Speakers labeled via automated voice-based diarization + AI name-matching against the city's official roster. Automated transcription can still mis-hear a name during fast speech (e.g. a rapid roll-call vote) -- clear near-misses are auto-corrected, but this is not manually verified line-by-line. Treat names as a strong best guess, not an official record.
[4:35] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): We'll go ahead and call the meeting to order, and we'll start with the pledge. 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. Thank you, and I'm pretty sure the reason no one is here is because we're going to start with a couple of executive sessions. So I will, in accordance with or pursuant to Title I, MRS Chapter 13, Public Records and Proceedings, Subsection 4056A, to discuss personal matters, move to enter into Executive Session. Can I have a second? All in favor? And if you would just make sure your mics are off and we will come out of this Executive Session and then enter directly into the other one. So thanks. I will make a motion then to exit Executive Session. Do I have a second? All in favor? And now I'll make a motion to re-enter Executive Session in accordance with Title I, MRS Chapter 13, Public Records and Proceedings, Subsection 4056A to deliberate on a Code of Conduct hearing. Do I have a second? Second. All in favor? All right. I'll make them see if this is back on. I'll make a motion to exit executive session. Do I have a second? All in favor? All right. And from executive session, I'm sorry we have a meeting going on, if you guys could, you know, keep it down, thank you. So from executive session, it was about a complaint that was brought to the board. I will make a motion that complaint has been resolved via the informal process. Do I have a second? Was Molly just, that mics are slow to pick up for some reason, so all in favor? Five. Nothing, thank you. All right, now welcome, and now that we're out of the executive session, we are going to start with a public hearing for the general assistance maximums effective October 1st, 2026. So with the public hearing, whoever comes up to speak, if they would like to speak on this subject, please come up, identify yourself and whether or not you are a resident. Please keep all your comments directed at the board and limit yourself to three minutes, and we'll start now. Anyone for the public hearing? Okay, seeing no one for the public hearing, we'll, I'll go ahead and close the public hearing for the general assistance maximums and continue on with the meeting starting with our announcements. Absentee ballots are available now for the November 3rd general election. There are four ways to obtain an absentee ballot. You can do online at absenteeballotrequest.sos.maine.gov slash absenteeballotmaine slash request. You can call the clerk's office 207-829-3705 and request your ballot be mailed. You can stop by in person to pick up your ballot and you also can download the application from the town website and fill that out and mail that in. The last day to request an absentee ballot is Thursday, October 29th and all ballots Pods need to be returned by 8 p.m. on Election Day. Trunk or Treat and Movie Night is Saturday, October 17th. So join us for a spooktacular night of fun. Mark your calendars for our Saturday, October 17th, and join us for our fourth annual Trunk or Treat and Movie Night at West Custigo Hall in North Yarmouth Community Center. The event kicks off at 4 p.m. in the parking lot. And if you want to host a trunk, the registration is open now. So if you want to decorate your vehicle and bring your best costumes feel free vacancies there are still a number of board and committee vacancies that town is looking to fill they are all listed on the website so if you are interested we do encourage you to apply for those and are there any announcements from the rest of the board I have a few just
[50:49] Select Board member: Just first, I want to recognize the amazing work that the Parks Committee did in hosting the Vigorous Tenderness event that happened on the Equinox at Old Townhouse Park. My family was able to join, and I brought a number of people who had never been to the park, and there were hundreds of people there who were all talking about how beautiful the park was, how amazing it was to have something like that and that they maybe had never been even to North Yarmouth let alone to Old Town House Park and I think we got a lot of admirers from that and the folks from the parks committee spent the entire time parking what was you know hundreds of cars out there and just a Big kudos to them for making that event happen I think it really helped North Yarmouth Shine. And then I also wanted to remind folks that the Waste Reduction Committee just had their Junk in the Trunk at Prince Memorial Library this past weekend to success. And my favorite event of the year is coming up October 24th, which is the Thrift and Sift clothing swap here combined with the repair fair. So I really encourage folks to come on out, and it's a really lovely time, and there's stuff for little tiny kids all the way up to adults, and it'll be, you know, kind of focused on winter this year, so encourage folks to show up. Thanks.
[52:22] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): Is there anyone else? All right, moving on. We'll go to our appointments. So the first on the appointments list is for parks committee, Mark Bradine. I'm actually gonna make a motion to table this appointment to allow for the appointment policy procedure to be completed. Do I have a second for that? Second. A discussion. So the, just so everyone knows, the policy hasn't, that actually the parks committee didn't even know the person had applied yet, so the, they have not gone through their process to talk to Mark, and so we're gonna allow that process to play out before we're gonna, before the board will make a decision. I decided to just leave it on there anyway just so the board had the information that someone did apply. I like the idea that select board gets to see these applications early rather than, you know, just having a day to look at it before voting on it, so that was the, that was the reason I was on there, and you know, nothing against Mark really. I've actually never had the pleasure of meeting him, so hopefully I get a chance to, and we'll hear what the park says and allow them to do their process. If there's nothing else, all in favor of tabling? Very good, five, nothing. And the second is for the budget committee. So if people remember back, if you were present at our meeting two weeks ago, we did have an executive session. We had two candidates for the budget committee, but unfortunately due to my oversight, I had not put the appointment for the budget committee on that agenda, so here we are two weeks later waiting to, decide. We had two fantastic candidates. I hope that the one that we did do not appoint tonight will join one of our other committees and even possibly run for budget committee in the future. Like I said, they were very, both very impressive, but I will go ahead and make a motion to appoint Rick Ben Dixon to the budget committee filling the empty term that expires on June 30th, 2027.
[54:53] Select Board member: 7. I'll second that. Just one. And you just, I'm sorry, any discussion? Guide, I, as I was ill at our last meeting, I wasn't here for the interview process, so I'm just going to recuse myself from this vote. Okay, all
Consent Agenda
[55:12] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): Right, any other discussion? All in favor for nothing and one recusal. Okay, we will move on to the consent agenda. Were there any questions on the consent agenda? I apologize. I will apologize about the few updates we had for the select board minutes. The recording at the beginning of the meeting last, the last meeting we had was a little choppy and kind of dropped out a couple of times. So there were, when we entered into executive session, things like that, the mics didn't pick anything up. So it was difficult to have that placed on there. And then I was out of town and my notes about all that was at home. So it just took me time to get it to the town office. »» All right. I will make a motion to accept the Consent Agenda as presented. Second? »» Second. »» All in favor? Five nothing. All right. It brings us to public comment for non-agenda items. Kind of the same rules that we have for the public hearing. Please step up to the mic and introduce yourself. Let us know if you're a resident or not. And you will have three minutes. Again, this is only for items that are not on the agenda later on.
