PHOTOS: Youth active in sports in central Maine

League champions

The Palermo Consolidated School’s middle school soccer team beat St. Michael’s School in a 2-0 win for the championship.  They had a 9-0-1 record for the season.  They end the season with a great appreciation for their coach, Dick Reitchel.  Dick Reitchel has been the soccer coach for Palermo School for eight years and also coaches and helps run the Palermo Youth Athletics (PYA) program. (photo courtesy of Stephanie Oliphant)

PAL Senior League champs

The Clinton Lions were crowned champions of the PAL senior league. Front row, from left to right, Colt Robinson, Brady Dearborn, Casey Gagnon, Nolan Owens, Caleb Collins, and Gage Mckenney. Second row, LoganWise, Trent Wishart, Keegan Littlefield, Cody Gagnon, Kayleb Gerow, Tucker St. Jarre, Trevor Denis, Kahl Bolster, Carter Sanborn and Maddok Lepage. Back, Coaches Jevon Owens, Toby Gagnon and Ryan Robinson. (contributed photo)

Cap unbeaten season

Messalonskee Grade 5/6 finished the season unbeaten (7-0) by outscoring the competition 284-46. Team members include, front, from left to right, Dawson Wellman, Sean Smith, Ayden Estes, Hunter Poulin, Hayden Cook, Malachi Cusano, Cavan Gooding, Parker Doucette, Brandon Frowery, Dawson Baker, Dominick Berry and Wyatt Bucknam, Middle row, Cameron Burrows, Trenton Bell, Owen Emmons, Connor Caron, Brayden Stewart, Eben Potter, Gabriel Steinberger, Caleb Corrow and Chase Lawler. Back, coaches Andy Steinberger, Justin Lawler, Tyler Jandreau, Darren Doucette and David Cusano. Absent from photo, Shawn Higgins, Graham Fitzsimmons, Quinn Charles. (photo by Sarah Lawler, Central Maine Photography)

LETTERS: High prescription costs affect the whole family

To the editor:

When it comes to prescription drugs, we can all agree that rising prices have become a critical issue. Some Mainers are going without their required prescriptions as they can no longer afford them. Others are cutting pills in half or going without daily necessities like decent food to keep up with the costs. It is time to help assure Maine families that they will be able to pay for necessary prescription drugs.

So why isn’t Congress fighting to do just that? The White House and Congress released their “Build Back Better” framework for a $1.75 trillion social spending bill. This bill does not including anything to address the high cost of prescription drugs.

This is the moment when Congress could include a provision to allow Medicare to negotiate for lower prescription drug prices. But this provision isn’t in the bill!

If you are reading this letter then I hope you will pick up the phone and call Congressman Golden and tell him Mainers need lower Rx prices.

High costs like this affect the whole family. Soaring drug costs mean that some people aren’t able to stay healthy or eat properly. It shouldn’t be this way!

Let’s advocate for what’s right. It’s time for Medicare to be able to negotiate for lower drug costs so we can afford the medications we need. Congress is debating the bill framework right now. Please call today. There is no time to lose!

Paul Armstrong
Palermo

Time to order citrus fruit

Once again, it is time to order your sweet, sparkling citrus fruit in time for Christmas or Thanksgiving. The fruit is picked and shipped within 24 hours and is guaranteed to be in peak condition and flavor, or your money back. Shipping costs only $6.95 per box, and can be delivered anywhere in the continental U.S.

Orders are taken online only. To see the mouth-watering fruit, please go to https://www.Floridaindianrivergroves.com/ecommerce/1018996. Please make sure the ID number, 1018996, is on your order. This sale benefits the Palermo Community Center, which, in turn, provides a venue, freezer space, and utilities for the Palermo Food Pantry. This is a safe, no-contact delivery. Thank you for helping to support the Community Center and Food Pantry!

For more information, please contact Connie Bellet at pwhitehawk@fairpoint.net or call 993-2294.

