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.
[0:21] Mayor (presiding officer): Good evening everyone, and welcome to the Saco City Council meeting for Monday, October 5th, 2026, at 6:30 PM. Would like to make note of all counselors presence, with the exception of Counselor Parks this evening, who has been excused, and we do have City Administrator Pelletier with us. Would you please join me for the pledge of allegiance? Thank you everyone. Moving on to item number four, there is no general this evening. Item number five, committee correspondence to council. Are there any council members wishing to share? Not seeing anyone. Moving on to item 6, that is public comment. If there are any members of the public wishing to speak, please step forward, state your name and address for the record, and you will have three minutes to address the council. Not seeing any members of the public seeking recognition. Moving on to item 7, that is the approval of the minutes. Is there a motion to approve the minutes of September 14, 2026? So moved. Motion made by Councillor Edwards. Is there a second by Councillor Gale? Any discussion or comment on the minutes? Okay, roll call vote. Councillor Edwards? Yes. Councillor Gay? Yes. Councillor Arnon? Yes. Councillor Gale? Yes. Councillor Hewitt? Yes. Councillor Johnston? Yes. Motion passes 6-0. Moving on to item 8, under consent items, we do have three items this evening. Item A is the Notice of Election for the General and Referendum Election of November 3, 2026. Item B is the Confirmation of the Mayor's Appointments to the Lucia Kimball Deering Trust Board of Gene Saunders and Joseph Moorhead. And Item C is Confirmation of the Mayor's Appointment to the Planning Board of Eric Burmeister. Is there a motion or any items that you wish to move?
[2:26] Councilor Johnston: Councilor Johnston? Could we pull Item B?
[2:33] Mayor (presiding officer): Yep, we will pull Item B, which is the Confirmation of the Mayor's Appointment to the Lucia Kimball-Dearing. That will become action item A. Remaining two items, is there a motion to approve? So moved. Motion made by Councillor Edwards. Is there a second? Second. Second by Councillor Hewitt. Roll call vote. Councillor Edwards? Yes. Councillor Gay? Yes. Councillor Ahnen? Yes. Councillor Gale? Yes. Councillor Hewitt? Yes. Councillor Johnston? Yes. Motion passes 6-0. Okay, moving on to Item 9, under Action Items. Formally Item B, Consent, is now Action Item A. And that is the confirmation of the Mayor's appointments to the Lucia Kimball Deering Trust Board of Jean Saunders and Joe Mooreshead. Councilor Johnston.
[3:22] Councilor Johnston: Madam Mayor, I believe back in April when we initially were presented with this, I tabled
[3:30] Mayor (presiding officer): this item. Oh yes, I'm sorry. Is there a motion to one table? Thank you. So moved. Motion made by Councillor Gail. Councillor Johnston. And is there a second? Councillor Gail. Will call vote. Councillor Edwards? Yes. Councillor Gay? Yes. Councillor Onan? Yes. Councillor Gail? Yes. Councillor Hewitt? Yes. Councillor Johnston? Yes. Motion to one table passes six zero. And Councillor Johnston, the city of
[4:00] Councilor Johnston: of Saco by special election held on the second Monday of September 1917 as authorized by chapter 95 of the private special laws of the state of Maine of the year 1917 having voted to accept the legacies and bequests of Lucia Kimball Dearing as provided in the last will and testament of said Lucia Kimball Dearing dated November 19th 1915 said legacies and bequest devices and gifts which City of Saco, Maine is or may be authorized to accept under the provisions of said Chapter 95 of the Private and Special Laws of the State of Maine of the year 1917 are hereby placed in the care, custody, and under the administration of seven citizens of the City of Saco who shall constitute a Board of Trustees for the care, custody, and administration of these funds and the income thereof and to be designated as the Board of Trustees for the care, custody, and administration of the legacies and bequests provided for under the terms of the will of Lucia Kimball Deering and all other legacies bequests devices or gifts to the said city of Saco for hospital purposes. Members shall be appointed by the mayor, the City Council confirmation for a term of six years beginning as each concurrent member in 2009 on file with the city clerk, concludes their lifetime term initially with two members being appointed for six years, two members being appointed for four years, and three members being appointed for two years. Vacancies that occur in the Board of Trustees by the death, resignation, or removal from the City of Saco or by failure to qualify as provided under Chapter 15-12 shall be filled in the same manner. The Mayor recommends confirmation of the appointments of Gene Saunders and Joseph Moore's head to the Lucia Kimball Deering Trust Board. Be adored that the city council confirmed the mayor's appointment of Gene Saunders and Joseph Moore's head to the Lucia Kimball Deering Trust Board each for six year terms ending on October 5th 2032. I move to approve the order. Thank you. Motion has been made by Councillor Johnson.
[6:12] Mayor (presiding officer): Is there a second by Councillor Gail? Any discussion or comment on the item? Roll call vote. Councillor Edwards? Yes. Councillor Gay? Yes. Councillor Onan? Yes. Councillor Gail? Yes. Councillor Hewitt? Yes. Councillor Johnston? Yes. Motion passes 6-0. Moving on to what was formerly item A, which is now item B. That is the public hearing renewal application for a special entertainment permit of the Bitterford Soccer Lodge of Elks number 1597, and that is Councillor
[6:47] City Clerk (or staff presenting permit item): Biddeford-Saco, Lodge of Elks, number 1597, have applied for the renewal of the special entertainment permit. The permit will be concurrent with the establishment's liquor license. The applicant has paid all applicable permit fees and the clerk has properly advertised the public hearing in accordance with the Saco City Code, Chapter 93, Entertainment Section 93-2. The clerk has also checked with code enforcement, finance department, fire department, and police department, and there are no concerns. Staff recommends approval. I move to open the public hearing.
[7:25] Mayor (presiding officer): A motion has been made to open the public hearing. Is there a second? Second. Second by Councillor Edwards. Roll call vote. Councillor Edwards? Yes. Councillor Gay? Yes. Councillor Anand? Yes. Councillor Gayle? Yes. Councillor Hewitt? Yes. Councillor Johnston? Yes. Motion passes 6-0 to open the public hearing at 6.37 p.m. If there are any members of the public wishing to speak, please step forward, state your name and address for the record, and you will have three minutes to address the council. Not seeing anyone seeking recognition. Councillor Gay? Yes.
[8:00] City Clerk (or staff presenting permit item): I move to close the public hearing and be it ordered that the City Council grant the renewal application submitted by Biddeford-Saco Lodge of Elks, number 1597, for a special entertainment permit to be concurrent with the establishment's liquor license to expire on November 6, 2027.
[8:19] Mayor (presiding officer): I move to approve the order. Thank you. Motion has been made by Counselor Gay. Is there a second? Second. Second by Counselor Edwards. Discussion or comment on this item?
[8:29] Councilor Hewitt: Counselor Hewitt. I just want to thank the Elks because they frequently allow many charitable organizations to use their facilities throughout the year including Age-Friendly Soco so I fully support this thank you anyone else we'll call vote Councillor Edwards
[8:48] Mayor (presiding officer): Yes, Councillor Gay. Yes, Councillor Anand. Yes, Councillor Gail. Yes, Councillor Hewitt. Yes, Councillor Johnston. Yes. Motion passes 6-0. Moving on to what was formerly item B, which is now item C, and that is the public hearing renewal application for a special entertainment permit, Island Brewing LLC DBA Run-of-the-Mill, and that is Councillor Johnston. Thank
[9:10] Councilor Johnston: you, Madam Mayor. Island Brewing LLC, doing business as Run-of-the-Mill, has applied the renewal of their special entertainment permit. Will be concurrent with the establishment's liquor license. The applicant has paid all applicable permit fees. The clerk has properly advertised the public hearing in accordance with Saco City Code chapter 93 entertainment 93-2. The clerk has also checked with code enforcement, the finance department, fire department, and the police department, and there were no concerns. I moved to open the public hearing. Thank you. Motion has been
[9:42] Mayor (presiding officer): made by Councillor Johnston. Is there a second by Councillor Gay? Roll call vote. Council Edwards? Yes. Councillor Gay? Yes. Councillor Ahnen? Yes. Councillor Gail? Yes. Councillor Hewitt? Yes. Councillor Johnston? Yes. Motion to open the public hearing at 6:39 passes 6-0. If there are any members of the public wishing to speak, please step forward, state your name and address for the record, and you will have three minutes to address the council. Not seeing anyone, sinking recognition.