[56:51] Paul Hodgetts, public commenter: Paul Hodgetts, North Yarmouth. I'm hoping the next Tricom meeting we have that the meeting will be streamed did not happen Monday. Was there an issue with the equipment or was it not planned that, you know? I'll talk.
[57:15] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): So if you're talking about the – it wasn't a Tricom meeting, but I'll hit that under any other business. The school town council. I'll talk about that under any other business if that's all right. All righty.
[57:25] Paul Hodgetts, public commenter: Then one other issue was I was at the town office a couple of times this past month. There has not been an American flag down there for quite a while. And I don't know what's going on. There's no rope and there was no pulley. So the flag has been – I'm not sure how long it's been down. But I would like to see that taken care of. Thank you. Thanks anyone
[58:01] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): else anyone for the board for public comment? All right, we'll go ahead and close public comment and go right into the manager's report. Yeah, the mics are, it takes a second for it to pick up for some reason may
[58:35] Town Manager: I borrow yours, thank you. So at the risk of repeating our chair, I will keep mine very brief. I'm happy to report that our new code enforcement officer and our new community development admin started last week. They've been working very hard at getting caught up to speed and are doing a fantastic job. So if you need them, please stop in and see them. They're they're doing great work down there. Also attended our fire department open house last night. It was a great turnout out. Jillian stepped up to help out in our chief's absence while he takes a well-deserved vacation, and she did a fantastic job. Other than that, I don't have much more to report. Thank
Unfinished Business
[59:29] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): you. Any questions for the town manager? Not for me. All right, no old business today, so we'll move right on to new business, and the first item under new business is the EDSC proposed charge. The charge itself is on the agenda item cover sheet, so as it states there that the Charter that actually established the EDSC also provides for the select board to give it an additional charge. Considering the comprehensive plan committee has just started meeting and there is a lot of information that has to get gathered, and I felt some of it was kind of right up the EDSC's area of expertise. So I had just written this together for the Board to consider. So I will just read it. The charge would be utilizing the information provided in Chapter 3 of the North Yarmouth 2018 Comprehensive Plan as a guide. Gather updated current information to provide to the Comprehensive Plan Committee for the preparation of the new comprehensive plan, especially information relating to businesses located in North Yarmouth. So and as you can see in your packet, the chapter three from the 2018 comprehensive plan is in there. So there is a lot of information that they look to gather and update that has probably changed in the past eight years. So I will I'll tell you I'll make a motion to approve the proposed charge to the Economic Development and Sustainability Committee as discussed and direct committee to provide its findings to the Comprehensive Plan Committee. Do I have a second? All right. Discussion? Whoever wants to start.
[1:01:27] Select Board member: We had our first meeting with the Comprehensive Plan Committee last week, and one of the sticking points was information. The more information we can give the Comprehensive Plan Committee from the town, from our fellow community members, anything more is going to be helpful in that process for them to sort through the deck binder that they've received and the laundry list of planning and state requirements. Can I just clarify? So that sounds like they are in favor of working with the EDSC on this? It wasn't specifically discussed at the comprehensive planning committee, but getting them more information was something that was discussed quite extensively. I think this would be a step in the right direction. And they're a pretty good body. They're going to sort through a lot of information. I think they're going to do a good job. I would concur with what Dana said, and we mentioned to them that there are resources in the various committees, including open space is another one, that there's a report coming for open space. And so they should look towards that as a great resource for some of the work they do on the Comprehensive Plan. So those are the two that I recall that we actually spoke about during the meeting. And who – has anybody talked to the EDSC about this and whether that's –
[1:02:54] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): Not yet, so – go ahead.
[1:02:57] Select Board member: I wasn't able to attend the meeting that was last week. It feels like we should talk to the EDSC to get their temperature on this before we pass a new charge. I'm just curious. I would love to know what they think about it. My understanding is that they've been actually working on that. Does anybody else have that? I think I was told that by someone else, and I haven't read their minutes because that's not a committee that I, But I'm 99% confident that they've been working on that for a period of time. So it's really an adjunct just to finish it off and make it available to the comp plan.
[1:03:39] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): And I also believe they've been in front of this board a number of times looking for a charge multiple times. And at the time, we just didn't have anything specific to assign or to ask them to look at. And I do believe they were working on at least a list of businesses, North Yarmouth businesses, which is one of the would be one of the big focuses for here for this i
[1:04:08] Select Board member: I don't disagree. I just feel like if we're putting a new charge in front of a committee, it is worth talking to at least the leadership of the committee about the charge before the select board votes on it. Could We just table this until, I mean, I'm the liaison to the EDSC, and so I'm happy to take it to the leadership and talk about it, and then we can put it on old business at the next meeting. Okay. I can withdraw the motion. And I move to table the EDSC proposed charge. I'll second that.
[1:05:13] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): Any further discussion? Any discussion about the charge itself? I mean, does it read okay? Do we think it should be adjusted in any way? I
[1:05:27] Select Board member: think the charge is fine. Okay. My main priority is making sure that the EDSC is, you know, good with it.
