Topsham Select Board approves grants, EMS plan, and honors departing member

[0:28] Doug Bennett: That was [0:33] Chair Tufts: so much fun. You got to give it some a little authority, you know. Welcome everybody tonight at 630 for our select board meeting in the Thompson Municipal Building and the Donald A. Russell meeting room. If you guys could all join me in standing for the Pledge of Allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Okay. ATM Emerson, if you could call the roll for us. [Clerk Campbell: Chair Tufts?] He is absent excused. Vice Chair Holmes? Here, that's me. [1:17] Clerk Campbell: Board Member Callahan? Present. Board Member Latte? Present. Board Member Kay? [1:21] Chair Tufts: Here. Sounds perfect. Why don't you roll yourself right into the town manager's report? Town manager's report. [1:28] Clerk Campbell: The absentee voting continues at the Municipal Building until the 29th of October during business hours. The last day, which is the 29th, they will be open until 7 p.m. And just a big thank you to Clerk Campbell and her staff for the amazing work that they've done during this month. It gets pretty busy, as you can imagine. The Halloween parade at the Thompson Fair Mall is still set for Saturday, October 31st, starting at 6.30 p.m. Come join and have some fun. And save the date on Wednesday, November 4th. There'll be a public meeting to review the close to final design for the 10-foot road and sidewalk rebuild. We'll post the plans once we receive them back from the engineer and we'll do a formal notice for the meeting. [2:14] Chair Tufts: Great news. Thank you so much. All right, let's move right down to our agenda into board and committee reports and updates. We have one this evening. Chief Hagan will introduce in a second, but this is the Saginaw Hawk Overdose Prevention Through Intensive Outreach, Naloxone, and Safety Options. Clinician Tom Hibbert will update the board on how the program works for the people of Topsom and surrounding communities. Good evening, Mark Hagan, Chief of Police. Yeah, [2:41] Speaker D (unidentified): this evening I'd like to introduce Tom Hibbert. Tom's a liaison for all the first responders in Saginaw Hawk County, and to be honest, I had a lot more to tell you about Tom, but he doesn't want me to steal his thunder, so I'm going to let him get out here and introduce the rest of the program here. So thank you for that, Judy. Good evening. And I want to thank Chief Hagan for being the front runner on this and meeting the Council of Thompson, Maine. Yeah, my name is Tom Hibbert. I don't know if you've heard of the Options Program, but it's a state of Maine program which is free to every county in the state of Maine. Usually every county has either one or two liaisons in the county. We started, I started out with Governor Mills back almost eight years ago. She introduced this program for drugs and alcohol counseling. I'm a counselor in mental health and drug and alcohol challenges. So we, I've worked in every county in the state of Maine except this one. And so there was a, absolutely there was a someone who left the Saginaw County, so I've been here for a couple of months and I could, I want to get in front of you people to tell you what I do. So I serve your community in drugs and alcohol. If someone, I can ride with the police departments in the sheriff's departments and that kind of thing. That usually doesn't work out because when someone's under the influence of alcohol or drugs, it's kind of, you know, it's hard to talk to them at the, at the time. But Chief Hagin and his force have kept me in, kept me abreast of what's going on in your community when there is a drunken driving or there is a mental health or sudden use disorder concern here in your community. They get in touch with me. I call them up and I meet with them one-on-one at that time in your community. So I'm open to anyone, if you have family members, anyone in your community that I can see. So this grant is a grant from the state of Maine, it goes to a different organization. This one went to Sweetser. Okay, Sweetser has wraparound services for other things. If there's other challenges with this human being, that we'll see them in other challenges. So it's been a great program. I've had a lot of success in different counties. For mental health, I worked in Commonwealth County as well on the front lines of the marginalized population and the homeless when all the big homeless tents and everything was in fall and I was part of that, cleaning that, helping more enforcement with the cleanup of that. So like I said, I'm a counselor, so if I can be of any help to anyone in the childhood community, Chief Hagan has been great. His PD has been great contacting me. I actually collect data every Tuesday, or they call me, and I just follow up with people, citizens in your community that have alcohol and drug concerns. I'm a person of long-term recovery myself from heroin. I'm 42 years into my recovery and sobriety continuously, so I have a little background in that. I'm a Mainer. I grew up in a little old Camden, Maine. My dad was a janitor up there, and long before Camden became a little