[10:13] Councilor Johnston: Council Johnston. I move to close the public hearing. Would be adored that the city council grant the renewal application submitted by Allen Brewing LLC doing business as Run of the Mill for a special entertainment permit to be concurrent with the establishment's liquor license to expire on October 8th, 2027. I move to approve the order. Thank you. Motion has been made by Councillor
New Business
[10:33] Mayor (presiding officer): Councillor Johnston, is there a second? Second. Second by Councillor Onan. Comment or discussion on this item? We'll call vote. Councillor Edwards? Yes. Councillor Gay? Yes. Councillor Onan? Yes. Councillor Gale? Yes. Councillor Hewitt? Yes. Councillor Johnston? Yes. Motion passes 6-0. Okay, that completes the action items for this evening. Moving on to item 10 under new business is more discussion and conversation regarding the Pepo Park redesign. Design, we do have with us Director Summers for any questions or comments that we have.
[11:10] Speaker E (unidentified): I think we do have a presentation also. Good.
[11:27] Ryan (park designer/consultant): Evening again. Thank you for allowing us to come talk about Pepo Park, to answer any questions that you might have, and begin to really have a dialogue about the design that we're looking for, what council is looking for, how we're going to cover the cost, and moving in the direction of going after federal dollars and federal grants and so forth. Todd Richardson is with me to talk a little bit more about the designs, a little more in details, and then answer any questions again you might have throughout this process. I appreciate your time. Thank
[12:17] Park design consultant (presenter): you. I realized that our last meeting a lot was put in front of you in a very short period of time, so we're pleased to be back to dive in a little deeper and take any questions as Ryan indicated. I think the focus for this evening is really questions and answers in regards to the three different alternatives, in terms of what I have prepared this evening, I brought forward the three different options, which I understand are in your packet. And also, I have a summary slide that indicates the anticipated range of investment for each of the three options. It looks like you have the full packet that includes last, the presentation from the previous meeting that we had together. I have that presentation on my laptop as well if that's helpful. We can dive into specific pieces of that previous presentation if you want to move specifically to some questions there, or you wanted to talk specifically about the three different options. Counselors, do you need a rundown
[13:31] Mayor (presiding officer): on the options again, or now having a couple of weeks to go over the items? Let's start off with some basic questions.
[13:42] Councilor Johnston: Councilor Johnston. Just for the benefit of the public, I think if we could have a brief explanation again of the three plans that might be helpful for anybody that wasn't watching the prior meeting.
[13:52] Park design consultant (presenter): Okay. Great. I'll attempt to give an overview. I think what I'm going to do is go to the last page of my presentation, which talks about the level of investment for each. So as I go through these, you have that in mind. So you may or may not recall from the previous presentation that there was a lot of work done with the committee to come forward with the three alternatives, and there was a unanimous agreement amongst the committee members that these three felt the most promising to bring forward. There was also a recommendation that the committee put forward for plan one, and it was emphasized that wasn't unanimous. There was a lot of discussion, but clearly the vote was in favor of plan one is the recommended plan coming from the committee. So the plan one, which I'll go back to in just a minute, the anticipated range of cost for that is between six and nine million dollars. Plan two, 4.5 to seven, and plan three, 3.5 to five. And so you might very well be asking, and rightfully so, what is that range about? And the answer to that, which isn't very specific, is that this is a master planning stage, and so in looking at developing the costs, certain decisions were made about scaling things back, substituting materials, eliminating a few things to come up with the different strategies for the plans. It is a master plan, so as further work is developed, the estimated magnitude of cost will get more and more specific. So that's why there's a range in those numbers, is because of the level of planning that's currently taking place. So here's Option 1. One of the primary differences between Option 1 and 2 is that Option 1 includes higher quality materials or more expensive materials might be the way of saying it, and then elements within the plan are suggested if they're full intention. So by example, the pond in option one is larger than the pond in option two. So if we want to make something less expensive, making it smaller but still including it and still doing it properly was a strategy there. So would it be helpful for me to go through the overall elements of each of the plans, or to focus on the differences between the plans? It might be helpful to go through the plan Option 1, because that sets the context for the reductions in Plan 2, and then I think provides the ability to understand Option 3 pretty easily. So I'll go through that quickly. Specifically proposed in the plan is a through-road here connecting School Street to Route 9, Beach Street, and that includes a two-way drop-off and parking area here, and then one-way circulation moving up and through the park. There's parallel parking along the roadway here. here. This is a multi-purpose path coming along that roadway that's coming up and into the park. There's a secondary parking over here by the church up at this particular location for people that might be coming from a different route from coming from town. I'll walk us through these numbers. In this particular option, the dog park that exists now, the proposal is to not only enlarge it, but enhance it. I talked about the road layout. Here's the pond. The pond includes a fountain that would be nice to look at, but also provide aeration to the pond and some white noise in and around the pond area. Area 4 is a lobe of the pond. It's more natural. 13, while I'm talking about the pond, is a footbridge. It spans over that connection there. Five here is a pavilion that's located adjacent to the pond obviously. That includes a restroom. This particular option there are two restrooms that are proposed. One is in this location five associated with that pavilion and another one is a separate one located over here where number nine is. And the reason for that is because there are other activities in the vicinity of nine that are worth noting. Seven is what we're calling a green amphitheater, so don't think Red Rocks in Colorado, but think a more diminutive setting with trees in the middle of it. The hope is that it would be a terrific place to be when there isn't a performance, and when there is a performance, it would be an appropriate setting for a relatively modest performance. There eight is a pond side either performance area or gathering space, so the rectangle here could be a temporary stage that's set up, and then there's proposed to have seating adjacent to the pond in that location there. 12 is a picnic area. 6 is a playground area right there. 10 up here, there is a stone tower that is at the top of the hill, if you've been in the park behind the school. And what we propose here is some very small gathering spaces on the front and back of that. This is the upper areas intend to be much more passive and quiet, and as was mentioned and articulated well in the previous presentation, this is the burial ground in this zone of the site right here. And then finally, this would be a labyrinth, and that has been discussed with the UU Church as a possible collaboration for a space behind the church in that location. Another thing to note is in terms of Beach Street, the idea would be that there would be crosswalks at key locations bringing visitors into the park, and there would be a boulevard treatment of Beach Street as proposed so that as you come along Beach Street, for whatever reason you're on there, as you come through this section of the city, it would feel like you're coming through a place that feels more like a park than just a continuation of Beach Street as it exists north and south. So that's an overview of those things that are included. You can see there's an indication of a lot of vegetation. Much of that is indicative of trees that exist and other areas where there would be proposed vegetation, but the park would have a lot of shade trees and low shrubs for safety throughout. Finally, before I leave this, 14 up here is a maintenance and storage facility that has access through here on the very edge of the park there. There are a lot of walking paths. I don't need to show all of them to you, but those are indicated pretty self-evidently in terms of this line work that's here. So there's an inner pathway around the pond. There's a secondary loop here. And then there's a loop that brings you up the hill by the tower and back down. And then a longer, larger loop that brings you all the way up towards the church and the parking lot and then loops down towards the roadway that would come through there providing different walking opportunities for those that wanted to walk or run or snowshoe or maybe even cross-country skiing in the park so that's the first option the recommended one and the greatest level of investment I just add one thing this may
[22:18] Councilor Johnston: have been mentioned in the last meeting I don't recall but I think it's important to point out that both the current entrance that comes off of the Park Street the top of the park and the entrance or I should say road for Pond Street would be closed to mobile vehicle traffic. Want to point that out. So under this plan it's a it's a School Street out to Beach you would no longer have that cut through down Pond out to James which was discussed quite a bit during this process. Yeah the
[22:58] Park design consultant (presenter): Goal was, and I'll just sort of paraphrase, was not to push traffic for the park through the neighborhoods, and then in terms of the unfortunate need of emergency vehicles getting in and through into the park coming through those neighborhoods, just turning radii aren't there and things like that. So this establishes a pretty convenient way for any needs along those lines to get to and into the park.