[1:05:36] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): Okay. I just want to make sure the charge is okay, too, and since it's here in front of us now and – Since we can. Okay. All right. All in favor of tabling this until the next meeting? I have nothing. Very good select board goals action items so I'd ask that this get put on the agenda just so we can actually start working at some of these and in a second here I'm gonna let Britt tell you about some of the things that they've been doing at the town office or she's been doing in the town office for some of these there was also as you'll remember when we went through these a number of them that you know what let me hold there for a second I apologize I did not open the public comment on the EDSC charge was there any public comment on the EDSC charge okay so let me get back to the goals now so if you'll remember when we did these there were a number that bread had highlighted as we were going through the changes saying well that the town office can do this And so I think my idea on this was just for us to start discussing and determining, okay, are there specific board members that want to take on some of these specific items to start working on them to be able to present them to the board or bring them to the board at a future date. It doesn't have to be anything more than a consent vote. We don't have to be formal motions on it. it, just looking for, you know, hey, I'd really like to do, you know, these two things really interest me, and I'd like to work on those if I could, you know, that type of thing. But first, I think I'm going to let, Britt, if you want to talk about the stuff that you have been doing already with this, that'd be great, if that one works yet. yet
[1:07:37] Town Manager: So first and foremost, what I did is I recreated the spreadsheet into a working doc that will change color-coded as we are changing statuses, and we will be moving this to the website so it will be available for residents as well, and it will change based off of in progress, complete, needs attention, on tracker, or hasn't been started yet. That was something I worked quite a bit on today, and it will also assign leads to individual select board members, select board as a whole, or the town manager, town manager will also be designated as staff, and it will provide us a target date and any notes that we have to make sure that we are on track or need to review it. So I'll be honest, as I was updating this and making it a working document, I didn't update it to complete what we have been working on in town, but I have gone through and I have started working on the policies and creating a spreadsheet for that as well, and it is the same, it's a very similar working document, so it will have the staff member, department, or select person assigned to that policy, when it has been reviewed, and then that way I can present you all with a working document and we can go through it and decide what is high, medium, and low priority. So that has been my primary focus on the board goals in the last week or so, and we have been working on looking for solutions for broadcasting and recording town committees and boards. Some things are in the works, but of course some things have taken precedence over that in the last few weeks, and then going through and the staff has been and updating the website as we can identify anything that needs to be updated. But now that we have a full staff, we are hoping that these things will be checked off sooner than later, so.
[1:10:06] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): So is there anyone who wants to kick off, volunteer to take on some specific tasks that they were interested in? And again, it's not something that you're necessarily to be bringing to the next meeting going, hey, I'm ready, but just, you know, working along and kind of being the primary point of contact for that particular action item. Go ahead, I don't have to go first. Okay, well, if no one wants to go, I'm happy to go first, because I do want to explore the referendum style town meeting and see what's involved in that. Obviously I'll need to work with the town manager on that, but I would like to take a look and See what is involved in doing that, and I also would like to take a look at some of the policies that, you know, the charter, the bylaws, and different policies, and see what needs to be, or, you know, what changes, what needs to be up, is there anything need to be updated or clarified, or, and bring it to the board and see what they think.
[1:11:24] Select Board member: I'd be happy to work with the Budget Committee on the MSAD school budget. I've attended enough meetings and more are coming, so that's under the financial piece. And I also think that under strategic and long-range planning, I've actually done a draft of a procedure for naming property and equipment that belongs to the town, something that we talked about before. And I think, Britt, there were several here you've already started that you didn't mention, capital improvement plan and others, and I know you're going down through the list. So I think we've got a few things done, actually, and launched, which is exciting. And I think having this available online is a great way to keep everyone informed and keep us on task. And also under financial stability, I think the access assess with Cumberland and MSAD 51 appropriate means to gain insight in school budget, it's in, it's actually in a couple spots, so, and that's that will happen through the Tricom and this other committee that Paul will speak about later that Paul Hodges mentioned, it's Going down the road, I only had one earmarked, but the continue listening sessions in some form, getting those started again, getting a date and time to start that, and give it a good go around, and I think you have the flag policy in there too under strategic and long-range planning, so you did have Another one, yeah, so Again, I'm happy to, I think there were some new main laws that our personnel policies might not have been updated to include, and so I'm happy to kind of work, I don't know that I know, Paul, you mentioned reviewing the charter, bylaws, ordinances, well, and
[1:13:25] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): You're, you're free to also, don't, this isn't, this is not a, and then there's room for everyone, that's right, there's room for everyone on any of these, I'm not trying to, I think
[1:13:41] Select Board member: I think the other one, we have a goal of proactively engaging taxpayers to encourage use of existing tax reduction opportunities. It's my understanding that main revenue services will sort of hold meetings with different constituents, and that has been on my mind. So I think sort of, I will begin to think, I'll start to have a plan for how to do that. And I'm happy to work with you on that as well, because that's something. Yeah. I mean, I think bringing in the Budget Committee, I think sort of maybe having it be, I just am thinking out loud, which is always dangerous to do on public television in a recorded meeting, but even thinking about sort of having like different groups come in on a particular day so that a representative from the Wood Bank or from various different organizations. I know the Wood Bank is probably getting a lot of calls at the moment with the costs of heating oil. Anyway, I will take the lead on that, though. And I'll say I'd be very interested in working alongside Britt in looking at the capital improvement plan and kind of building that up and something that I'm working with the state on already and so I think that 's a good place to jump in as well as on kind of taking a look at the TIF and making some plans and then I would be happy to work with the town office on the climate action plan and kind of evaluate where does it stand and what are the changes that we need to see made in order for it to move forward I'm happy to work with you on that and I work with you in the TIF thank
[1:15:49] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): you this was you know it's more an exercise try to get us all moving and towards completing some of these goals and or at least getting the ones that we can down the road that you know as far as we can so I appreciate it again you know it's not a monopoly that you know if someone took your took the one you wanted to work on that you can't work on it too so but so thank you and I'll open it up to public comment if anyone wants to anyone has any comment on the select board choosing different action items on the goals okay very good any other questions on that like I said it's nothing to no vote or anything on that just a discussion all right so committee schedule for select board discussions as we had discussed back very early on when I had presented the idea of removing the liaison or not having liaisons and having the committee members come almost every committee said hey how about a hybrid version how about a hybrid version so I took that on board I reached out to the committees asked them, said hey, every coming to the second meeting every other month. I sent an email to all the committee leadership and the ones that I heard back from, you know, got their choices. The ones that I didn't, I just plugged in where it made sense, just based on numbers. The idea of this is for every other, so you'll see starting next meeting, October 20th, you'll see the committee, what we called previously committee reports, and I'm trying not to scare people with the name reports, but where the liaisons would go through and discuss you know what 's going on with their committees that will actually return at the next meeting but only half of the committees will have liaisons giving those brief and the other half will have the actual committees there to an actual committee member there just you know find out or to let the public know what's going on with their committee ask any questions that they might have of the select board allow the select board to ask any questions that they may have of the committees, and then provide any direction if they wanted any direction in particular. So as I said, if they got back to me in within the time frame that I asked, I gave him about two weeks to get me that information, I put them on here. You'll notice there's a couple of them that we actually do not, that don't fall under our policy, our liaison policies, so those, the Budget Committee, the Planning Board, and then there are a few that are not on the listed, like ZBA is not on there, Planning Board is, so it'll be nice to hear from these other, these other committees or other boards that we get a chance to not usually a chance to hear from. So again, it's not, you know, this hard fast binding rule. I'm not expecting the committees, if you know, if something comes up that creates a conflict and they can't make it, they can't make it. I mean, it's not, it's not some directive from on high here, it's just to lay out a schedule for them to work off of, and hopefully it will work out for them. There may be a question about the Comprehensive Plan Committee being on there for both schedules. The idea on that was the Comprehensive Plan Committee is because of the large task they have in front of them, that there, it was felt that it would be best for them to be in front of us each once a month. It would give them time or give them access to us to be able to ask for direction if they need it, ask for resources as they need it, as well as, you know, update us on any progress, so that's the reason they're There on both schedules, they're going to be here every month as they can again. They miss a month, they miss a month, we'll live. Any questions on that? Any public comment on that? In that case, I will make a motion to establish a schedule for periodic select board discussions with the with town committees as discussed and presented. Second. Any further discussion? I'm sorry.