different than it is now. And but it's still a beautiful town, and so I can help out any way that any you want. [6:17] Chair Tufts: Okay, thank you. Does options, does this, is that an acronym that stands for something? [6:21] Speaker D (unidentified): Options, the word options, is that right? Yeah, it started out to be overdoses for drops. Okay, for oxys and everything else. Okay, they started, they started out with that, and so but the overdose is we've come down in numbers. We're down to 400, we were up at 1,600, and I think 42 deaths in the state of Maine from overdoses from all kind of drugs, and now it's down in the 400s. So we branched out through the years in the community, and it's not so much going, we still go for overdoses with the PD's or whoever. And get called, but yeah, awesome. Do you guys have any questions? [7:01] Chair Tufts: Questions or anything that you, well, thank you for coming tonight and sharing what you guys do, and thank you for announcing all of these different things as a program for us. Making us aware of it is step one, and now that we're all apprised of this information, I think it's a, it's a good resource for us to utilize, so thank you very much. Exactly, yeah, not perfect, thank you. Okay, moving down in our agenda, public comment. Is there anybody that would like to speak? You can start by please stating your. Name and address. [7:35] Doug Bennett: My name is Doug Bennett. I live at [address], Austin. I was troubled to read this week of the resignation of the members of the Comprehensive Plan Implementation Committee, a committee that had been working for six years to implement the Comprehensive Plan that hometown voters approved in 2019. That's the account that I read in the past record. From the reporting, it appears that the CPIC's efforts were brought to a standstill by the Planning Board. Where is the Select Board in all this, I wondered. It looks like the Select Board members just held up their hands in dismay and accepted the resignations after six hard years of work. I can only think the CPIC members are feeling citizen hard work counts for very little. Do not we as voters elect the Select Board? Board? Do not we as voters approve the comprehensive plan? I'm pretty sure we have. The Select Board appoints other committees, so when two committees come to loggerheads, isn't that a moment for the Select Board to step up? Shouldn't the Select Board be concerned to see that the town goes in directions approved by the voters? It doesn't seem to be what's happening here. Comprehensive plan that we voters approve says that the implementation committee is, and I quote,, to act as core leaders and champions to oversee implementation activities and provide coordination assistance. The key role of the implementation committee is first to be advocates of the plan and second to ensure all parties are advancing the strategies identified in the plan in the spirit of the visions the comprehensive plan sets forth, end quote. And it says, quote, outcomes of subsequent plans and studies may truly be town meeting action or endorsement or adoption by the select board. The pace of implementation will be set by the willingness of the select board and residents to financially support the recommendations in this plan." Those are key roles for town meeting and for the select board. What it does not say is that the planning board can blockade the process. It doesn't the comprehensive plan point toward the RICO project? If so, why is the planning board standing against it? Why is the select board tacitly allowing several years of hard work of the CPS to go down the drain? I think we voters deserve an explanation. These are just questions I have. I don't know any more than what I've read in paper, but this citizen and taxpayer would like [10:19] Chair Tufts: there's some answers thank you got me to respond if you'd like to initiate i can also respond to That thank you Mr. Bennett you can be seated if you like and we have questions we'll bring you us but we did as a select board assigned the town manager to meet with both committees and there was meetings between the two of them. We also accepted the resignation with reluctance we were really not wanting to. I just wanted to point out that the CPIC committee is an ad hoc committee. It's not a permanent committee. So when they all resigned, that dissolved that particular committee. That doesn't mean that we won't revisit that and bring it back up again. It just meant temporarily while we're trying to figure this whole thing out. According to the charge to the planning board, they're ultimately responsible for the implementation of the CPIC plan. I don't know if you're aware of that, but that is the charge of the planning committee, and so I understand your viewpoint, and it's not that we as, we're also residents as well as members of the select board, and we listen to both sides, and we didn't feel like we were in a position to make a decision. We just temporarily put it on hold, and that doesn't mean that it's not going to [11:36] Doug Bennett: to be risen back up again. Well, I appreciate hearing that. But my understanding is that we have