[23:29] Mayor (presiding officer): Any questions at this time?
[23:34] Councilor Arnott: Councilor Arnott? A couple questions. When we were talking about the amphitheater and the cost difference between options one and two, what's the capacity, estimated capacity of the amphitheater for option one versus the capacity for option two?
[23:47] Park design consultant (presenter): Yeah, I think we have a overall square footage. Let's see, the green amphitheater in two, we had a 20% reduction in there. I don't think that the amphitheater really holds more than a few hundred people.
[24:03] Councilor Arnott: So we've not actually done a number on this?
[24:05] Park design consultant (presenter): No, we have not calculated the specific number of seats in the amphitheater at this point.
[24:12] Councilor Arnott: So how do you do the estimate of cost reduction of 20% of something you don't know? Well, it's not... I'm not being flip. I'm just trying to... No, I can answer you honestly.
[24:23] Park design consultant (presenter): It's not the number of people that is going to increase the cost or not. It's going to be the physical seats and the infrastructure. So we drew it, we measured the length of those benches, and then determined what those might be made of, put a cost per linear foot of those, and then we said, okay, we can make that amphitheater 20% smaller, and therefore we cut the cost by 20%.
[24:45] Councilor Arnott: So there are physical structures, there are seating structures for the amphitheater? Absolutely. Okay, all right, great. And then there's a walk between pond option one and pond option two. What's the reduction in size? What is the size of the pond to start in option one? What is the size of the pond and its natural pond in option two?
[25:04] Park design consultant (presenter): 1.3 acres in one, and it has the fountain and a water interaction area, which is shown right here. And then it reduces down to one acre in option two, includes a fountain, but does not include the water interaction area. Councillor Gail.
[25:25] Councilor (questioning pond bridge/playground costs): Thank you, Mayor. Following up on the pond discussion, I'm just curious, on the pond bridge, if I'm reading the chart, it looks like there's a pretty big variance between $75,000 and $500,000. I'm curious, is that based on the amenities of the bridge or if it's a culvert versus
[25:50] Park design consultant (presenter): the... So the number for option one, I'm not looking at the same sheet you are, is what?
[25:56] Councilor (questioning pond bridge/playground costs): For both, oh, for one is 75 to 500,000 for Pond Bridge, and then option two is 75,000 to 250,000.
[26:07] Park design consultant (presenter): Yeah, so we generally looked at the materials of the bridge, stone versus wood, and we also looked at a flat bridge versus an arch bridge, and stone arch is going to be a different thing than flat wood, so we put a range to both of those. And I think as I listen to the questions, which are all really terrific, by the way, that as we move into the development of this, those are the types of decisions that we can put our hand on the rudder and make, like the bridge could be a simpler bridge, and the way that things are developed here is that they're kind of bundled and packaged with a series of related decisions about what's included, what size it is, and what material is made of. So I'm trying my best to answer the very specific questions, but overall the way that it was approached was how do we come back to you with three options that the committee really felt good about that had different levels of investment, and that's how we got there.
[27:13] Mayor (presiding officer): So that's kind of the, so if you were to say we really like option one but we don't want to spend $9 million, we want to stay on the lower end, we would make sure that everything in option one was included, but materials, small sizing, those are the types of things that we can limit. But you say, no, we want every single thing that you have listed in option one. That's where that range, correct me if I'm wrong, Todd? And that's where it's going to come down to, what materials are we using, certain sizes.
[27:43] Park design consultant (presenter): And I'll say, personally, there's a lot of choices in terms of managing the overall cost, even if you took the highest level option, that could result in something terrific. But an example would be you could do it with granite pavers and you could do it with concrete pavers. There's a significant difference between the two. Both are going to be terrific. Granite would be a traditional New England material, exceptionally high quality, but that would just be one example of how those different choices could be made. And I think that was a repeated theme working with the committee is that we can break it out and create the underpinnings of how we broke it out, but that doesn't mean it's this way, that way, or the other way. So happy to entertain additional questions, and if there are particular line items that there's a sentiment that we would want to reduce that specific one, or as the mayor had indicated, you know, maybe you like a particular approach and what's included, but you want it to be on the lower end of that budget, we would work to do just that. Thank you, mayor. Let me pose it, let
[28:49] Councilor Arnott: me pose this question a different way. Have we identified in the project plan elements that once they're started can't be changed, and elements that once they're started could potentially be adjusted? For example, if you're beginning to build the park and you're starting to build the amphitheater and suddenly you're coming up short a half a million dollars, you don't buy the extra our own seats. Have we identified those elements of the design where you hold them in reserve to make those calls as necessary as you go through this process over time, as budgets begin to actually flesh out, as dollars actually start to come together, as inflation starts to kick in? Have we started to make that list from these master plans of those elements that are variable, that can be played with, right, as you move through the project? For example, once you, Once you've cut the road, the road's cut. There are certain elements of this where you go, if I do it, I'm done. I can't change this.
[29:45] Ryan (park designer/consultant): I think the biggest question is, at the end of the day, once you go, where can you pull back if you had to or move forward? Really at the end of the day, the pond is something that if you put forward, you're not going to go back after. It's a one-shot deal. You're going to have that pond. The size you're going to go with, you're not going to pull back. Your pieces that you can potentially pull back would be your bathrooms. Instead of saying to you can do one first, Stop the second, or have a second location out of the water sewer line run there, but not build the bathroom, But eventually you can do it. Playgrounds another one, again, you can do a playground, and playgrounds of one of those things We could be twenty five thirty thousand dollars to two hundred fifty thousand dollars, all depending on the size, the handicap accessibility, the material that you put down on the ground. And those are numbers that begin to play that you can expand those later. So when you begin to get tight, those would be the playground would be something I would pull back for a short period of time. A trail, something that you can continue to pull back in one of those trail systems. The bridge would be something that would probably be at the end, I would assume, you built. So again, if you're looking at materials and you're coming short, okay, so you're not can go with a granite bridge you're going to go more with a bridge that you can find the entry afford but your part of your three biggest scenes that you're going to go right out the gate will be the amphitheater your pond area and the road those are your three that you'll come out of the gates this is what we've decided to go with everything else we can kind of play along once we get there thank you Counselor.
[31:25] City Clerk (or staff presenting permit item): Gay and then Counselor Edwards. Yes, thank you. So I have a question that I think involves either of the options or all three of the options, and my concern has been protection of the cemetery, and that's there. So I haven't seen a survey. I know we talked last time about getting that the cemetery area fenced, yes. So I don't know where that fence would lie, but there is, you know, a path that is being added to that area that cuts through it, and then the labyrinth, which would be accessible from that. So I have some concern and question about the impact that might have on the cemetery area. So when you go up to the cemetery right now
[32:11] Ryan (park designer/consultant): And you'll see granite like four by fours that outlines where the cemetery is truly passing. So when I had Bob Perry come out with topographics, we did 10 feet on both sides of those granite posts where the cemetery was. And I can tell you that the cemetery lies within those concrete posts, those granite posts that are there. So that right now where the post is today will be where your fence line will probably go down. The outback, if you walk back in the cemetery now down by the fence over by High Street, there is a path that's already there that's been created over the years by looking of it looks like cars used to drive back there used to be the horse buggy they used to drive back there is a section that i did have again bob make sure in that section that there was there was no one buried in that section pretty much where the path is right now that's where we'll run that path out back so there would be a Small path that would take you back behind the cemetery over to the labyrinth, and then if you notice the path does not go back into the front of the cemetery, it would actually come down along the walkway along the road front on the front side of where the barrier grounds are today.