Various broadband initiatives across Maine to provide improved access

Photo credit: Barta IV, https://www.flickr.com/photos/98640399@N08/9287370881

by Jeanne Marquis

Communities through the Central Maine and Coastal regions are creating initiatives to improve their internet services to existing users and provide connection to underserved areas. Each community or coalition of communities is in a different stage of their progress, yet all have similar goals of future proofing their internet connections, providing reliable service to underserved residents and more affordable service to those who are currently served.

The Southwestern Waldo Broadband Coalition (SWBC) is one of these initiatives. Their goal is to connect Freedom, Liberty, Montville, Palermo, and Searsmont with affordable, accessible broadband coverage. In a survey conducted from April to September of 2021, fifty-five percent of respondents stated that no company was able to provide internet service to their homes. The survey results are further supported by a Geographical Information System (GIS) Mapping of the area showing most of Southwestern Waldo is in an internet desert devoid of connection.

Bob Kurek, Palermo selectman, explains why he works actively to advocate for SWBC,

“This is my second term as a selectman. I would like to leave the town doing something good for the town and I think this is probably the one thing that will benefit most of our residents.

“My next reason is funding. I would call myself a pragmatic conservative. I wouldn’t normally have gone after the government put in a lot of money. But as long as the government has decided they’ve got money that’s available [for broadband coverage], I want to be ready, willing and able to accept it and put it to use to solve a problem for our residents.”

The SWBC is fueled by volunteers from the five towns that comprise the coalition. Kurek explains, “If you realize the resources that it takes to pull together the information that you need to work on these grants? Small towns, like the R5 towns, don’t have enough resources to do it but when we combine we have the resources – I’m just thrilled by the people who work with us. We’ve got engineers, we’ve got educators, we’ve got accountants, we’ve got a good group of people who understand what it is that we’re wanting to do. They’re all working to solve the problem. They realize that our area is so unserved and underserved by broadband service. We could enhance our economic development, we can enhance education, and we can make it easier for people who need to communicate with doctors.”

The SWBC completed an extensive survey to ascertain the level of interest and need in their five town area. Key members of the coalition presented the results this September in informational sessions at town meetings. The SWBC earned the approval of all five select boards to use funds from the first distribution of the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) for a feasibility study. The SWBC is now soliciting bids from eight consulting firms.

Another broadband initiative in the Central Maine region is the Western Kennebec Lakes Community Broadband Asso­ciation, which combines the towns of Fayette, Leeds, Mount Vernon, Readfield, Vienna and Wayne. A statement on the association’s website expresses that their towns need improved access to the internet to help their students get an education, promote remote work opportunities, access information and reduce isolation by connecting family and friends. The association also views internet access as vital to the future financial wellbeing of their communities by encouraging new residents to settle and their current families’ youth to stay or return.

The WKLCBA is currently gathering survey information from residents from their six communities. Video testimonials are posted on their website expressing the need for improved internet service from a variety of sectors: health, education and business.

Ellsworth is an example of a community with a newly-installed fiber network serving three miles of their downtown area. The city is currently offering leases to connect to the network to both residential and business customers. The goal of the fiber network project is to position Ellsworth as a technology-friendly city to attract remote workers and companies for whom broadband is a vital component of their business.

The Ellsworth city website says the city may expand the network overtime as the interest grows and update the technology at either end of the cable as needed.

The Town of China appointed a broadband committee to research options for better internet service and this committee has been meeting since early 2017. The China Broadband Committee (CBC) found that the major internet provider services only 70 percent of the town, the rest are serviced by a lower quality DSL or have no service. The committee’s solution to provide more reliable, more affordable internet service to every resident and business in China is similar to the fiber network plans of the broadband initiatives in progress across our state. The CBC plan is highly detailed and analyzed in an October 14, 2021, article by The Town Line technical advisor Eric Austin found at https://townline.org/category/sections/columns/tech-talk/ and on the CBC website at https://chinabroadband.net/.

HALLOWEEN EVENTS 2021

HALLOWEEN EVENTS

CHINA

Erskine Academy will host Trunk or Treat from 6 – 8 p.m., this Friday, October 29, at the school.

There will also be a haunted house inside, around the gymnasium.

