagerness and personality.

“One of the things that resonated for me with Josh was that he is approachable,” Monahan said.

Kelly has retained strong family and civic ties to southeastern Connecticut. His mother, Deb Kelly, is principal at East Lyme High School and serves on the Waterford Board of Education. His father, Kevin Kelly, is a registration dean at Three Rivers Community College in Norwich. His sister, Sara Kelly, teaches seventh grade in New London.

Josh Kelly has not given up on his love of music. He helped organize the Project Bright Music Festival in East Lyme and Waterford and a theater festival last year in East Lyme. The COVID-19 pandemic had curtailed most public musical performances, relegating Kelly to sing at home or in the car during long drives from his current home in Winchester to visit family and friends in Waterford.

And he sings for his partner, Katie Lipman, a graduate student at the University of Massachusetts, Boston.

“I play at home for her,” he said.

c.bessette@theday.com