Roderick receives MPA award

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Mackenzie Roderick

CHINA, ME — Mackenzie Roderick, of China, a senior at Erskine Academy, has been selected to receive the 2022 Principal’s Award, Headmaster Michael McQuarrie announced. The award, sponsored by the Maine Principal’s Association, is given to recognize a high school senior’s academic excellence, outstanding school citizenship, and leadership.

Roderick is a consistent high-honors student in a highly competitive academic program that includes all classes taken at the honors or accelerated level and numerous Advanced Placement and Concurrent Enrollment courses with nearby colleges. She has received recognition and accolades from within and outside of the school for her standout accomplishments in the classroom, athletics, and voluntary community service. Roderick has been awarded for outstanding achievement in calculus and statistics, excellence in Spanish, top performance in student council, and she is the Valedictorian for Erskine Academy’s class of 2022.

“Mackenzie is universally respected and esteemed by the school community. She is an exemplary student, school and community citizen, and a fine representative of Erskine Academy and young people. Mackenzie personifies the school’s core values of scholarship, leadership, stewardship, and relationships,” noted Headmaster McQuarrie when making the award.

Swift announces candidacy for House District #62

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Pam Swift

PALERMO, ME – Pam Swift, MD, a Democrat from Palermo, has announced her candidacy for Maine’s House of Representatives in District #62, which includes the communities of Palermo, China, Somerville, Windsor, and Hib­berts Gore.

“With decades of work experience in both healthcare and agriculture, I understand that the well-being of our families is fundamentally tied to affordable healthcare, access to nutritious food, and the health of our soil, air, and water,” Swift said. “My education and lived experience will make mine a valuable voice in the Maine Legislature.”

Swift earned a bachelor’s degree in animal science with the intention of becoming a veterinarian, but later decided to pursue a medical degree. After graduating from medical school and completing her residency in obstetrics and gynecology, Swift joined a large practice that specialized in high-risk obstetrical cases, where she worked her way up to full business partner. After 23 years practicing medicine, Swift returned to her animal science roots and purchased a farm in Palermo with her husband, Don, where they raise grass-fed sheep, free-range organic laying hens, and acorn-fattened pigs.

Swift is serving her second term on the select board, in Palermo. Although the board’s three members span the political spectrum, they work together with the common goal of doing what’s best for the community as a whole. Most recently, the select board worked cooperatively with the Palermo Volunteer Fire Department and Liberty Ambulance to create a new service for Palermo residents that will provide a more rapid response as well as a higher level of emergency medical care.

As a representative, Swift would focus on ensuring her neighbors have access to affordable healthcare, reducing the cost of prescription medications, and preventing and treating opioid addiction. She is also interested in issues related to food sovereignty, supporting Maine’s small family farms, and dealing with the threat imposed by PFAS (or forever chemicals). Regarding the environment, Swift notes observable changes that concern her. Due to drought, there have been years where she’s had to start feeding her sheep hay in August instead of December because the grass didn’t grow back after the first round of grazing. This dramatically increases the cost of production. Also, milder winters mean more ticks in the spring and fall resulting in a higher risk of contracting tick-borne diseases, not just for people, but for horses, cattle, and dogs as well. And Brown-tailed moths, the new scourge, are negatively impacting both quality of life and businesses—especially those involving tourism.

“In my previous work as a physician, and now as a member of the select board, I have a proven record of working effectively with people from all walks of life,” Swift said. “As a candidate, my goal is to help create and pass legislation that will lead to healthy, fulfilling lives for my fellow Mainers.”

Swift, who has qualified for the ballot, is running as a Clean Elections candidate.

LETTERS: Happy to support Smith

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To the editor:

I am happy to write to support Katrina Smith for State Representative for District #62 China, Hibberts Gore, Palermo, Somerville and Windsor. Katrina brings a true passion for conservative values to this race with a deep understanding of the issues facing Maine. As the chairman of the Waldo County Republicans she tirelessly worked to engage with constituents and educated them on legislation within the state house. Over the past three years Katrina has spoken often and boldly against the policies that threatened the well-being of the people of Maine.

