Betty C. Bustin, a former treasurer and tax collector in Holliston from 1968-89 and a 52-year resident of the town, died Thursday at home after a long illness. She was 85.
Bustin is believed to be the first woman elected to a Holliston town office, back in March 1968.

Born Betty Belle Coggins on Feb. 2, 1925, in Knoxville, Tenn., she graduated from Knoxville Central High School in 1944. She soon met her husband, Hugh, and the two married July 22, 1944. Following World War II, the couple moved to the Framingham area and she transferred her job with Westinghouse from Knoxville to Boston. She later left Westinghouse to raise a family and later worked for Howard Johnson and Giovanni’s restaurant. She was active in the Framingham Women’s Club from the late 1940s into the mid 1960s.

After moving to Holliston in 1958, she worked for Stop & Shop in Framingham before joining the Framingham Trust Co. in 1962. She left as head teller in the Holliston branch when she was elected to the newly created combined position of treasurer and tax collector in 1968. It was initially drawn up as a part-time position but Bustin, after collecting more than 6,000 delinquent tax bills in her first year in office and working 60-hour weeks, swelling the town treasury by hundreds of thousands of dollars, persuaded the Finance Committee, Selectmen and Town Meeting that it needed to be a full-time position. During her tenure, she served in several official capacities with the Massachusetts Treasurers and Tax Collectors Association.

She retired in 1989 and for the past 20 years, she and her husband had been dividing their retirement between Holliston and Pontotoc, Miss., home to several of their relatives.
Betty Bustin is survived by her husband, Hugh, daughters Tenna of Holliston, and Sandee Corbett and her fiance Dick of Shrewsbury, a son, Craig, and daughter-in-law Joyce of Long Island; a sister, Grace, of Wisconsin; five grandchildren Lisa and her husband Richard, Dylan, Bryony, Rick and Josh, and four great-grandchildren, Kiera, Jaelyn, Ellie Beth and Nathan.

Visitation will be Tuesday, March 30, 2010 from 4-8p.m. at Chesmore Funeral Home, 854 Washington St., Holliston, and there will be a funeral service Wednesday at 10:30 a.m. at the funeral home, followed by burial at Lake Grove Cemetery in Holliston, followed by a reception at the Town Hall auditorium in Holliston.
In lieu of flowers, the family asks that donations can be made to Metrowest Hospice, 85 Lincoln St. Framingham, MA 01702, Metrowest Heart Center or Metrowest Cancer Care, both at 99 Lincoln St. Framingham, MA 01702