[1:20:57] Select Board member: That's okay. One question, please, which is what do we do about some of those, like, so for example, the library, so though, are we just gonna have a list or you know do
[1:21:08] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): you want? Yeah, those lists will show up, so on the next agenda, and it's good question, on the next agenda the list will show back up, so you'll see that like the library, the right, and remember those were members of those versus liaisons to those in reality, so the Recreation Advisory Committee, you know, the Prince Memorial Library, the you know, well, the joint standings now all of us, but so you'll see those just as we normally do, and since we're the ones actually attending those mostly as members anyway, we'll be giving those. Library isn't like
[1:21:50] Select Board member: that, right, Molly? You're a liaison, and there's actually elected folks, so I probably should, library should be on this list instead. In that case, right, I don't know, because it's not a it's not our committee per se, it's a joint of a member on there, and again, not trying to belabor this. Just thinking, I think actually there's talk of having the executive director come up and
[1:22:27] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): speak. Yeah. And this is obviously separate. If someone wants to get, if they want to come and give a presentation, I'm happy to get that on the agenda separately from this, so that they can have their own time and their own space on the agenda.
[1:22:43] Select Board member: I'm happy to, again, because the membership of that library board is fairly limited, I can certainly ask, but I think there will be... Except me. Okay. I think, I don't, I guess I don't know how to handle the library. If it should be on, I think we should probably just make sure that there's a time for it and on the agendas to give a report. And I'm happy to continue to do that as the liaison. But I didn't want to vote in favor of the motion and not raise it.
[1:23:45] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): No, that's fine. Yeah, I avoided putting a lot of the joint type committees on there. I left Shellfish Commission on there only after emailing with Len, the chair. And he, you know, he's not going to be at all for, but he's like, you know, yeah. And just, we rarely get to hear from just because their meetings, like their meeting is tonight as is ours, so it's difficult for us to have our liaison there. So they, so it'll be nice to hear from them and what they work on. But yeah, and I'm happy to add the library if we, you know, if one of those members would be interested to come and do that, I'm more than happy to add it. Well,
[1:24:35] Select Board member: I don't, if you want to check with them, yeah, I'll check with them and then we can
[1:24:41] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): add it to another. Yep, sure. No, you need mine.
[1:24:52] Town Manager: So for clarity and staff, would the board be open to having a open time slot for any committee that can't attend their scheduled one to attend the next schedule at following all other committee, and it may give you the opportunity to invite library if
[1:25:14] Public commenter (North Yarmouth resident): they're available. Thank
[1:25:18] Select Board member: you. Elegant solution, right? Sounds great. Any
[1:25:25] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): other questions? Are we still good with the motion that's on the table, which is just to approve the schedule that has written? All right, all in favor? Five, nothing. Thank you. We are moving on to the charter communication fran, franchise agreements. So I'll let you cover this one, Brit. I've been speaking a lot anyway. Oh yeah, I'm gonna play
[1:26:02] Town Manager: thank you. All right, so our franchise agreement is set to expire on October 22nd. This allows the town to receive a revenue source of three percent of gross cable service revenues. There have been very minor changes compared to the our last agreement. Some of the changes are 20 households to now 15 outside in that per linear mile, and also I will note that there was an error that we noticed after the agenda was posted, but it is in the revised agreement that under section 9.4 it lists North Yarmouth Memorial School, it's actually a community center. But other than that, not much has changed from the last agreement that was signed 10 years ago.
[1:27:15] Select Board member: Paul, can I ask a couple questions? Or did you want to? You can ask. Thanks for catching 9.4. It was on my list of questions. It spared me in that. My understanding was that at one point we were asked to stall signing a contract while they, well, someone in MMA or some other organization create a universal contract for all communities. Is this compliant with that? Are we gonna just charge ahead
[1:27:41] Town Manager: in the meantime? So we will have the ability to cancel this if that time comes. Okay, but the state is still, that's fine, haven't completed theirs, so ours will expire on the 22nd, so yeah, just trying
[1:27:55] Select Board member: to be know that makes sense I'm pleased you're doing that and this has been a topic at meetings for a year or whatever maybe longer and one of the questions other quest couple questions i had it seems to me there was a hardware problem we didn't have proper
[1:28:14] Town Manager: hardware is it related to this at all and so when we upgraded our hardware software we lost the capability. They're not compatible. There has been some research to see what it will cost us, and it is several thousand dollars. It was something that was considered in the last budget, but I do know that they decided to cut that as there were other priorities. So it is certainly something that we can look into upgrading into the future, but again, it will be a cost.