a town forum of government in which the legislative body are the voters. Correct. And that comprehensive plan is pretty clear about our direction. And Thompson, in my opinion, has a hard time moving forward. It often seems like doing nothing, leaving things the way they are rules today. And I think it's time that we, when we do a planning process and lots of people get involved and we have a town meeting and the comprehensive plan is approved, that we move forward down that road. And if the planning board is going to stand in the way, you appoint the planning board. And maybe we've got the wrong planning board. I don't know those people. I don't know what led them against it. I just have questions. But it makes me unhappy to have watched artwork go into it. I was enthused by the comprehensive plan. I would like to see that go forward. It seemed to me to have some good ideas, including maybe especially the recode. And then I see this, and I think, oh, here it goes again. [12:51] Chair Tufts: Okay. Ristami? I'm gonna I just want to make one comment. Normally public comment is for public comment and we leave it at that. However I think it's important to entertain this because it's an it's an important topic to our town and it's something that I feel we should address. So I don't I don't mind allowing a little bit of time to have this conversation because I think it would help your understanding maybe put your mind at ease a little bit maybe at least clarify some of your questions and maybe we solve the problem maybe we don't but at least we could be transparent in that regard so I just wanted to say that citizens of Topsum have the right to apply to be on that planning board and we as a select board decided that just because someone wants to renew their membership it's not automatic anymore they have to be re-interviewed if their term is up and so that's another process if somebody in the town wants to get involved in that and if I can put my final remarks on this thank you for bringing this these comments up it is important that the people of town have a voice so this is this is the place to do it a couple of things that I would like to note because I agree with some of the things and some of the quotes that you had are accurate however I do feel that under the circumstances that we were with the comprehensive plan implementation committee leaving that doesn't mean the comprehensive plan is going away. We all feel the comprehensive plan needs to move forward. And there's many different ways that we can move forward with that. The way that CPIC was proposing certain ideas, yes, there was clashing on the planning board. There was different ideas, different opinions. We got involved on those types of things. Ultimately, that particular scenario did not work in everybody's favor however that does not mean the work is stopping we believe in the comprehensive plan and we have acted upon the comprehensive plan in many different ways we do have more walkable streets because we've had lots of sidewalks we've added crosswalks so that we can enjoy our town and get across places we've added some speed humps to the dismay of other people in our town but we've we've done so we are improving and we are working on that comprehensive and plan on a regular basis. Those things do move forward on a regular basis, and we are in the middle of some very big changes for Topsom as far as development is concerned. And the way that Topsom is growing, we have to be very deliberate and cautious about how that looks and what it is. So yes, it does take longer than we all want it to happen. We want it to happen yesterday. It is happening slowly and probably not as fast as we all would like, but it is happening. And I would reiterate that it's going to continue to happen. And I mean, while we're losing one board member this evening and we have another vote on November 3rd to continue the process, but it is going to move forward. And those are the things that are important to the people of town. They voted on it. We all believe on this board that everybody deserves a voice. That was the voice. We are the protectors of that voice and to enact that voice. [15:56] Doug Bennett: Well, I appreciate what you've said, and I will leave this evening with optimism that we'll see more movement. Thank you very much. [16:07] Chair Tufts: Thank you for speaking. Mr. Baxter? Yes. If there's no one else, can I make a comment from this evening? Sure. Ann Callahan, 45 Emerald Avenue. I just wanted to say what a privilege it has been to serve these three years on the select board and working with all of you. It's been great. And I really appreciate the support of the residents of the town. And my official date of end is November 3rd. But this is my last select board meeting. So it's been a real pleasure. Thank you. Thank you, Ann. Is there any other public comment? Well, I wiped my nose because all of a sudden I started running. Okay, let's move down the agenda. Correspondence. Do we have any correspondence? I have not. Anybody? No. Seeing none. Adjustments to the agenda is the next item, and we have none. So we'll move on to consent calendar and approval