[33:28] City Clerk (or staff presenting permit item): Is it possible to add the fence to this plan so it can actually see that?
[33:34] Ryan (park designer/consultant): I don't see put a fence on the plan so I absolutely there'll be as you kind of graph that out a fence where the fence would be along, yes, the question is could there be a fence
[33:49] City Clerk (or staff presenting permit item): around the cemetery to the plan I've been I understand that there will be a
[33:54] Park design consultant (presenter): fence so okay and I'm sorry is that the existing fence or a new fence around a
[34:03] City Clerk (or staff presenting permit item): new fence so right now it's not fenced around the cemetery but my understanding is that it will be fenced as part of this to keep traffic away from the
[34:13] Park design consultant (presenter): burial sites there well there's been a variety of viewpoints about that public Cemeteries are public accessible, so we can keep people out of it if we want, but I guess we'd want to talk about that. Yeah.
[34:27] City Clerk (or staff presenting permit item): So I don't think the idea is to necessarily keep people out of there, is to protect the existing grave sites from, if there's going to be a lot of activity going on there, and a lot of people, and a lot of kids, and a lot of things going on, to make everybody aware that this is a cemetery. Yes, you can walk through it, but it's not the same as the rest of the park is.
[34:46] Mayor (presiding officer): Yeah because currently it's previously open so when people are there you know playing sports if something they're not realizing so it's all the open area yeah up by the tower possibly having an entrance point but basically providing a boundary okay that shows where the boundary lines are like to counselor's point not keeping people out but letting people know hey there is a very specific boundary mark and one of the things we had discussed with the committee was whether it would be an actual fence or more of a natural boundary you know depending on the improvements to the tower and we did talk about not putting as much improvement on the cemetery side of the tower because we don't want to draw people if there were an event in the amphitheater we don't want people kind of overlapping across to the other side, keeping the benches more on the north side of the tower. Right. Yes. Not that they can't go in and sit, but again, we don't want to encourage activity, large activity, playing sports, that kind of stuff.
[35:56] City Clerk (or staff presenting permit item): Which is one other comment on option one, that the seating on the cemetery side as well.
[36:06] Park design consultant (presenter): So, just so I'm clear, there would be a fence with gates in it where you could come into the burial area? Is that what's sort of being requested or?
[36:15] Mayor (presiding officer): Not necessarily a gate. Again, yeah. Sorry.
[36:24] Ryan (park designer/consultant): Okay. Is that right? You're just looking for them to put a fence on the gland just so you can kind of see it?
[36:31] City Clerk (or staff presenting permit item): So you can see it, and so people, again, if there's activities and things at the amphitheater that people and kids aren't just running through there without respecting the fact that there's a cemetery. Okay.
[36:42] Mayor (presiding officer): And again, we've talked about either a natural boundary, whether it would be bushes versus a hard wire fence, depending on how the scape of the area, definitely a boundary marker.
[37:01] Councilor Edwards: Councillor Edwards. Thank you, Mayor. So, hi. I have several questions. One, I'm, I don't, I haven't had the experience of participating in creating a park, so I'm assuming that this park creation will, after the destruction of the Fairfield school, will take, could take up to a year. Am I, or was there any thought about how long it would take? And within that, I was, sounded like based on what you were saying that it would be done in stages. Well,
[37:41] Park design consultant (presenter): I think Ryan can
[37:43] Ryan (park designer/consultant): address that. So to be honest with you, it won't be done in stages. Okay. If it, fine air she comes out of gate to my goals to do it and one fell swoop, great. It kind of, kind of take it all in and move on after that. In the sense of a, the time frame, I think because it's more of an earth project and not so much of a construction project, I don't see it taking a long time in the sense of bringing it to fruition. The more turf you have to grow, you know, the, it's going to take about a year for turf to grow in once you, once you kind of get it going, trees and all that, I would assume probably a 12 to 14 month from the time we tear down the school to build in and out. Awesome. Be a pretty close assumption. Thanks. Okay. Here's
[38:28] Councilor Edwards: Here's another question, so the restrooms, I'm assuming that they would be multi-stall, were they going to be unisex or like male, female, or will they be kind of like the stalls that are at Bayview, for example?
[38:44] Ryan (park designer/consultant): So those are the questions we're still kind of working out. I'm that person, it's easier to have single stalls, it takes away a lot of the headaches, a lot of the issues. At that point, they're unisex, you can kind of make it that, but it takes away having multiple people go into a bathroom that people just don't know. It's just cleaner, safer, it just makes things a little bit easier. Cool.
[39:06] Councilor Edwards: And the last question I have currently is around parking, actually it's two part. One, will there be parking protection for the church, particularly, or will there be some cooperation and maybe modification of the church's parking current parking in consideration of like events and things and when there is a large event and I'm being hopeful a lot of people will come to the park looking at the parking on the plans I don't know if there's enough parking for a large event and I'm wondering where that parking overflow will be how much will the
[39:47] Ryan (park designer/consultant): neighborhoods be impacted well that's that's a good question so thank you with the u church one of the reasons we are we are looking to put a parking lot up by the u church is for their services and during the sunday mass and so forth a lot of the expectation is we won't plan on a sunday morning just because we know they'll be utilizing it i can't always guarantee that but at the end of the day that would be that would be taken into consideration So the Plan 1 has 80 to 90 parking spots. And so you're right. On an event that could see, let's hypothetically speak, we're going to have a movie in the park night. We're going to have some food trucks. We're going to use the amphitheater. You would expect more than 250 people in there. So parking would begin to flow into neighborhoods. hoods with that said though with burn school the way it's located the superintendent's office where super where it's located that will absorb a lot of the parking that would be put on the street because you're not very far from walking great so at that point and with the design of this memorial park becomes part of papua park in the sense of the proximity to one another great thank you
[41:09] Councilor Hewitt: councilor hugh and then johnston a few quick questions do these prices include the cost of the demo and have we found out what that cost would be so the answer is no it does not include
[41:20] Ryan (park designer/consultant): The cost of the demo, I am waiting before I get it wrong. I've talked to Director Roth. I'm waiting for the report called the your hair report, A-H-E-R-A, that reports for all the schools that were built before a certain time, that talks about all the chemicals that are in the schools. Once I get the report, I have reached out to a company called Mill City Environmental at Worcester, Mass, per conversation with one of my advisory board members who knew somebody down there, just to get an estimate, but once I get the report, this gentleman is willing to take a look at the report to give me an estimate of what the abatement will cost, not what the teardown of the building, but what the abatement will cost. Once I have that, I will be able to answer that question more clearly than what I can
[42:10] Councilor Hewitt: today. Okay, and then for the three different options, do we know, and I know it's a rough estimate, do you have a projection, a rough estimate for what the maintenance and care of these parks would cost annually?