[1:28:52] Select Board member: and the final question I had is have we been collecting fees yes and so and it's not worth voting we wouldn't be voting on a discussing tonight but why wouldn't we look at those fees that we've collected and apply them towards a hardware upgrade maybe that's a question for the board later not for now I'm not
[1:29:10] Town Manager: exactly sure how the revenues have been applied but I do know that our last revenue check that we received is roughly in the ballpark of $12,000 how
[1:29:19] Select Board member: much 12 000 12 000 okay great and the only other question i had was it gives you one port or each building is that adequate and would we be better served by multiple ports that's for your that's a call for you whether you have enough and whether it goes into one connection then it's spliced out but i was curious not curious i was wanted to make sure we had enough ports in the buildings where we need access that's all i can look i'll let you take care of that 's all i had any
[1:30:06] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): other questions i will open it up for public comment judy
[1:30:20] Public commenter (North Yarmouth resident): potter north yarmouth and these franchise fees comes from people you said 15 homes that have spectrum is that correct i
[1:30:32] Town Manager: don't know exactly which homes these franchise fees are coming from because on the spectrum bill
[1:30:38] Public commenter (North Yarmouth resident): Bill, it does say a franchise fee and the amount, and it says it goes to the town of North Yarmouth.
[1:30:45] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): So in the agreement, if you look at the agreement, the cable company has the authorization to be able to pass on that franchise fee to their customers. So, we charge, this agreement allows them to provide cable services in this town. We charge for them, we charge them to be able to do that. They take that charge then and pass that on to the customers within the town. So we're not actually collecting from you, we're collecting from Charter Communication. So we don't collect from the residents of the town, but that charge originates because we charge them to provide cable services.
[1:31:38] Public commenter (North Yarmouth resident): Okay. So when you get a check from them, where does that money go towards?
[1:31:47] Town Manager: I can't speak to how previous revenues were allocated for that. I'll be completely honest, I haven't had too much time to review the revenue schedule. It is something I do plan to look into,
[1:32:00] Public commenter (North Yarmouth resident): but at this moment I couldn't tell you because I know that when the box was pulled by three people without any knowledge from anyone else it was going to cost a lot of money to put a new box in but they also took fourteen thousand dollars out of the budget that people voted on for the new equipment and put it towards a sweets or culvert so that should have been done or provided to get the tv up and running for people yeah I can't speak to how a previous I understand I'm just
[1:32:38] Select Board member: Saying there's some history Brett I have an email from Diane on this subject I'll share with you and help you jump start your research anyone
[1:32:49] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): Else so I will make a motion to approve the franchise agreement between the town of North Yarmouth and Spectrum Northeast LLC and authorize the town manager to execute the agreement on behalf of the town is there a second I'll second [Select Board member: That any] Further discussion I think I found the discrepancy in the 15 or 20 I think it's in
[1:33:24] Select Board member: 6.1 the service area it's talking about how many residents they have to have in order to serve it that's that's i think what you're referring to that i don't think we're we're getting more money for more than 15 or 20 households that 's the only clarification i wanted to make right thanks
[1:33:39] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): Nothing else for me perfect all right any other board member very good all in favor thank you Okay, EPR program letter, and you're going to speak on this, tell me you are. So this is the extended producer responsibility for packaging program. There is a letter that ECO Maine has drafted and asked communities to send out. The state I'm not as familiar with this program as I'd like to be but the state has entered into this program that essentially passes the cost of using non recyclable material or large amounts of recyclable materials to the manufacturers who package in such so when we recycle that there's a fee and a reimbursement and anyway it's it's a fairly complicated formula from what I was reading in the ordinance so if you really want some good reading and I know that you have a much more much better understanding than I do of the whole thing, so if you'd like to get up and talk about it you are welcome. However, the state has gone very slow with actually getting what they need to get this program up and running, and we have tipping fees for recycling have increased fairly significantly, and that also weighs into the reimbursement cost, or I'm sorry, the reimbursement. So the higher the tipping fees, the greater the reimbursement. However, right now there's no reimbursement, so we've all made adjustments for things as a town in order to better set up ourselves financially, only to be kind of let down by the state who couldn't finish the job, and now we're left paying these fees still, and we don't know that we're going to get reimbursed. We're supposed to start this year, I believe, I think they were going to use 2026 data, or at least use 2026 data going into 2027. Anyway, we don't know if we're going to get reimbursed at all for it, so it really makes it kind of a mess. There is a letter that Eco Main is asking communities to sign that is being sent to the governor to kind of put a little pressure behind getting this program done, so that's my limited, a fairly confusing way of trying to explain this, and I will, I'm happy to let the board have any questions or anything they want to ask, and then I'll open it up to public after that.