of the minutes of the regular select board meeting on October 1st, 2026. I make a motion that we accept the regular select board meeting minutes as presented. [17:13] Chair Tufts: We have a motion from Ms. Callaghan. Second. And a second from Mr. Labby. Is there any further discussion on the minutes from October 1st? Seeing none, we'll take a vote. All in favor? And that is a unanimous yes. Okay, moving along. Public hearing. We have none. We have none of these next things, but I'll say them out loud. No unfinished business. No old business. And now we are on to new business. You welcome Chief Hagan back on the bike for consideration and any appropriate action to apply and accept a grant from the Patrick Leahy Bulletproof Vest Partnership. [17:52] Speaker D (unidentified): Good evening, Mark Hagan, Chief of Police. So yes, we would like to apply for this grant. Again, it's administered by the Bureau of Justice Assistance. It reimburses law enforcement up to half of the cost of bullet-resistant vests. The average vest that we are purchasing now costs about $1,000. So for every vest you buy through this grant, we'll get $5,000 back. We've got a few more people to hire. We've been hiring several people in the last few months. We've got a few more to go, and it also helps us with our officer's replacement vests. The average resistant vest is about five years before you need to replace it. So what we would like to do is apply for $2,500 which would get us five more vests. So we are up here. I'm up here to request permission to again apply for this grant and in the amount of $2,500. [18:50] Chair Tufts: Dollars. Great. Does anybody have any questions for Chief Hagan? Self-explanatory. I know we don't talk about it a lot, but I'll just mention this is something that Chief Hagan has brought up to us many, times. Grant opportunities, we typically enjoy grant opportunities, so we don't discuss them that often. That's just for the public notice anyway, but for this specific thing, I would entertain a motion. Sure. I make a motion to apply and accept a grant in the amount of twenty five hundred dollars from the Patrick Lady Bulletproof Desk Partnership and we have a motion from Ms. Callahan and a second from Mr. Labby. Any further discussion on the motion? Seeing none, we'll take a vote. All in favor? And that is a unanimous yes. Thank you all very much. Thank you. Moving on, 26-102 consideration and any appropriate action on the select board approval of emergency medical services transport plan as required by Maine EMS and the state statute 30-AMRS section 3172 enacted via LD 245 and to wrap us on this one is Assistant Town Manager Jeff Emerson. Good evening [20:03] Clerk Campbell: We let our deputy chief of EMS take the night off so we're going to give this a shot. Basically this is a piece of legislation that was created by Maine EMS that makes it mandatory for every Maine town to adopt, post, and submit a plan outlining how emergency medical transport services and ambulance coverage is delivered within their community. So basically, what our deputy chief has done is created a municipal resolution that outlines lines basically our current practice that is what was requested by Main EMS. They were satisfied with that. I'm happy to pass it around and get signatures from everybody, but it just reflects our current practice, and it makes it so that the next time we license that we're we're within the parameters of the of the Walkers group. So these are just standards of the set forth [21:04] Speaker D (unidentified): by state EMS, so we just, it's just saying we're agreeing to play within those standards. [21:10] Clerk Campbell: Yeah, I could read it if you want. No,, no. It's, yeah, basically, primary provider transporting emergency medical services within the borders of Thompson shall be primarily provided by Thompson Fire Rescue, directly managed municipal regional service. It has to be posted publicly, and you have the ability to change your plan as long as you submit a change to Main EMS within 30 days. It changes nothing in our operations. [21:39] Chair Tufts: Just something new they're requiring. Something new. Something new, yeah. How's that feel? Those who might be listening. [Clerk Campbell: Yeah,, absolutely.] There's a few new requirements coming down the pike for fire and EMS, so. [21:50] Clerk Campbell: Yeah, there's quite a few. The EMS especially. [21:55] Chair Tufts: Okay, any further questions? I would entertain a motion. Sure. I'd like to make a motion to approve the Emergency Medical Services Transport Plan as required by the Maine Emergency Medical Services and the State Statute 30A of the Maine Revised Statute, Section 3172, enacted via Legislative Document 245. Okay, we have a motion from Ms. Callahan. Second again. And a second from Mr. Levy. Any further discussion on the motion at hand? Seeing none, take a vote, all in favor. and that is a unanimous yes to pass this around shortly and [Doug Bennett: who's that she's] i'll let we'll move on we'll pass that around as we go okay let's move on to the section our agenda item 26-103 consideration and any appropriate action on the approval of the