CHINA VILLAGE

Albert Church Brown Memorial Library, in China Village, will be welcoming trick or treaters from 5 – 7 p.m., on Sunday, October 31.

FAIRFIELD

Due to the impending inclement weather, the Fairfield Trunk or Treat has been rescheduled to Sunday, October 31, 2 – 5 p.m., on Eskelund Drive.

PALERMO

The Palermo Consolidated School eighth graders will hold a haunted trail on Saturday, October 30, from 3 – 8 p.m. The scariest experience will take place from 6 – 8 p.m. Admission is $5 per person and will include games, pineapple juice. You will not be touched. All proceeds to benefit the eighth grade heritage tour. The school is located at 501 ME-Route 3, Palermo.

WATERVILLE

The Alfond Youth and Community Center will be hosting a trunk or treat open house, family fun Halloween event for all ages and abilitites on Sunday, October 31, from 3 – 5 p.m., in the parking lot and facility, 126 North St., in Waterville.

WINDSOR

This year we will be having our Trunk n Treat on Friday, October 29, from 5:30-7:30 p.m. at the field across from the fair grounds. This will be a walk through event, you will park in the field and we will have the trunks in a line for the kids to walk through. We will be selling glow sticks for a $1.00 at the front of the line. All monies will go help the kids at Windsor school this year. Parking will be in the big fields where the camping is.

WINSLOW

Trick or Treat at the Winslow Public Library on Friday, October 29, 2 – 6 p.m. Ring the library doorbell for a trick or treat surprise. This will include candy, a snack, a craft, a bookmark and more. Let us know if you need an allergy friendly option. Feel free to wear a costume. Open to youth of all ages.

Up and down the Kennebec Valley: More high schools, part 3

The Lawrence Library, in Fairfield.

by Mary Grow

Fairfield, Palermo, Sidney

In Fairfield, according to the Historical Society’s bicentennial history, town meeting first appropriated money for schools in 1793, five years after the town was incorporated. As in other towns, schools were based in neighborhood school districts. The history says in 1904 there were 25 schools within the town boundaries.

The first high school classes were in 1873, in “part of the already existing grammar-school building…at the corner of Main Street and Western Avenue.” Voters raised $500 for high-school education. This building was presumably the one that was North Grammar School by the middle of the 20th century, and now houses businesses.

In 1881, an article asking voters to build a separate high-school building was on the warrant for the March town meeting. Voters passed over – did not act on – it.

The history says a building for Fairfield High School was built in 1890-91, on Burrill Street (which is at the south end of the business district, running west from Water Street across Main and High streets to West Street). It cost $5,000 and “served the Town until Lawrence High School opened in 1907.”

After 1907 it became South Grammar School, on the north side of Burrill Street between High and West streets. It is now an apartment building.

The 1907 Lawrence High School was a brick building on the west side of High Street, facing Memorial Park. It opened on Sept. 21, with the more than $60,000 construction cost paid by Edward Jones Lawrence.

Lawrence had made a fortune in lumber, street railways, shipbuilding and other ventures. Readers will see more about him in a future article, because Fairfield’s Lawrence Library is also named in his honor.

The Fairfield history says Lawrence’s fortune was drastically reduced in the global financial panic in 1906-1907. He kept his promise to build the high school by “mortgaging his home and borrowing against the schooners” – six-masted schooners built in Bath in which he had invested.

On Feb. 15, 1925, the high school building was “gutted by fire,” the bicentennial history says. It was rebuilt by the spring of 1926.

The Fairfield town report for the year ending Feb. 28, 1926, includes financial information on rebuilding. The town borrowed $50,000, with repayment beginning Jan. 1, 1927, and got more than $57,000 from insurance. The “contract price for construction” of $103,446 covered payments to the architect, contractor, electrician and plumber.

The report from the new Lawrence High School Principal, Edward S. Young, in the same town report said that the school “opened September 14 [1925] in its temporary quarters in the Opera House with an enrollment of 204.”