[1:36:47] Select Board member: Sure. The only thing I would say is that all we're asking for here to vote on tonight is to approve a letter going to the state to say let's get a move on, I mean, basically what we're doing. And it's a reimbursement that we should be receiving once these procedures and policies and red tape is created by the state in order to execute this. So I don't know that we need a ton of discussion on it. Feel free. But I think we just want to vote on, you know, do you want us to send the letter or not, which was in the packet. And that's what I'll be thinking about voting on. That's my two cents for it. Anyone else? I think this is a really important thing for us to do, you know, we as you said, you know, we were in the process of kind of muscling through a year where we have higher tipping fees knowing that we're going to get that reimbursed as we move forward into next fiscal year, so I'm still, I'm still optimistic that we'll be able to do that. I would, so I definitely have in favor of us signing this letter and sending it to the governor's office. I also potentially would encourage us to consider asking our House and Senate reps to put some pressure as well because this is really it should be a full statewide issue. It's something that's really important and it will make a big difference for our already strained budgets as this letter lays out. Anyone
[1:38:31] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): else? Anyone in the public? Lisa
[1:38:41] Belanger, Waste Reduction Committee member / eco-Maine board member: Belanger, resident of North Yarmouth and a member of the North Yarmouth Waste Reduction Committee and eco-made board member. You're right, Paul, this is not an on a less than complicated discussion. That being said, I would say that EPR is a good thing. Maine was first in the nation to implement this law even though it hasn't been implemented yet and there are other states that have followed suit and they are running with it. There's a couple states that came after us that are already off and running and benefiting. One of the big benefits of this law will be that we, as taxpayers, and municipalities will benefit. We get reimbursed because the packagers that are producing all this waste are going to be held responsible. So it's not just going to be on us as taxpayers to bear the weight of that. With that in mind, I know there was also a question about having a presentation for the select board because this is a complicated topic and I didn't know whether that was still
[1:39:59] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): for discussion. I would stay I mean I can certainly that's something that I'm interested in still. I know I mentioned it when I was at the at the meeting last waste reduction meeting that I'd be interested in getting a president or hearing a presentation. I'm sure I'm pretty sure the rest of the board would be too and probably a lot of the public who has no idea or is like me and read through the ordinance and went what in the world is this saying the statute. So yeah I would love to be able to set a time or you know find out when someone or yourself if you wanted to do it but
[1:40:39] Belanger, Waste Reduction Committee member / eco-Maine board member: what I'm going to suggest is that when I was at the last board meeting eco main board meeting Sarah Nichols, who at the time was a member of the Natural Resources Council of Maine, was the architect behind EPR. She's the one that got this thing going. And she lives in Cumberland. And she gave a presentation at the EcoMaine board meeting, and I approached her afterwards and said, Hey, Sarah, how would you like to come and talk with us? She's willing to do that. She gave an excellent presentation to the ECO main board that lasted about 20 minutes and simplified this to an understandable level. So I have her card, and Britt, I can share it with you. I think you already have it, though. I gave you some information already, I think. But if Sarah's available and can come, I would highly recommend that might be of benefit to the committee, to the board, to know more about this. I also did take the step of connecting with Annie Graham, who likewise connected with Dan Ancalis, who is a member of the Environmental and Natural Resources Committee for the legislature. And there's been an update. So would you like me to read a little bit of the update because he took the step of connecting with a commissioner of the DEP who's responsible for getting this stewardship organization up and running that's what the that's what's been holding us up is getting the stewardship organization on board so here is his update. Here it is. The DEP will be issuing a revised RFP after engaging in dialogue with some of the potential bidders for the stewardship organization, who ultimately decided not to move forward. What the department found was that the bidders were struggling with the IT requirements for the data system and the statutory 180-day time limit on getting the full system up and running. The DEP is already making adjustments on the IT side, and my sense is that there's also going to be an understanding if progress and good faith work is taking place, the DEP will be able to exercise a small degree of flexibility with regard to the 180 DAs. Specifically, with regard to our comparison to other states, here's the argument in favor of the way we're doing things. things. Other states allow producers to run the system and provide much more limited benefit, if any, to municipalities. Maine's law has the state run the system through a contractor, the stewardship organization. If we followed other states' models, most of the detail in our law and our rule would not exist, nor would the level of transparency about the producers cost the bottom line is the department expects that the reissue of the rfp will delay the program's full launch by a couple of months and his hope is that a revised timeline holds and the new timeline won't cause fiscal pain to municipalities awesome
[1:44:33] Select Board member: Thank
[1:44:36] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): you lisa any other board comments although
[1:44:56] Select Board member: I was just going to vote on this out. I will complement the waste reduction Committee. I actually did some research. I was in, worked for a company and managed some businesses that produced a lot of waste, so I'm like, okay, what impact is this gonna have on these companies? So and I did read that although we were the first ones to pass the law, it's had two or three revisions, which are good things, but those who did implement it, the plans just aren't as great, and it concurs with what's been said here this evening. So I think this is a good thing, and being patient is okay, as I tell my granddaughter, but at some point we've got to get off the pot and get this done. It sounds like they're committed to doing that, at least in this letter that you read.
[1:45:43] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): I'm glad to hear that they're taking steps and feeling some pressure. I'm still of the mind that we should be sending this letter and keeping that pressure going.
[1:45:57] Select Board member: Do we want to amend it to include letters to our representatives, as Andrea mentioned? Even though you've reached out, it would mean something also coming from the slug board. What are your thoughts? I mean, I think that would be a good idea. I think we can also just simply CC them on this letter, making sure that they know, and that helps the governor also to know that we've included our state reps. All
[1:46:42] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): right, so let me ask this. Would you prefer that each of us sign it, that it gets signed by the select board itself, or just authorizing the town managers to sign it on our behalf? Which do you think carries more? I don't know, that's why I think I'm asking here.
[1:47:02] Select Board member: I would say elected officials would have more weight.
[1:47:05] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): So have us, all right. So it'd be signed by the five of us instead or the five of us, okay, I'm fine
[1:47:13] Select Board member: with that. Yeah, I think you know if Brit signs it and says this is on behalf of the select board, probably works just as well, or we can on behalf of the select board with our names there. I don't know, I would hate for it to wait another two weeks for us to sign a letter. All right, yeah, that would be my one concern. I'd rather get it. I don't disagree that we have more clout because we are elected. I don't disagree with that, for better or for worse, and let's be expeditious. Yeah, all right.
[1:47:58] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): In that case, I'll make a motion to authorize the town manager to sign on behalf of the select board the letter addressed to the governor on the extended producer responsibility for packaging program, and to ensure that it also is letter of cc to our two representatives in the state legislature. Do I have a second?
[1:48:19] Select Board member: I'll second that. All
[1:48:27] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): right, any further discussion? All in favor? And thank you again, Lisa, I appreciate it. Okay, general assistance ordinance. So we had a public hearing earlier today on the general assistance ordinance. Is there any question or comment from the board on it? Anything from the public? Very good. I will move then that we adopt the 2026 2027 general assistance ordinance and appendices effective October 1st 2026. You have a second? Any other discussion? All in favor? I have nothing, thank you town manager. Three-month performance review. As I know the board members will remember, and just so the rest of the town knows, the contract that we signed with Brit has us doing a review at the three, six, and nine month mark. Part of that was in order to align the annual reviews with the budget season properly, with the budget season, so rather than waiting until August. So what we'll do is we're going to do a three-month, a six-month, and a nine-month review, and then the review after that would be one full year. So since it has been, believe it or not, almost three months, although to Britt it probably feels like seven or eight months already, we need to set that timeframe. frame, so I am going to, well I'll allow, is there anyone who has public comment on that?
