Town
of Lamoine, Maine
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Town
of Lamoine, Maine |
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The Lamoine Quaterly - January 2005 |
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Long Range Planning Effort Trudges On
Ornithologist Educates Lamoine Residents
Town Meeting Planned for March 8 & 9
Transfer Station Overflows to End Year
| Long Range Planning Effort
Trudges On (Lamoine) — The folks interested in looking at the long range needs and desires of the town are still at it, but progress in coming up with a game plan is slower than expected. The committee had hoped to hand in a report to the Board of Selectmen in the fall, but final approval to a report has yet to materialize. The discussion in the 23-person committee has taken some interesting turns, and focuses on a number of areas. Some committee members feel it would be a good idea to do a survey of the town to see what residents think are the areas that need focus in the future. Much of the discussion has revolved around code-enforcement needs and desires of various town officials. At least one member has expressed a strong desire in establishing a memorial to all Lamoine Veterans. The committee will resume its meetings starting on January 11, 2005 at the Lamoine School. That meeting will focus on a possible survey of townspeople and serve to re-charge the committee which suffered from low attendance at its last meeting in November, and failure to publicize a scheduled meeting in December. The long range planning committee’s formation resulted from a town-wide planning conference held last May. |
| Ornithologist Educates
Lamoine Residents (Lamoine) — Lamoine’s Comprehensive Plan has several pages devoted just to the different bird species present in town. Expert Michael Good of Bar Harbor emphasized that point in a talk to Lamoine’s Conservation Commission in December at the Town Hall. Good, who runs a nature tour business in Bar Harbor, said many of the birds that arrive in Lamoine in the summer season start out in the tropics. He showed dozens of slides of birds photographs he’s taken near his home and around the area. Good has relatives that own seasonal property on the Seal Point Road. He warned of development and clear cuts taking habitat away, especially from tropical origin birds and said that’s been a problem in all parts of Maine. He said planners ought to keep that in mind, especially with subdivisions. Good’s talk was carried live on Lamoine’s Cable TV Channel and replayed several times during the days after the talk. |
| Town
Meeting Planned for March 8th & 9th Nomination Papers Available Now, Due Jan. 21st (Lamoine) - Selectmen are planning for the regular town meeting and set the date for the annual event for March 8th and 9th. Voting for municipal officers will take place on the 8th (Tuesday) from 10AM to 8PM at the Town Hall. The annual open town meeting takes place the following night beginning at 6:00 PM at the Lamoine Consolidated School Gym. While the dates are firm, the agenda for the town meeting (officially called the warrant) is far from set. The first order of business, though, is always the selection of a moderator, and that will take place about 5-minutes before the polls open on Tuesday the 8th. The next order of business will be to elect the municipal officers, and if there are any referenda to decide by secret ballot, to decide on those. It’s expected the Planning Board might have a series of changes to propose to help clarify sections of the Building and Land Use Ordinance. Additionally, a Parks Ordinance is ready for a vote and an Appeals Board Ordinance is near completion to send to voters. Whether the ordinance votes will come via referendum or in open town meeting will be determined in the next few weeks. The race for municipal officers did not bring a flood of candidates rushing for nomination papers. By year’s end, only one person had taken out papers for the 1-year Selectmen’s position, and no one obtained papers for the 2-year or 3-year position. Glenn Crawford is the lone incumbent whose term has expired on the Board. He is finishing his third 3-year term as Selectman. The School Committee has just one seat that will open up, and by year’s end no one had taken out nomination papers to appear on the ballot for that position. The incumbent, Bonnie Marckoon, has served two full terms and one partial term. There is one