[42:24] Ryan (park designer/consultant): So ideally, a rough estimate right off the back, it's going to be pretty much a full-time staff, but that full-time staff will be not just associated with Pepperoa Park, but it's going to be also required when the new school comes online too, because we're inheriting that 65, 70 acres. So really that person between those two pieces of property would be the person who's gonna be mowing it, maintaining it. This park would take more in the sense of staff because of beautification, so now a lot of the plans is to go more natural and not as much flowers, and again, we really want to take some of the beautification off it. We are very good with maintenance, just because what we have for staff, beautification becomes that much harder to do. You're looking at least a full-time staff member, but that will also be part of that requirement come to school. The equipment that we have, the zero-term mowers, the most, we have all that. Hopefully we'll be able to team up, maybe at tops a staff and a half, but the half person would be a whole cultures, so it won't be a maintenance, they'll be required not just for this part, for beautification, but really beautification throughout the city at that point during the pretty much from April through October. So and then you got plumbing, so you got water, you got electricity, you're gonna have making sure that the ducks and the geese don't hang out in the in the pond, so you're really trying to work those issues out and so forth. If you're asking about a number, it's more Staff, you're probably looking at 100, 120,000, okay, and it doesn't vary from option one
[44:00] Councilor Hewitt: to option three, it really doesn't, it's the same square footage, okay. My last question has anybody contemplated if we do put the boulevard in on Beach Street, which I do like the idea, it's going to slow things down, right, but as far as plowing and maintenance, have we talked to them to see what the inconvenience or cost for them would be if we did something like that? So really what
[44:20] Ryan (park designer/consultant): what will happen once you put the boulevard in is you eliminate on-street parking on B Street, so instead of making the street wider, what you're doing is you're putting the boulevard in there, you're having that path, so maintenance of it, the plow will still get down, so still one swipe up, one swipe back, you're just eliminating the on-street parking and to allow for safer crossing as you cross B Street from Memorial Park to Pepero Park because you'll have that safety intersection safety zone with the boulevard in there. Thank you, Councilor Johnson. Thank you.
[44:55] Councilor Johnston: I want to go back to Councilor Gay's comments and I hadn't originally intended to bring this up at this point, but it's probably an opportune time, again this is for council or to kind of to think over. I think there's been a question about where exactly the graves are or the burials are in that part for many years, to be honest, some data points say one thing, there's maps that say one thing, the during this process, you know, as Director Summer said, we did do ground penetrating radar of what most you know visually appears to be the graveyard, there was concerns with the dog park that came up, we've done that, but I would advocate the council that before we do anything we do all of that area, which again that's probably outside of the parks current budget, which is why I'm directing it at council. I wouldn't be comfortable moving forward with anything until we are 100% positive. We're not building on top of burials. So I'd throw that out here now. I mean, it seems like a pretty simple process, but it might be an opportunity to do it this fall.
[46:16] Ryan (park designer/consultant): You're probably looking closer into the spring now. I can see if Bob will be coming out. Again, when we talk about Bob, he's a 78-year-old wonderful man who's retired that I keep reeling him back in to help us. But he can pretty much give you a good eye of where people are located. For me, I knew I wasn't going to touch the inside of the park, so I was just concerned exactly where the boundary line was and to ensure that I had the capabilities to put in the path on the backside of the cemetery to make sure that I can go from the lower part of the Peppermint Park to the UU Church in the upper part.
[46:52] Councilor Johnston: Yeah, so I just want to be clear. I'm not saying the entirety of the park, but my concern is actually onto the left side of what we call the cemetery grounds today. I have several maps that show that burials at one point existed all the way up to the backside of the UU Church and where we're potentially putting a parking lot. I don't know if they're there. I mean, I have historical documents that say they may have been moved, but I haven't been able to find council minutes and this is a great opportunity to partner with the library as far as council minutes that voted to actually move the bodies i know that a legislative act did occur that authorized the city of soccer to move bodies i don't know if it ever happened so i just think we need to rule that out for the rest of that area before we if i may i can guarantee you there
[47:49] Ryan (park designer/consultant): there's no barriers where the parking lot's going to be, where the next U Church is. I had Bob come up because, again, the historian wanted me to find the old Thornton Academy that was burnt down in the early 1800s. I'm pretty sure I found the foundation. We've done a couple of test pits in it. We've got a couple more coming up this Thursday to know exactly where that foundation was. But in the sense of right where the parking lot is, there is no burials on that site as well.
[48:21] Mayor (presiding officer): And to Councilor Johnston's point, when Laurel Hill Cemetery was created, a lot of the more affluent members of the community moved their bodies of loved ones to Laurel Hill. That's why there's a lot of confusion, because they may have originally been there and they've all been moved over the years and transitioned keeping the records up to date after that. So a lot of them were transitioned moved over to Laurelville. Yeah, like I said at
[48:48] Councilor Johnston: One point it was over 600 and some were moved, but there was back in 1860s through 1880s, before the current well, it's not the current, but the original park was built, there was some concerns throughout the community at council level about what to do, and there was a legislative act I think it was in the 1890s that from the state that authorized the city to move the bodies that were didn't have loved ones that had moved them, like I said, I haven't found any documentation that says that those bodies were moved, so I think that's why there's still some concerns about where some of those bodies may still be, but again this was an issue back in the 1960s when they built Fairfield, it was a very sore subject from some long-standing members of the community, and I'd like to avoid that going forward when we have the opportunity, so thank you. Were there any
[49:48] Mayor (presiding officer): documents done when they, when Fairfield was built, did they do any surveying of the properties? I do
[49:55] Ryan (park designer/consultant): not know. I know I've done a survey with Dal Kulam, my Coulom, so the property's been surveyed on this for us on this, but I would have to go back and talk to the planning board or the planning office to see, or the codes, to see if there was any documentation prior to the early
[50:12] Mayor (presiding officer): 60s when that school was voted in. If I remember correctly, I think the biggest issues were with some of the Indian tribes, descendants of the Indian tribe that was in the area at the time, believing some of the burial area, well, I mean the, not to give the history of it all, I don't
[50:31] Councilor Johnston: on board everybody, but I do know the first burial occurred in 1752, it was Miss Gray, which is what Gray Ave is named after, I don't think that headstone's still there, but so we have burials that date to 1752 and they appear to have occurred through the Civil War period, and Laurel Hill opened in 1844 I believe, so there is potential, but point is I just want to make sure we rule all those up, those potentials out, and know that we have absolutely and council gate
[51:07] Mayor (presiding officer): to that area as well. We've also discussed creating a new monument, we do have some plaques up there but they've been damaged over the years of course, but also taking and recreating the names even whether they had been moved, but were anybody that may have originally, so we have looked at memorializing that area a little bit better as well and recreating some of the structures
[51:31] City Clerk (or staff presenting permit item): If I could just add a little bit to that, working in the history room, I know that the archivist Antol Brown has done a pretty thorough job of determining who perhaps, what remains perhaps still remain there, several hundred more than is on the plaque that exists right now. Correct. And just going on, continue that history lesson. My understanding is that the city was authorized to remove remains but never funded that, so the city never did that. Families came and removed remains, but so that anybody who didn't have families, I couldn't afford to. I had two other questions though. One is, so on the promenade on Beach Street, is there room there for a bike
[52:28] Ryan (park designer/consultant): path going down? So you'll, you'll have the sidewalk. So there will still be room for a bike path on the street? Yes, it just won't be wide enough for parking as well. So you eliminate the parking for a bike path that will allow you to go up
[52:44] City Clerk (or staff presenting permit item): and down. And then just one other question for you, if I could. I think that in the last time we looked at this, you had mentioned that there was some, is there some funding available from LWCF, Land, Water, and Conservation Fund? Okay. I had thought actually from the parks, the money that's collected through the impact fees. The impact fees.