(The Fairfield Opera House was built in 1888, supported by Amos Gerald [1841-1913], “the Electric Railroad King,” another local boy who made good. It was “demolished in 1961 to make way for the present modest municipal building,” which is at 19 Lawrence Avenue. Lawrence Avenue runs from Main Street at the end of the Kennebec River bridge up hill past the library to High Street.)

Young continued: “Your principal has made a determined effort to make the scanty equipment in the Opera House adequate for a good school and he feels that real work is being done in spite of adverse conditions.”

An innovation was provision of a hot lunch twice a week, at cost, “through the cooperation of the domestic arts department,” for students who did not go home during the noon break.

The 1925 school routine included 10 a.m. daily chapel, with two hymns, the Lord’s Prayer and a Bible reading. Outside speakers were invited every Wednesday. To prepare students for public speaking, “Three times each week a student gives a declamation before the entire school. He is introduced by a fellow student.”

When yet another new Lawrence High School was completed in 1960, the 1907 building became a junior high school. It is now Fairfield Primary School, serving students in pre-kindergarten and kindergarten.

In Palermo, historian Milton Dowe found early settlers had many children – John Cain had 18; Amasa Soule 13; Jacob Worthing 12, five of them born before 1800. Primary schools were in existence before 1811; that year, seven school districts were created.

By 1886, Dowe wrote in his 1954 town history, Palermo had 17 schoolhouses. “At this time several of the elementary schools also held terms for free high school classes,” he added.

Millard Howard’s 2015 history said Palermo’s 17 school districts never operated simultaneously; and he said not all districts hired a teacher for every term. His book includes a paragraph on high schools, in which he wrote that Palermo offered none until after Maine’s 1873 Free High School Act.

By 1888, eight Palermo school districts offered high school courses, Howard wrote, the first established in 1882. He explained, “This meant that these districts were occasionally providing a ten-week high school term. There was no fixed course of study.”

Howard found an 1893 Kennebec Journal reference to a free high school at Carr’s Corner ending a term at the end of April. Carr’s Corner, on North Palermo Road, was the site of the schoolhouse for District 13, which was organized in the 1830s and lasted until Palermo school districts were consolidated in 1953.

Dowe also mentioned the Academy Hall on the China side of Branch Mills Village, described in last week’s account of China high schools as Barzillai Harrington’s high school.

Alice Hammond wrote that the Town of Sidney never provided a town high school. There were primary schools from 1792, when Sidney was separated from Vassalboro.

Hammond did not say what opportunities for higher education were offered in the 1800s. Nor does Henry Kingsbury’s Kennebec County history have any information; in a half paragraph about education in Sidney, Kingsbury wrote that by 1891, the number of school districts was cut from 18 to 14 because there were so few students.

From 1906 on, Hammond wrote, Sidney paid students’ tuition to out-of-town schools. The majority chose the public high school in Augusta, Belgrade or Oakland or Oak Grove Seminary, in Vassalboro.

The elusive Barzillai Harrington

Barzillai Harrington, who built an Academy in Branch Mills Village, in China, in the 1850s, was, according to on-line genealogies, born in Tinmouth, Vermont, June 13, 1819; or in Sherburn, Massachusetts, in 1816.

The genealogies and the Maine Historical Magazine, Vol. 1 (1886) identify him as a son-in-law of Shepard Bean (July 16, 1784-1847, the 12th of 14 children of Joshua and Mary Bean). Shepard Bean was born in Readfield, and his wife Jerusha (Hayward) (d. 1876), was from Easton, Massachusetts. Shepard and Jerusha Bean had five children, born in Readfield.

The three older Bean children all found spouses in Readfield. The younger of the two daughters, Lucy Ann, born May 20, 1828, married Barzillai Harrington on Oct. 12, 1843.

(Lucy’s younger brother, Alvin S. Bean, married Phebe Snow, of China, according to the magazine; or Phebe Worth Jones, of China, and after her death a widow named Lizzie [Erskine] Tyler, according to one genealogy.)

Barzillai and Lucy Harrington had eight children between 1844 and 1860. Their oldest son, Myron Clark Harrington, born Aug. 1, 1844, died Oct. 9, 1862, at Bellow’s Heights, Virginia (almost certainly a victim of the Civil War).