tax assessor’s seat that will be elected in March as well, currently held by Terry Towne. Mr. Towne has obtained nomination papers to run for re-election to a 2nd term. Should no candidates turn in the required 25-nominating signatures by January 21st for a particular opening, the ballot space would contain only an area for a write-in candidate, and the candidate with the most write-in votes would be elected to the office. Should the candidate refuse to accept the position, it could mean a special election at a later date. The rest of the town meeting will be in the open format at the Lamoine School Gym starting at 6:00 PM sharp on Wednesday March 9th. A series of usual housekeeping items will start out the warrant, and then voters will decide the budget matters for the fiscal year that starts on July 1, 2005 and ends on June 30, 2006. The Budget Committee has been hard at work looking at each budget item and will have its recommendations printed with the town meeting warrant in the annual report book. The final, bottom line for taxes, though, probably won’t be known for several months as the Maine Legislature is wrestling with several tax reform measures. That directly affects the amount of state aid for school funding, which directly affects the amount of property tax the town will need to raise to operate. |
| Transfer Station Overflows
to End Year (Lamoine) — If one could judge by the amount of waste generated, it was a good Christmas in Lamoine. In just about 3-hours the Friday following Christmas, the 130-yards of dumpster space was filled to capacity, causing the transfer station to close early for the day on New Year’s Eve. That left trash hauler Rusty Boynton with an unfinished route for the day, and arrangements were made for him to meet the trash truck first thing Saturday morning to off-load the trash he picked up on one leg of his route Friday. The facility was open on New Year’s Day. For the calendar year the town experienced a smaller increase in trash than expected, with about 23-tons more than 2003, or just over 3% more. The Selectmen will meet with Pine Tree Waste to ensure the accuracy of the amount of trash being hauled from the transfer station to the PERC plant in Orrington. By previous agreement Pine Tree had mixed Lamoine’s and Eastbrook’s trash in the same load to PERC and estimating the tonnage from each community. That ended several months ago, but Pine Tree officials said there had been some private contract pickups from Lamoine mixed in with the municipal trash which affected the tonnage. The recycling rate for 2003 was 54%, but will drop significantly for 2004 as much of the recycling in 2003 was attributed to a wood cutting operation credited to the town’s overall recycling that did not happen in 2004. |
| Permit Issuance Slows
for Year (Lamoine) — After a record setting pace in 2003 and 2002, the number of building permits fell slightly for 2004. The Code Enforcement Office had issued 79 permits by the end of December, compared to over 80 permits each of the previous two years. Permits issued since the last edition of The Lamoine Quarterly are to: |
| 04-61 | 10/12/04 | 2 | 16 | Ashmore/Kauffman, David & Robin | Deck & Addition |
| 04-62 | 10/12/04 | 7 | 33-1-1 | Munsell, Mark | Addition |
| 04-63 | 10/15/04 | 12 | 8 | Madrell, Robert | Deck, Sunroom |
| 04-64 | 10/15/04 | 4 | 30-1 | Bragdon, Merle & Joan | Residence, Garage, Deck |
| 04-65 | 10/26/04 | 6 | 4-1 | Fennelly, Richard Jr. | Replace & Reposition mobile home |
| 04-66 | 10/26/04 | 5 | 22-1 | Chalfoun, A Marc/Moala, James | Residence |
| 04-67 | 10/28/04 | 6 | 11 | Hogdgon, Wayne | Addition |
| 04-68 | 11/2/04 | 6 | 25-3 | Mingo, Derek & Michelle | Mobile Home, Garage |
| 04-69 | 11/2/04 | 2 | 5-1 | Grindle, Mima | Wood Shed |
| 04-70 | 11/2/04 | 4 | 46-4 | Cosulich, Jeff | Residence |
| 04-71 | 11/9/04 | 4 | 13-5 | Wright, Wayne | Residence |
| 04-72 | 11/9/04 | 16 | 38 | Miller, Ed & Lilly | Garage |
| 04-73 | 11/9/04 | 5 | 23-2 | Woodard/Constantine, Michael & Ginger | Addition |
| 04-74 | 11/16/04 | 1 | 23-2 | Belden, Stephen & Candace | Residence |
| 04-75 | 11/30/04 | 3 | 39-10 | Belch, Anthony/Elizabeth | Residence |
| 04-76 | 11/30/04 | 5 | 23-2 | Woodard, Michael | Garage |
| 04-77 | 12/7/04 | 10 | 8-4 | Ghander, Judith | Storage Shed |
| 04-78 | 12/30/04 | 18 | 16 | Alley, Tracy | Addition |
| 04-79 | 12/30/04 | 14 | 9 | Paige, Michael | Conversion to residence, addition. |