[53:08] Ryan (park designer/consultant): Yep. That is that? Yep. So really, if we, again, one of the conversations is how are we going to fund this park? And there's three options. I'm going to lay them out and kind of hopefully have a direction of where we're going to go from there. That. One option is to bond the park. You know, a couple projects come down the road, you're going to bond them and so forth. However you decide, it's not worth the city to bond a $4 million park, I'll be honest with you. But if you have multiple pieces that you want to put together, that's a conversation at that point to maybe do it. That's option one. Option two would be getting creative. And how we get creative is, again, using impact fees. So every new home that's built in the city of Saco, you have an open space impact fee and you have a recreational impact fee. And for the last eight years or so, I've kind of worked hard to not touch it. We took a deficit into roughly about 1.1,.2 million dollars. So that's kind of what we're sitting with for impact fees combined for open space and recreation. This past year, fiscal year 2027, we put in some money through capital, through TIF money, as well as through capital money, to put into the budget. And then moving forward is asking council if we decide to go plan B, is to go after LWCF funding, which is Manning Water and Conservation Fund. They have a million dollar grant, it's a federal dollar. It puts a restriction even greater than what you have on the park right now. So really, if you accept any LWCF funds, at that point, you cannot touch the park again unless getting approval from the federal government. You can enhance it in the sense of make the pond better, make the trails better, but in the sense of changing the park to what you have it after you agree to it, you have to go back and get permission from doing it. So it's a million dollars, but it comes with some major strings. And then, knowing that this park won't be built for the next two or three years, we will continue to add money in the capital and TIFs as we move forward, because a lot of the infrastructure, the trails, the road, the sewer line, the water lines, all can be paid for through TIFs. And then the rest will become through capital. And really, talking to the city administrator, in the next two or three years, it'll probably be more of a 50 split between tiffs and through capital. The third is a private public scenario where some of it is through public dollars and some of it is through private donations, and really the private donations are naming rights. So you're going to name the pond, you're going to name the amphitheater, you're going to need the playground, you're going to name the hardest thing about private public partnerships and municipalities is there is no tax write-off. We are not a non-profit. So if you give me a dollar, you can't write it off. And that is the hardest thing. We are tax exempt. We are not a non-profit status. So really at the end of the day, if I'm asking for a half million dollars for the name of the pond, that gentleman needs to know he's not going to get a half million dollar tax write-off. He's just it's something out of it. So it becomes hard as a non-profit. It's a little bit easier to maneuver because for every dollar they give you for a donation they can write it off, so that those are the, those are the biggest things for me. Obviously, you know, if you go with the gold, which I know represented as council, the council that is the plan we would like to see, it's up to you. That gets extremely hard for me to fund through one and two, through B and C being, you know, to do grants and don't grant them in capital or through private partner. That would really if you can go with that 's more of a bond question you know six to nine million dollars you throw on the tear down of fairfield school and now you've got a conversation you truly do have a bond question that citizens probably should go for the other two you go with a plan two plan three I can realistically tell you at least what I can see how I can get there to build the park I can find the funding through what we have in place right now through private partner or through go find the money the teardown really is the question more than anything else. That is truly how much is that going to cost, and I'm hoping by the time next time I meet with you I will at least have a number for you that we can begin to discuss that as well. But there will be some grants out there as well to be able to utilize to tear that down, so again it's not a doomsday type of conversation, but you know I just I want you
[57:57] Mayor (presiding officer): to have that number before we have that conversation. So the next time we bring this back to council would be a vote for approval on the plan, yes, and or you can add in a cost variance to we want plan this with a maximum cost of that. Then once you have that you will be able to start the price estimates, starting to narrow down products. Next time you come to council you'll be bringing that information so
[58:26] Ryan (park designer/consultant): once we come back and say okay Ryan you have read if you said you can go with plan one, plan one, at that point it allows me to go and begin to create an RFP for engineering for the, for the property. It'll be, so again about a 50, 75 and 100, that will begin to look at materials, we'll begin to look at you know what the cost is to bring in the water line, sewer line, move those around, drainages, true cost, what the pond is, so that would begin to really begin to narrow the cost as well as material so you Know, Ryan, we want six million dollars, and then the money is running high. Let's just say you're running nine million dollars, but you said you wanted six. That's when you start playing around with, okay, well, we can't afford that, we're going to shrink this, we're going to use this different type of materials and so forth. So it really is a direction kind of cost, the directions it allows me to go on to the second page, which is the engineering side of it.
[59:21] Councilor Johnston: Do you need the cost of the plan before going after the LWCF funds, because any of these plans you'd go after those funds, correct? I just need, so with that authorization to go seek the funds, so that's just process wise in, yes, my mind that's what I was thinking, is that council may say we don't want to do anything. I don't project that, but it may. So to me it would make sense that we authorize moving forward with the LWCF funds, and then we can continue the debate funding process and what your need for that is
[1:00:00] Ryan (park designer/consultant): the plan. So we want plan one. I give you permission to go off and seek federal dollars, not just LWCF, but again other grants out there and so forth that you can see that would fit into this project. It's it's a 50 match, so you know you're already committing if you're going to go after, you're already committed, but you can also utilize the money that we have spent to this point as part of that match. So that is that is there, that will begin, we'll start that process in the next couple months. We have to submit by May of 2027 to be awarded in September of 2027. So they just awarded this year's grant, so having the plan, having a 50 percent build out through engineering will help. They know that this project is about 80% chance of it gonna happen, because again, LWCF doesn't want to type a million dollars knowing that the project might never get off the ground. So by kind of making the engineering side of it push out there to it gives them more faith that the plan would get there. That's
[1:01:11] Councilor (questioning pond bridge/playground costs): okay, thank you, counselor. I'm with you the, and I know you mentioned this the last time you were up, the playground sizes, could you give, so option one was 7 000 in terms of the existing playground at Young School. Could you put that 7 000 or any of the Any of the playgrounds, I guess. Could you put that 7,000 figure in context? Sure.
[1:01:43] Ryan (park designer/consultant): So the playground that you have there right now is probably closer to option three, about 4,900 square feet. So it's really your smallest playground that you're going to get. But, again, it's a sizable playground. I believe we spent probably about $58,000, $60,000, $58,000, $60,000 on it. Yeah. And that's a 5 through 12 playground, more or less. You don't have a two-year-old through five-year-old playground. It's not a small playground for a load of kids to play off of, which is what you want to do. It's not handicap accessible. So you begin to look at that. So the bigger playground allows you to put a couple of those pieces back in there.
[1:02:25] Councilor (questioning pond bridge/playground costs): So it'd be like roughly twice the size. Option three is like roughly twice the size.
[1:02:30] Ryan (park designer/consultant): Probably about $100,000 to $125,000 in playgrounds.
[1:02:35] Councilor (questioning pond bridge/playground costs): And then just also in terms of the, we're talking about like lines on the map, so just to confirm with the bike ped multi-use or multi-purpose path, we did, or I guess this is a question, did we envision bike parking and kind of where and how much was that discussed? Yeah.
[1:02:59] Park design consultant (presenter): I think that's also tied to a question that was brought up earlier about parking. The goal is to have this accessible by a lot of people that might want to walk there and bike there, and so the facilities would be provided for those at multiple locations. When we started the project, we looked at the location of Pepper Park and we drew concentric circles, and there's a standard as to what's walking distance to a park, and it's quite a number of city residents that live close by that don't have larger yards and things like that. So the hope is that by providing those facilities, it will also encourage them, providing safe routes to get there and safety within the park. But yes, there would be facilities
[1:03:40] Councilor (questioning pond bridge/playground costs): for those. Might be nice on other iterations as we move forward just to demarcate that on the, on the map there. Okay, thank
[1:03:55] Councilor Arnott: you, Mayor. Last question that is really mundane, are there industry, is this your standards for the number of bathrooms you should have for an area, and are we compliant with that? Is one bathroom compliant to any kind of code that you would have for a space this size and facilities?