Their second son, born Nov. 30, 1845, was named Barzillai Shepard Harrington after his father and grandfather. The genealogies offer no further information.

The magazine article identifies the senior Barzillai Harrington as “from China” and adds: “He built the Lowell, Me., tannery.”

Milton Dowe offered one more clue to the family when he wrote in his Palermo Maine Things That I Remember, in 1996 that “The Branch Mills Sewing Circle was organized at the home of Mrs. B. Harrington in 1853” and went on to list the officers, including “Mrs. L. Harrington,” secretary.

Lowell is a small Penobscot County town, east of Passadumkeag, south of Lincoln. Ava H. Chadbourne’s book on Maine place names says it was Page’s Mills Plantation in 1819 or soon thereafter; then Deanfield Plantation; and Huntressville when incorporated as a town in 1837. It became Lowell in 1838, reportedly to honor Alpheus Hayden’s son Lowell Hayden, the first male child born in the town.

Chadbourne has no Harringtons on her list of early Lowell families. She wrote that Alexander Webb, a New Yorker who had managed tanneries in other Maine towns, “superintended” the building of a large one in Lowell after he moved to town in 1856.

Did, then, the senior Barzillai Harrington literally build the tannery, with Webb overseeing his work? If so, why and how did Harrington switch from running a high school in China to building a tannery in Lowell, a hundred miles away?

Lowell was not his farthest journey. One on-line genealogy says he died May 13, 1885, in Harvard, Nebraska; another says he died in 1881. Lucy survived him, and also died in Nebraska, according to one source.

News from Victor Grange

Here is another update on a prior topic, Victor Grange #49, in Fairfield Center, described in the May 13 issue of The Town Line.

The Grange’s Fall 2021 newsletter reports the successful completion of the effort to raise funds to insulate the building. The money is now in hand, and, the newsletter says, “Northeast Poly Insulation [of Fairfield] will start the job shortly.”

Grangers also obtained the advice they needed on ventilating a well-insulated building. The report says D. H. Pinnette Roofing, of Oakland, “will install six turbine vents, this should do the trick.”

The Grangers expect the insulation will much improve heating in the building and allow more programs. People are invited to suggest programs they would enjoy.

The newsletter lists Grange programs and events. They are open to anyone interested, whether a Grange member or not.

Vaccination clinics are scheduled from 8:30 to 11 a.m. Thursday, Oct. 6, and Thursday, Oct. 28. The Grange Hall will host Northern Light Health personnel administering the Pfizer vaccine against Covid and the quadrivalent flu vaccine, which offers protection against four different strains of the influenza virus.

The annual Grange Fall Fest and Craft Fair is scheduled for Saturday, Nov. 13, from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.

Bridge lessons are offered Mondays from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. The newsletter says the original turnout of two tables (eight players) has already doubled some days as more people hear of the chance to learn this card game.

Grange members are looking for help with two more projects, one needing money and the other expertise.

They would like to buy an Automatic External Defibrillator (AED) to provide emergency help to a heart attack victim. The cost is listed as $1,300; donations are welcome. The newsletter requests checks made out to Victor Grange 49 AED Fund and left at the Hall, at 144 Oakland Road in Fairfield Center; or mailed to Victor Grange 49, c/o Roger Shorty, 118 Oakland Road, Fairfield ME 04937.

For the Nov. 13 Fall Fest, Grangers are looking for someone who can sharpen knives and scissors, for a fee. Anyone interested can get in touch through Roger Shorty or by emailing Victorgrange49@gmail.com.

Main sources

Dowe, Milton E. , History Town of Palermo Incorporated 1884 (1954).
Dowe, Milton E., Palermo, Maine Things That I Remember in 1996 (1997).
Hammond, Alice, History of Sidney Maine 1792-1992 (1992).
Howard, Millard, An Introduction to the Early History of Palermo, Maine (second edition, December 2015).
Fairfield Historical Society, Fairfield, Maine 1788-1988 (1988).
Kingsbury, Henry D., ed., Illustrated History of Kennebec County Maine 1625-1892 (1892).