use of four-side recreation area to host a rest area for the trek across Maine 2017-2027 on Friday, June 18, 2027. Good evening, Pamela Duke, Parks and Recreation Director. [23:10] Speaker F (unidentified): This is the third year that I stand for you asking for you to approve the particular use of the American, or the Maine version of the American Lung Association, who will be running the record across Maine on June 18th, 2027. Because this doesn't fit in our normal parameters of use of the facility, it needs to come before you just for your permission. They are waiting for me to sign the letter that was provided to you to go forward and I'm asking your permission to do so. Thank you. I can add that we have not had any incidents of concerns with the process and this year their plan is to go out Foreside Road to Bodenham I think I provided you a map of that as [24:02] Chair Tufts: well he did does anybody have any questions I don't I mean you've done a couple of things [24:10] Speaker F (unidentified): this is our courage going in yeah it works when they were unable to be hosted oh forgive me where were they hosted forever it's been three years I forgot it was yeah I think but they were unable to be hosted in their usual place and they now start at Poland at the farm in Poland and come through Freeport and up we're day one stop [24:42] Chair Tufts: it's it's a great it's a great actual and I would I would like to add to that it's a it's a very well-run event I've driven through town in the middle of that and with bikers everywhere but didn't seem to impede traffic it seemed I mean I think Chief Hankett probably could add more to that but I was nervous because they went out Meadow Road [25:02] Speaker F (unidentified): so we're much happier to have them on the door side the side is natural for biker it's always [25:08] Chair Tufts: been met with great success and it's a it's a great cause so thank you for bringing that up to us okay with no further questions I don't want to speak preemptively but we'll see a lot of head shaking though so I would entertain a motion for this okay I'd like to make a motion to approve the use of the four-side recreation area to host the rest area for the trek across America 2027 on Friday June 18 2027. We have a motion from Miss Callahan and we have a second. I have a second for Mr. Labby. He's trying to give it away. [25:42] Speaker D (unidentified): I just want to check the language. I think you said track across America. [25:46] Chair Tufts: Oh, did I say track across America? Yes. I stand corrected. Change that to Maine. Do we need to vote again or are we all set? We can just make the amendment. Just want to accept the amendment. [25:58] Clerk Campbell: I've been waiting for a year to correct the amendment. Very last one. [26:03] Chair Tufts: Not offended at all. Or what else meaning? So we do have an amendment to the agenda. Do you, are you willing to accept the amendment? It's not to the agenda, I mean, I'm sorry, to your motion. Yes, it's changed. You got it, motion is accepted. Is there, yeah, exactly. All right, so the motion is amended and seconded. Any further discussion? Okay, let's take a vote. All in favor, as unanimous. Yes, I was just, experience territory, we are, we are just, thank you ma'am. Okay, we are on to agenda 26-104, consideration and any appropriate action to direct the town manager to explore alternative snow removal options for the upcoming winter season and provide recommendations on his findings to the board if it should become necessary. I'm gonna, I'm gonna start and we've [27:01] Clerk Campbell: We've got Matt Hunter here, if any specific questions come up. This is really a basic request. It's kind of an exercise of transparency. Everybody understands where we are staffing-wise at public works right now. We're a little bit down. It is our intention, and we are moving forward, trying to fill those vacancies before the wintertime. You know, in Lockheed-Gunwood, it's going pretty well so far, but we've got a little road ahead of us. And so we're trying to be proactive. We understand that this kind of thing needs to be planned for. And so our intention would be to explore certain options that we can bring back to you should the need arise. We're not asking to do this tonight or to put anything in place. We're just asking to permission to start the groundwork. So if the need arises, we're prepared for the first storm. [27:58] Chair Tufts: And the need would arise basically because of short staffing. Yeah, the need would arise if we [28:03] Clerk Campbell: if we cannot fill the vacancies, the vacancies we have right now with people that are qualified to plow snow. And so full transparency, if that is the case and this does have to take place, those positions would be funded by the, by the money left by the vacancies. And so there would be an impact on that as well. We probably would end up not hiring those vacancies until spring or potentially the new fiscal year. [28:39] Speaker D (unidentified): We're hoping for the best in terms of this. [28:41] Clerk Campbell: We are certainly hoping for the best that we don't have to do this, but we would like to plan appropriately. [28:47] Doug Bennett: It's property, I guess. [28:50] Chair Tufts: Anything you have to, do you want to add to that? [28:53] Matt Hunter: Matt Hunter, Director of Public Works. Well said, Jeff. This is just covering our bases for preliminary groundwork in case the need should arise. Optimistic at this point that it won't be needed, but you never know. Things can change. 