[1:04:17] Park design consultant (presenter): I think there's probably standards that apply and we have not gone to the level of that in terms of designing the restrooms themselves. We've kind of said here's square footage between a more modest one and a more involved one. You know, there's also specific, there's a number of things still to look at in the park in terms of surveillance of the park and safety in the park. So we have not looked at that specifically. There's a number of things that have not been looked at to the level of specificity that they will be looked at. Another example would be traffic engineering. You know, we're redoing a road, a pretty significant one. What are the impacts to School Street, where the impacts to Beach Street? So there's still more study to confirm a lot of the things and determine some of those. So that's a long way of me saying we don't have the specifics on those at this stage. I think my only concern with that is if there is
[1:05:13] Councilor Arnott: standards and it locks you into saying I need to, then the variability of the option of option two isn't there anymore. So I might, my point is simply the sooner you understand that, the more we are confirming the numbers that we have to live with, as in once you cut the road, once you cut the pond, once you cut the amphitheater, you're there.
[1:05:34] Ryan (park designer/consultant): Is just making sure we know that. So and right, once we know the standards, most parks, if you look at most sides of parks, there is no bathrooms. So again, most parks don't have bathrooms and so forth. It's a, it's a luxury, it's not a necessity, especially in parks because there is no buildings. So at the end of the day, I think having one will have multiple bathrooms. When you do events though, you're required because now you're drawing people in. Now you're providing a space that you have. So when events or if you did a movie, a concert night or a movie night, you'll have port-a-parties that will be placed and most likely be placed by round number 14 because again, you don't want them in the center of the park. You want to kind of hit them. Them, so those as events get placed out, order parties will be brought in. So even if you have just a two, a two star, four star, you know, I think that would be adequate for the park on a daily basis. It's when you have the special events that you're going to need to make sure you bring bathrooms, anyone.
[1:06:37] Councilor Hewitt: Else, Councilor Hewitt, I think the design is great. I love the location, but I do have to say that after hearing from constituents after the most recent tax bills, that they are looking for us to be more fiscally conservative. And given the big capital projects we have, both schools, the wastewater treatment, the improvements to the jetty, which a lot of them that we have received federal dollars, but my one hesitancy is this the time for another capital investment?
[1:07:14] Councilor Edwards: Anyone else? Council Edwards. Yeah, I thought about that as well. Though I do live in the hope that the impact, the financial impact, will of this park will also bring visitors, not only Saco residents, but residents from the area. And I would probably say that businesses that sell consumables like food and drink probably should be ready, because after someone spent a day at the park, they might want to take advantage of the local eateries, and that's money that's
[1:07:51] Ryan (park designer/consultant): flowing into Saco. If I may, my biggest concern is when the schools vacate, you can have an empty building there at the end of the day. And one, the building is going to have to come down, you know, because it's just going to be emptied over time. It's just going to be an issue. But once you take the building down, you just haven't just an open pasture or open green space. Yes, it's a parking to be mowed and be maintained and all that, but really it's not going to give a place for people to want to come to. Want to give a place for people to come in and be a part of. So I hear the constituents, because I live in this town and I grew up in this town and all that, with the same thought process. I don't want my taxes going up any more than I have to. Read, I'll be the first one to tell you, but it's an investment, not just for today, but it's an investment 50 years down the road. And if you don't build it today, I really don't believe you're going to build it 50 years down the road, because the cost is just going to continue to go up. I think it's hard to sit there and say is it worth it, when is a good time to actually build this park. So really the conversation I truly have, you know, and maybe it leads you to a bond question, because then they have the right to vote. It is, there is your constituents, it is the community saying yes we want it and no we, or no we don't. And maybe that's where it should go, but again I leave that up to the seven of you, but I think if you don't invest in it, if not now in the Next five years after the school leaves, I really think at that point you're going to begin to wonder what do we
[1:09:22] Mayor (presiding officer): do, what we should have done something different. This is a property owned by the city, and because of the deed restrictions, because of the covenants, it's not a saleable part, but you know we're limited with what we can do with it. And to Director Summers' point, the school's gonna have to come down, you know, it's it's not a building that really can be renovated or refurbished through the years, so the cost that we have to put into it anyway, this is potentially the benefit to outweigh. You're going to leave just an empty parking lot type of situation, what do we do with it and
[1:10:00] Ryan (park designer/consultant): and you can't turn the school into housing just because of the restriction of the deed, so the restriction of the deeds really force your hand on what you can do with this property.
[1:10:10] Councilor Johnston: Council Johnston and Council Gail, thank you. Yeah, I forgot what I was going to say, bring it back. I was just going to say that overall, I mean, as you know, I was a member of this committee, as was the mayor, and full transparency, I'm one of the six votes that was supportive of option one, and I'm happy to, you know, share my feelings on that when the time is appropriate as far as, you know, a vote, but you know that's not really what's before us tonight, but I did want to add that, you know, I certainly share your concerns. I've heard it myself, and I do think this is a community decision, which is why again I support option one. I've, you know, had several discussions with some of my fellow councillors that I, if we're going with that, I do think it should be a bond question, but even outside that, just right now, I think early on in this process we had, you know, we put the survey out, we had a lot of great feedback that really helped craft what you see these three designs, and so I guess my thinking is if it's appropriate, if we have time between now and the next time this becomes with for council, I think it would be good to get another survey out now that the figures are attached, because that public didn't have the benefit of knowing the figures at the time and have the ability to weigh in. I mean, I want to get this right, and I'll just give a quick recent example, you know, school construction bond, during that process there was a lot of thought, I supported it, the idea of adding an auditorium, there's a Thought that there was a need for that in the city of Saco. I fully agreed with that, but as cost came in, you know, that got shaved out, but it really wasn't ever relayed to the public. So I still receive feedback from the public saying, I thought we're getting an auditorium. Like to avoid that, I'd like to say so. An example here, we as a committee cut out the ice pond, or the ability to freeze upon, because it cost nine million dollars, nine to ten million. So we made a decision that was unacceptable, but I know there are still members of the public that want that, even with that cost. So I'd kind of like to hear, you know, if there's appetite for that, because they could always still be added. A lot of people thought, or I shouldn't say a lot, but it, you know, relative to how many people have communicated with me, that was like a key component they thought they were getting, you know, the ability to ice skate there in the winter. But like I said, as a committee, we just said we, that was unacceptable. It may be acceptable at bond. So I just having that feedback in some form of the survey I think would be helpful as we move forward to make the decision. There may be other components. I mean, I advocated for two bathrooms. I think there's a need there if this park, you know, ends up with as many people as I anticipate and hope that will utilize it, and giving the demographics, you know, from all the way to zero on, you know, I might not be the number one clientele for that bathroom, but I have family members that seem to go to the bathroom all the time. So yeah, as you age, that happens, or when you got little ones, you need that. So, you know, that's why I advocated for two. But, you know, having that feedback from the public or things that we've missed, that's the other thing. Maybe there's something that we haven't thought of that we just totally missed that could be, you know, added to the plan. So like I said, if it fits the timeline, if we could have a survey put out from communications to, you know, just get some follow-up with what we've designed, I think that would be
[1:13:54] Ryan (park designer/consultant): helpful for all of us. I'll, I'll take that, and I'll have a conversation with Andrew tomorrow and see if we can create a survey that we can get out. I voted for option two,
[1:14:06] Mayor (presiding officer): went middle of the road, council.
[1:14:10] Councilor (questioning pond bridge/playground costs): Gail, thank you, Mayor. So just following up on that, was kind of where I was going in terms of, you had mentioned there's a, there's a sweet spot for bonding, and it sounds like option one and option two, the high level of option two and the low level of option one, is kind of where we start thinking about bonding. But you know, as we look at the project, we want to do it right, but we want to do it fiscally responsibly. I guess as part of that conversation, in that survey, it'd be helpful for me to understand, when does the benefit of bonding kick in versus going to options B and C? Or do we stretch ourselves too far if we go down one route?