Websites, miscellaneous.

China Transfer Committee discusses raising transfer station fees for Palermo residents

by Mary Grow

China Transfer Station Committee members held a special Sept. 21 meeting to talk about increasing fees charged to Palermo residents. The meeting was consistently cooperative and courteous, with each town’s representatives expressing appreciation to the other’s.

According to the discussion, the 17-year contract allowing Palermo residents use of China’s transfer station was signed in June 2016 and was effective Jan. 1, 2017. It prescribes an annual $18,000 payment from Palermo to China; sets fees for Palermo mixed solid waste, which must be in bags that China buys and Palermo residents pay for; and includes China’s right to increase fees charged to Palermo, with at least six months’ notice.

China cannot increase fees by more than the cost-of-living increase (a prescribed measurement and time period are in the contract), except as needed “to cover any ‘pass-through’ costs (such as increases in tipping [disposal] fees) and federal or state mandated policies” that increase transfer station costs.

Representatives of both towns had calculated the consumer price increase since the beginning of 2017. They presented similar figures: China Committee Chairman Lawrence Sikora figured about 13.3 percent, Palermo representative Bob Kurik about 12 percent.

The two men agreed the consumer price increase would justify a recommendation to increase the price of a large trash bag from $2 to $2.25.

China Town Manager Rebecca Hapgood observed that the large bags now used are 33 gallons, not the 30 gallons specified in the contract. There are also 15-gallon bags, priced in the contract at $1.25; they are so little used that over the years the price has been reduced, Kurik and Hapgood said.

There was a long discussion of pass-through costs before committee members agreed that they include four components: tipping fees; transportation; state or federal mandates (no one was aware of any); and higher costs for the Town of China buying the bags.

They do not include pay increases for transfer station staff, because those are defined as part of operating costs that China pays.

Committee member Ashley Farrington had reviewed records from 2017 to Aug. 1, 2021, to prepare information on tipping fees and trucking costs. Committee members did not translate them into a figure to be recommended as an increase.

The trash bags are used for mixed solid waste, the stuff that goes into the hopper at the transfer station. Another component of trash is larger items like furniture and carpets. Sikora and Farrington had collected information to start a discussion of fees for such items, but committee members made no decisions.

Sikora prepared a table based on average weight of different items, as listed in an on-line guide for moving companies. It appeared that if the transfer station charged the new 10-cents-a-pound fee for demolition debris that selectmen approved Aug. 30, disposal fees for some items would increase significantly.

The most conspicuous example was a sleeper sofa, for which a transfer station user is now charged $10. If the typical one weighs 275 pounds, as the guide said (committee members had doubts), the new disposal fee would be $27.50.

These fees for special items apply to China and Palermo residents equally.

Committee member Mark Davis warned his colleagues not to recommend fee increases so big that residents would resort to roadside dumping.

He extended his comments to ask whether the transfer station is supposed to make a profit, or to provide a service to residents. Sikora reworded the issue; it is not a question of profit, but of seeking the appropriate balance between defraying costs and providing service.

Transfer Station Committee members scheduled their next regular meeting for 9 a.m., Tuesday, Oct. 12.

Transformation Project

Palermo Christian Church (photo from the church’s Facebook page)

The Bible says “Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is — His good, pleasing and perfect will.” Romans 12:2

The Palermo Christian Church believes in lives being transformed and thought it would be great to apply that to a transformation of the bulletin board at Palermo Post Office.

One of the Small Growth Groups at Palermo Christian Church recently spruced up the bulletin board. The frame was straightened, new doors with Plexiglas were installed, fresh coat of paint, turf carpeting was laid, and flowers added a special touch. Many nodded their head of approval for the improvements.

During one break Jeff Twitchell, donated a delicious apple pie. They thoroughly enjoyed and had an opportunity to share with three individuals while they were picking up their mail.

A big thank you to SD Childs Construction and Kempton Tobey & Son who provided gravel and loam.