[1:50:23] Select Board member: Yep, sure. So in my review, and for whatever reason it's not now showing up, I read through the final contract and it's my understanding in what I read that it's only a six-month review and then a one-year review, so I was surprised to see the other. So this is the contract sent from Don Garish to the select board on 713 and it's called attorney full changes Barton final, I mean so it's, he titled it final manager contract. I believe that, I think what we signed, I mean at least within this document under 3b says the select board sure held a meeting at the town manager within six months of execution review their performance, nothing herein shall prevent the select board from holding more frequent meetings with the town manager to review performance, and an annual evaluation shall be done in April of each year. I might have that wrong, and Britt, maybe you have a different contract. Is that in line with the contract you have, or am I looking at an old version?
[1:51:52] Town Manager: On so my contract, the one I have, the signed one, is 6b. It does state shall hold a meeting with the town manager within six months of execution. So it's the same one. I apologize then.
[1:52:11] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): I'm looking at the wrong and an old version of it. So because I know we were shifting around to make sure we get an annual review prior to the budget being voted on, we will wait for the six month mark. Thank you. Yeah, all right, I will place that on. Actually, we'll just pass over that agenda item and move on to any other business. Anyone have anything for any other business? A
[1:52:59] Select Board member: couple of things. Several of us, including Brit, myself, Andrew, attended northern region of greater Portland council of governments with some other neighboring towns a week or so ago, last week, and had some good feedback discussions between ourselves and New Gloucester. I think was the only other town there. A couple towns were missing and sharing ideas and challenges and ideas for overcoming some of the challenges we have. And it's, it's the common theme of, you know, we're stealing your employees, you're stealing our employees. And not so much Gray wasn't there. We did steal someone from Gray, but they're talking more about firefighters and some of the other challenges. But there was an announcement, an announcement, just a report by the Cumberland County manager that some areas they're looking at providing services to towns for, they're just evaluating them and want to know what interest there was, I guess. Animal control, HR services, IT services, code enforcement services, communication services, or marketing, teaching people how to market. And they've just hired a new fire EMS person, I think, at a Casco who will be on board with the county to help advise on fire and EMS, former chief, if I understand correctly. It's a good meeting there. And then several of us also attended a meeting the next night at Falmouth. Five towns came together with their school boards and their school administrators and the town administrators to talk about interest in regionalization, I guess, was kind of the theme of That meeting and so just to be open and transparent with everyone, several of us attended that and participated in those discussions, and seemed to be a fair amount of interest in some kinds of consolidation of regionalization with no particular target, just some ideas, and really gauging interest I guess. A couple of other things, I'll let Paul, you can talk about the tricom or you know I'll let you do that since it was raised. And October's tomorrow, I guess October 7th, I'll be attending the rails to trails alliance monthly meeting as a representative of North Yarmouth, so I guess that met with open space as well, and they are planning on delivering a report, and we all got emails on that here soon, a draft of a report, and we'll get clarity on that here soon. But that will be coming up for discussion, receipt, debate, whatever, and vote. That's it from me. Anyone else? Go ahead, Dana. Go ahead. The only thing I have is more of a question for probably the board and town manager on this one for parks. Moving forward with any projects or reports with Knights Pond, since we currently don't have the joint standing committee doing Knights Pond, what will be their process to get that completed
[1:56:09] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): or get that moving forward? So I'll just jump in just real quick a little bit about that. So the Cumberland just approved doing the joint standing committee is the two full boards, so they are now gonna move, there will be a Knights Pond devoted committee between the two towns to be able to get together and discuss that. It's going through a bit of a process thing right now, but there will be, and I will touch base with you on that, you can pass on the parks. I have
[1:56:50] Select Board member: two things. The first is just a little bit about, just I don't know if it's like a staff retention question or something on these lines, but I've noticed that the last few agendas that we've had out have, Casey has been working on them over the weekend and has sent out multiple revisions. And I'm just concerned that we're asking our staff to be working over the weekends to make some of these things possible. And so I was hoping that we could just kind of shift and acknowledge as a board that if changes come about over the weekend, it is okay for them to be delivered to us on Monday instead of days when staff are not supposed to be working. That feels important to me. But yeah, so just ensuring that staff are not being overburdened. I know it's a really tough job and, you know, weekends are important, especially like Casey as a little kid, little baby. So I just want to make sure that we're not putting an undue burden on our staff to be working when they're not supposed to be. And then my other question or issue is around the code of conduct and the kind of continued surfacing of past dismissed Code of Conduct complaints against me in particular. I was concerned, I asked Michael when this agenda came out if this Code of Conduct hearing was about me and had to find out afterwards. I would ask that when we have items about executive session where it would be helpful for us as staff to or as select board members to be informed before we come that we get a heads up about what the topic is going to be in those but I'd also say when I asked Michael about that he let me know that Paul you and Britt are working together on scheduling the hearing for me and I was really surprised by that because your wife is the one who submitted that so and you had mentioned you were going to be recused and not involved and so that was really concerning that you're continuing to be involved in that process and part of the discussions i have to assume if you're being part of the planning so i just i just like to again acknowledge that this has been dismissed and i would like to ask that the select board respect the fact that this has been dismissed in a process and not move forward with that MR. Just for clarity, what I believe I said was that Britt and Paul were working on the schedule, not on the particular complaint based upon availability. I think I said relative to Britt not being available for one of the meetings and what have you. So it was about scheduling. Paul is not working on the complaint against you from his wife. it does continue to feel you know even with scheduling I think this is really important that it not be it feels very retaliatory to me that this is coming back up and so I just want to acknowledge and request that there is clear division there thank you yeah I can I can attest to That and I can also, I had aspirate today, I thought yesterday, whatever day it was, to notify both parties, multiple parties. So but I can assure you that there has been no discussion except for scheduling and clarification from the attorneys of the attorney and how to proceed from the get-go. So I can assure you that we're good there. I'd also love for the board again to be informed about out the response from the attorney as to whether they feel like this is something that is putting the town at risk. I feel like that's a reasonable request, and I'll just continue to ask that the select board be informed about that before putting itself in a position where it could put the town at risk of lawsuit. Thank you, that's it for me. Okay, thank you. So as Michael