[1:15:03] Ryan (park designer/consultant): So for me, knowing what I can come up with, I'm going to tell you, the benefit of bonding is about $5 million. I can get us to $5 million. After that, it becomes a stretch. It really does. However, I've kind of played it, not to take away from capital projects no going in the future, just kind of, you know, making sure that we can do what we need to do within the city with the vision of this product being built out in the next three years once the school closes, and then you got a couple years up there after that, five and five point two five, you really get, you get to the point that I think, I don't know if I can come up with the money and get creative, that's really your threshold, it's really how far I can get creative with finances moving forward. Just, I like the bond approach
[1:15:50] Councilor (questioning pond bridge/playground costs): too, because it lets the community weigh in, and exactly, but a big part of me also wants to cost a lot, so if we get it under five, it would be helpful to have still have that community or that community buy-in, or just that survey, I think will be an interesting, could be an interesting
[1:16:14] City Clerk (or staff presenting permit item): I just wanted to add with respect to whether we should go forward with the park here at all or not. So over the years, and Councilor Johnston will remember this as well, the city has expended funds doing a lot of planning and comprehensive planning. And one of the things that consistently came up was that Saco doesn't have an area, a gathering place to have music and festivals and to invite people from not from Saco to come and take part in some of those festivities, so the idea of a central park, gathering place, music place, location like this has actually been something that Saco has talked about and planned for since at least the 2011 comprehensive plan update, any
[1:17:13] Mayor (presiding officer): Last thoughts, questions. Okay, so we will be bringing this back in a couple of weeks for one last discussion and potential vote on either a one of the plans if council chooses to go forward with the park project. So moving forward, I'll reach out to Bob.
[1:17:39] Ryan (park designer/consultant): Perry to see if I can get him up and do the burial grounds to kind of know where people are buried. I'll reach out to Andrew about doing a survey. Probably going to do it, so I'll probably push this off the next time we meet, probably in a month. We'll probably do it like we did the survey the last time, it was a three-week survey that we sent out to the public, so we'll kind of do that. Hopefully by that point I'll have also the documentation that I need from the school department from Director Roth to have at least a number of what potentially could cost you to remove field school. So my guess is if it's okay with the city administrator and the mayor, probably come back to you in a month with all the pieces that you've asked me for tonight.
[1:18:20] Mayor (presiding officer): And I would like to note out that our meetings with the park committee are open. We meet the third Wednesday of each month right here in city hall at the chambers, so you're all invited as well as the public as we go through this process. So you don't have to sit and wait for a council meeting, you can come and hear the ideas and suggestions that are coming out and invoice some of your own at that time as well, and again so open to council members as well as the public as we continue this process. Forward, thank.
[1:18:51] Ryan (park designer/consultant): You for your time, I greatly appreciate it. Thank.
[1:18:55] Mayor (presiding officer): You, thank you Todd. Okay, that completes the new business item for the evening. Moving on to item 11, administrative update, City Administrator Pelletier. Thank you mayor, just a reminder.
[1:19:11] Speaker E (unidentified): A reminder that Saco Public Works crews will be paving Gooch Street that started this week, which leads to the Saco Transportation Centre. Paving is expected to take one day and the road will be down to one lane of flagged alternating traffic while work is underway. Community members who plan to use the bus or train at the Saco Transportation Centre should plan for potential delays that may be caused by the paving. Also, the Public Works will be surface paving Beach Street beginning at Middle Street, extending Tending to Old Orchard Beach also this week. This section of Beach Street will be down to one lane of flagged alternating traffic. Travelers should expect delays and plan an alternate route while work is underway. The Cascade Falls parking lot paving project, that will happen on Thursday, October 8. The lot will be closed for paving. Parking lot is scheduled to reopen on Friday, October 9. Just a reminder that Saco does have a swap shop, which reduces waste and provides community benefit by allowing residents to give away what they don't need and pick up something that they do all for free. The swap shop is located at the transfer station 24 Foss Road and is for Socko residents only. Transfer station hours are Tuesday through Saturday from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. And a detailed list of acceptable and prohibitive items can be found at Socko main org front slash transfer station. A couple seasonal beach reminders, the bathrooms, the beach bathrooms located at Bayview Beach and the Camp Ellis Pier will close for the season next Tuesday, October 13th. Beach accessibility mats at Bayview and Camp Ellis have been removed early for the season due to the recent nor'easter. The beach mats will be reinstalled in the spring. And a reminder that starting October 1st through March 31st, dogs may be off leash on Saco's beaches if they are under voice and site control. Dogs must be on a leash while entering or exiting vehicles at the beach and while the beach may be less busy and warm this time of year there's plenty of beauty to experience on Socos coastline even in the offseason. Learn more on our website at Socomaine.org front slash beaches. Also absentee ballots will be available starting today for the November election. In person absentee voting has begun here at the City Hall auditorium. Election day voting will be at Thornton Academy's Lindell Gymnasium at 438 Main Street on November 3rd from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. You can learn more on our website, including details on how to submit an absentee ballot application online at sacomaine.org front slash elections. And a reminder that we have closure next Monday, October 12th, City Hall, in observance of Indigenous Peoples Day. Upcoming council meetings are October 19, October 26, and November 2nd.
[1:22:00] Mayor (presiding officer): Thank you. Any questions or comments for the city administrator? Councilor Hewitt?
[1:22:06] Councilor Hewitt: I just want to say thank you for the new, if you haven't gotten it in your mail, check it out, the City Spotlight, the print edition that came out. I found it really informative, and thank you to our city manager and any staff that did it. It was really helpful.
[1:22:23] Speaker E (unidentified): Thank you. All credit to the communications department on that one.
[1:22:27] Mayor (presiding officer): Anyone else? Okay, moving on to item 12, council discussion and comment.
[1:22:32] Councilor (questioning pond bridge/playground costs): Any counselors wishing to share anything? Counselor Gail. Thank you, Mayor. I apologize I was a little slow on, I wanted to discuss just really quickly my vote on the appointments and kind of my thought process on that and the change of, just I view it important that a quorum is able to be held with the trust so the members that were appointed will help in facilitating that, and I also just want to make it clear that there's from my perspective this is just the beginning of a new chapter in the relationship with the trust, and I hope that we're moving forward. Some of these issues that have been brought up are going to be addressed as we move forward with a new board and one that will be able to meet and hold their meetings. Thank you.
[1:23:30] Mayor (presiding officer): Thank you. Anyone else? Okay, moving on to item 13, that is executive session. Is there a motion? So moved. I'm going to read it. Council Ronin document
[1:23:46] Councilor Arnott: be it ordered to the city council enter into executive session pursuant to mrs a title 1 chapter 13 sub chapter 1 section 4056 real estate economic development dash 12 School Street thank
[1:24:02] Mayor (presiding officer): you. Motion has been made by Councillor Arnen. Is there a second by Councillor Edwards? Roll call vote. Councillor Edwards? Yes. Councillor Gay? Yes. Councillor Arnen? Yes. Councillor Gale? Yes. Councillor Hewitt? Yes. Councillor Johnston? Yes. Motion to enter into executive session passes 6-0 at 7:54, and we will be meeting in the city administrator's office. Okay, welcome back everyone. Is there a motion to exit executive session? So moved. Motion made by Councillor Ahnen. Is there a second by Councillor Hewitt? Roll call vote. Councillor Edwards? Yes. Councillor Gay? Yes. Councillor Ahnen? Yes. Councillor Gail? Yes. Councillor Hewitt? Yes. Councillor Johnston? Yes. Motion to exit executive session passes 6-0 at 8:18. Councillor Arnon, is there a report? No report. No report, Madam Mayor. Thank you. Item 15 is a motion to adjourn. Is there a motion? So moved. Motion made by Councillor Edwards, second by Councillor Hewitt. Okay, Councillor Gay, roll call vote. Councillor Edwards? Yes. Councillor Gay? Yes. Councillor Onan? Yes. Councillor Gail? Yes. Councillor Hewitt? Yes. Councillor Johnston? Yes. Motion to adjourn passes is six zero at 818 and thank you everyone and have a great evening.