2021-’22 Real Estate Tax Due Dates

Albion

Tax year runs Feb. 1 to January 31
Taxes due September 30, 2021

China

Semi-annual
September 30, 2021
March 31, 2022

Fairfield

Four quarters

August 25, 2021
November 10, 2021
February 9, 2022
May 11, 2022

Palermo

October 31, 2021

Sidney

September 1, 2021

Vassalboro

Four quarters
September 27, 2021
November 22, 2021
February 28, 2022
April 25, 2022

Waterville

Four quarters
October 8, 2021
December 10, 2021
March 11, 2022
June 10, 2022

Windsor

Semi-annual
September 30, 2021
March 31, 2022

Winslow

Four quarters
October 8, 2021
December 10, 2021
March 11, 2022
June 10, 2022

To be included in this section, contact The Town Line at townline@townline.org.

Another year of outstanding water quality at Sheepscot

PURPLE SKIES: Ashley Wills, of Palermo, photographed this unusual sunset over Sheepscot Lake recently.

by Carolyn Viens

All who pause to look out at our Maine lakes see a beautiful natural marvel, but how do we know if a lake is as healthy and vibrant as it looks. The answer is through water testing and the Sheepscot Lake Association (SLA) is committed to the task. Throughout each summer the lake association tests for water clarity, dissolved oxygen from the surface down to the deepest part of the lake, and for phosphorous. SLA founding member Beth Bond initially ran the monitoring for the lake association for several years, and for the last five years the testing has done by Lake Steward of Maine Certified Lake Monitors Ursula and Joe Burke of the SLA board.

The water clarity is tested using a Secchi disk and scope. The Secchi disk is a plain black and white circular disk 30 cm (12 in) in diameter used to measure water transparency or turbidity in bodies of water. The disc is mounted on a tape measure and lowered slowly down in the water. The depth at which the disk is no longer visible is taken as a measure of the transparency of the water. This measure is known as the Secchi depth and is considered the standard methodology for measuring water clarity. The last test revealed a clarity to 16.1 feet, over an inch better than state average.

The SLA monitor also tests for dissolved oxygen using a YSI Pro 20 dissolved oxygen meter, and for phosphorus. The measure of total phosphorus in Sheepscot averages 7 ppb (parts per billion). The state average for tested lakes is 12 ppb. This is good news as phosphorus is a nutrient that feeds algae, and the lake has been fortunate not to have had any algal bloom.

Phosphorous is our primary concern these days. When this natural element lands in the water algae thrives on it. It comes from soil that’s washed into the lake from rain and snow melt as well as from fertilizer and leaking septic systems. Human development along lake shores results in five to ten times more phosphorous than from undeveloped land. There is also a threat of additional phosphorous from fish die-offs, such as when alewives, should they be in a lake, spawn and, during low water years, cannot leave the lake at the end of their cycle.

The SLA also coordinates the LakeSmart program which helps lakefront homeowners understand how their property impacts the lake and how to reduce that impact. If you are a lake homeowner and interested in having your property evaluated, please email us at sheepscotlakeassoc@gmail.com for a free evaluation.

In addition to the lake quality testing regularly performed and the LakeSmart program, we also continue to run an invasive plant patrol, a courtesy boat inspection (CBI) program funded in part by grants from the Town of Palermo and Maine DEP. The CBI team regularly inspects boats entering and exiting Sheepscot via the boat launch. The goal is to identify any invasive species foreign to our lake prior to a boat being launched.

At our annual meeting this year we transitioned the presidency of the lake association board from Slater Claudel to board member Maria O’Rourke. Thank you, Slater, for your years of dedicated service to SLA. We also welcomed John Curtain to our board. John, in addition to Jeff Levesque and Chrissy Doherty, will be taking over the water quality monitoring program from the Burkes. We appreciate their years of dedication to this important role, thank you Joe and Ursula!

Sheepscot Lake is a wonderful resource for all Palermo residents and visitors to enjoy. With the continued attention to the health of the lake by all, we will help it thrive for many, many years to come. To learn more about how you can help protect Sheepscot, and to join us in our efforts to monitor and maintain this treasure please contact the lake association at sheepscotlakeassoc@gmail.com. Enjoy the remainder of the summer.