27, this half or even in 27 as we move into the next half. [29:19] Chair Tufts: What percentage of Public Works employees have their CDL license? [29:26] Matt Hunter: Well, there's 60%. Yeah, we have roughly seven law routes, and six of them are CDL needed. We have ideally seven, but thank you. [29:43] Chair Tufts: So it sounds like you prepping the plan is key. Without it, we could get caught with our pants down. So it makes to me, it makes sense that we plan for it. We don't necessarily need to pull the trigger on anything, but to have something ready for action in case we need it is valuable, because we gotta, there's certain things that we have to plan. It's not the main roads, I'm assuming it's going to be parking lots and other town does hire somebody. We do some CDO license training. [30:16] Matt Hunter: We train in-house, we don't send them anywhere. Yeah, we help them through the process. [30:24] Chair Tufts: All right. Anybody have any further thoughts, questions? [30:27] Speaker D (unidentified): I think it's a great idea to be proactive on this. [30:34] Chair Tufts: Just for those of you who didn't hear me, I asked Jeff if he needed us to buy him a new shovel. That's what I heard. I heard Jeff was, he's interested. All right, do we have a motion? Okay, I make a motion to direct the town manager to explore alternative snow removal options for the upcoming winter season and provide recommendations on his finding to the board. If it should become necessary, okay, we have a motion from Miss Callaghan. Probably I'll second that. We have a second from Mr. Kenny. Everyone's getting involved tonight, this is great. Okay, so any further discussion on the motion at hand? Seeing none, all in favor? And that is a unanimous yes. Thank you, guys. Also, that does kind of conclude our agenda for the night. However, we do have a little bit of a special agenda item and more of an announcement. Anne already spoke, but I think it's prudent for us to also speak. I kind of prepared a little thing. Not much, but I'm going to read through it. But before we wrap up, I'd like to take a moment to recognize Anne and thank her for her service to our community. I think I can speak on behalf of the entire Select Board when I say how much we appreciate the time,, energy, and dedication you've given to the town of Topsom. Serving on the select board isn't easy. It requires a tremendous amount of time, patience, and a willingness to make difficult decisions. And often much of that work happens behind the scenes where very few people ever see it. One thing I've always appreciated about you, Anne, is your diligence and your attention to detail. You've never been someone to simply accept something at a face value. You've taken the time to understand the issues, ask questions, and make sure decisions being made were in the best interest of the residents of Topsom, and I think that's something worth recognizing. You've never been afraid to ask tough questions, even when those questions might be uncomfortable or unpopular. You've brought your own perspective to the table, and you've reminded us that good governance isn't always about agreeing with one another. Sometimes it's about challenging each other and think a little harder, look a little closer, and make sure we're doing what's right. I also want to thank you for your willingness to serve. It's easy to sit on the sidelines and have an opinion about how things should be done. It's another thing entirely to step forward, put yourself out there, and take on the responsibility of helping lead a community. And you've done that. You've done it with a genuine commitment to the people who call Topsum home. And as you finish your time on the board tonight, I hope you walk away knowing that your contributions have mattered. You've helped shape conversations, influence decisions, and move our town forward. On behalf of the select board, our town staff, and the residents of Thompson, thank you for your time, your dedication, and your service. And on behalf of everyone, we do have a little bit of an annoying token. Oh, thank you. I'm sniffing because I got a cold, unless it matters if you think I'm crying. And we wish you the best in whatever comes next, and thank you for caring enough about this community to join and serve on the board. I had to take out the part of that where I was like, and she ran the committee meeting interview meetings. You stepped up and did everything. Yeah. It was very good. [34:14] Doug Bennett: I know what it is. [34:24] Chair Tufts: There you go. Oh, lovely. Lovely. It's a it's third. Everyone's behind the back. Thank you all so much. Thank you. Thank you. And now that our special announcement is done. We have one last motion. Motion that we adjourn this meeting motion by