[2:01:15] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): stated I'm involved in the scheduling of the board and all aspects of the schedule. So that's part of the job, as you're well aware. And I am not involved in the individual complaint itself. I am involved in when executive sessions get scheduled and how the agenda gets written. So as far as the agenda and the changes over the weekend, I would have to say that I was actually expecting them to come out on Monday and quite surprised that they didn't, that they came out earlier than Monday. As I said, for the minutes especially, which was a very minor change, I just wasn't home to provide the information, and I don't travel with all my notes, so I just wasn't home to provide the information. And was very surprised that they came out so quickly. So I am happy to wait also until Monday for those items that don't quite make it before the end of the week. So I have just a few things for any other business. As I mentioned when Dana brought it up, this so Carmel and just passed the joint standing committee where it's their entire board in our attire board we will now try to start getting a schedule together for the two boards to start meeting and discussing different items. The school funding thing does sound like it's the going to happen, it'll be interesting to see, and when they get the number of signatures, because as Britt actually pointed out to me this week, this election is a governor's election So those numbers will actually get reset by the number of people who vote in this election. So if they, I don't know what, if they turn them in after November 3rd, they may be insufficient. Of course, they may also collect way above the number that they need anyway, so it may not be, it may not matter in the long run. But just so you know, it does look like that process is going to go forward. But that will be probably one of the items that we'll be discussing at that joint standing committee. And as I said, I will touch base to see where they stand about getting something together for the parks and Cumberland to talk Knights Pond. The I will touch baseball on the so on Monday we had a meeting, what are they calling it, the community partnership meeting or committee, community partnership committee. It's two members of the select board, myself and Michael, it's Tim Valente and Sean Thurston from the school board, and Jeff Mihalik and Bill Follett from Cumberland Council. And it's basically, it's formalizing something that had been done informally previously. There was an attempt to, we all actually discussed this at the meeting that we would like to see them, you know, recorded, broadcast. I did attempt to record it actually on my computer. The recording is not very good. You can hear of course me, you can hear Tim Valente was sitting next to me, so you can hear Tim pretty well, but Bill Follett was opposite side of the table and difficult to hear. And it, you have to sort through who's speaking, who it is. So I'm, I'm doing my best with a little bit of some different tools to see if I can't get a transcript script to a degree of that discussion and get that out. But that is something we are working on. It was just kind of funny because we narrowed down a time where we could all make it a time and day. No one ever bothered to find a place. So I was bothering Britt during the weekend about, hey, do you know if this room's available, you know, if you can let me know on Monday if this room is available for Monday evening. Of course that's pretty late to find out that the rooms available on Monday morning when I, when the school got back and touched me, one of the school board members got back and touched, well I guess with all of us said he was waiting to hear on the Geiger room in the at the school, he never heard back, so it was a very last-minute thing and we just didn't have the personnel that we needed and such to be able to record it. So that was not intentional. So we are hoping very much that moving forward, we will see these recorded broadcast. That is, that will be the intention. So that's the best I can say on that. The meeting itself was very introductory. It was more about, well, I guess there was a bit of beating up on the school for some of their spending and what's going on, and a lot of the frustration that people had was coming out in that meeting. A lot of it was more a discussion of, okay, here we are meeting together now publicly and meeting together to discuss whatever we need to, how do we want things structured, what items do we want to discuss, what are we looking to get out of this committee. So it was fairly productive in that manner. So there will be an agenda for the next one. So that was one of the, so we want it structured like a committee where there is an agenda, where there are minutes, where there are, you know, where things are like I said, hopefully recorded and broadcast. So the idea is to be much more transparent, and it is mostly an exchange of information and then ideas to either bring back to their, to the school board, or to each individual of the town boards. So we'll see how it, how it grows moving forward. Right now we're on a monthly meeting schedule. I believe it's right now the first Monday every month. So that's, that's what the plan is. So we'll, we'll see how it, how it, if it continues and, you know, what comes of it. The, oh, I'm sorry, please go ahead. Can I just add to that? Yeah, so you may
[2:08:24] Select Board member: recall that we actually voted to for this in a previous meeting, and it was at the request of the school board chair, just so everyone's aware. And I at the time, it's like, okay, this is interesting, let's get together, and we voted, and Paul and I volunteered to participate on that, and the board appointed us. I think if you go to the MSAD 51 site and you read the superintendent's recent memo or information, you'll see why this was initiated, and there are, they're starting their budget process much earlier, and that's all I'll say. You read it yourself, but I think that's what prompted these discussions, let's start talking to these communities, plus we've got this hanging overhead about reallocation of school funding, so that I think was a motivation for it, and the, and the fact that the Tricom doesn't get together that often, and that's still on the docket, by the way, you know, two or three times a year, and there's not enough time to get into some of the meat of what's going on and then carry it back and have boards make decisions so that's all i'd add okay and the last thing i
[2:09:32] Chair (Select Board presiding officer): have is i was asked about the budget process and how we'd like to proceed since the last two years we did and this is just for future planning for the town manager which is what the request who requested this information so the last two years we have done a saturday and gone through the entire budget previous that we had done departments during a meeting or during a workshop just prior to a meeting for a number of months until we got through the budget so there and this is all again this is information for you i'll put it on the agenda probably in November since you won't be here next. So it'll be on the agenda, just the budget process, just so we can vote on how we want to do this. So the other question or the other item to think about on that will be public input, getting public input, the best way to collect that public input and at what point in the budget process we would like to see it. All stuff just to consider, think about for, again, that'll be on the November and as I just mentioned Brit will not be here at our next meeting, so there won't be probably quite as much on, but we will have the committee reports again that you'll see on there and we will hear from some of committees and I believe the open space had sent out a request about that too. So was there any final thought from anyone? All right, I will make a motion to adjourn. Second. All in favor. VERY GOOD. MEETING ADJOURNED.
[2:11:34] Select Board member: HAVE WE POSTED THE TRI-COM ON OUR CAMERA? HAS IT BEEN SCHEDULED? IT IS? YEAH.