I’ve worked with Katrina for a few years and when Katrina says she will get things done you can absolutely count on her.

Anne Kurek
Palermo

China select board wraps up “almost final” warrant

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by Mary Grow

CHINA, ME — China Select Board members put the warrant for the June 14 annual town business meeting in almost-final form at a two-hour special meeting April 4.

The draft document they came up with has 37 articles and a potential 38th. Most are requests for voters to act on proposed 2022-23 expenditures and town policies.

Art. 37 asks if voters will approve a solar moratorium ordinance (see The Town Line, March 31, p. 3). Select board members debated whether to present it, because three of the five do not want a moratorium.

A majority consisting of Chairman Ronald Breton, Jeanne Marquis and Janet Preston voted to leave the question on the warrant and let voters decide. Breton then joined Blane Casey and Wayne Chadwick in recommending that voters reject the moratorium.

(The “Large Scale Solar Facilities Moratorium Ordinance” is not the “Solar Energy Systems Ordinance” that is on the China website, but an ordinance that would prohibit new commercial solar systems until the “Solar Energy Systems Ordinance” is in place to regulate their installation. The moratorium ordinance was not on the website as of April 5.)

Proposed Art. 38 would ask voters to approve China’s updated comprehensive plan. Town Manager Rebecca Hapgood had just received notice of state approval. Voter approval requires a public hearing, and Hapgood needed to make sure there is time to meet state-required deadlines for the hearing, with appropriate notification, before adding the warrant article.

Select board members intend to prepare and sign a final warrant for June 14 at their regular meeting, scheduled for 6:30 p.m. Monday, April 11, in the town office meeting room.

The June 14 town business meeting will be by written ballot, with polls open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. in the former portable classroom behind the town office.

China budget committee holds final spring meeting

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by Mary Grow

CHINA, ME — China Budget Committee members held their final spring 2022 meeting on March 31, rediscussing a few of the proposed 2022-23 expenditures and making recommendations on warrant articles.

Ultimately, budget committee members changed only one proposed figure. At Elizabeth Curtis’ suggestion, and on a split vote, they recommended reducing the contingency fund appropriation from $123,80 to $88,290.

When select board members reviewed the draft warrant at their April 4 special meeting, they unanimously accepted the lower figure.

Curtis insisted that funds will not be needed to cover increased health insurance costs if a town employee with a policy covering only him – or herself leaves and is replaced by an employee who elects more expensive family coverage. The gap in salary while the position is unfilled and, if necessary, leeway in other expenditure lines should be adequate, she said.

Budget committee members also advised voters to reject one proposed expenditure. The list of projects to be funded with federal ARPA (American Rescue Plan Act) money includes buying a portable speed control sign that Hapgood said could also be used for announcements, like a road closing.

The amount proposed is $20,000. Hapgood had found two signs to consider, so far; one was 45 by 80 inches and solar-powered, the other 48 by 96 inches with batteries.

Only Curtis and Trishea Story supported the expenditure. Committee chairman Thomas Rumpf, Kevin Maroon and Michael Sullivan voted against it and Timothy Basham abstained.

Five other proposed ARPA expenditures got unanimous support: $20,000 for two new generators for the town office complex; $38,000 for 911 identifying numbers on each house; $33,000 for a digital sign on Route 32 South, shared with the South China volunteer fire department; and $5,000 for future senior events and activities – maybe a bus trip, Hapgood suggested.

Curtis cast the only “no” vote on the recommendation for $15,212 from ARPA funds for extra pay for town employees who worked through the pandemic.

Sullivan asked whether putting up the 911 numbers would be mandatory, thinking of homeowners who might object on aesthetic grounds. Hapgood, thinking of the need for emergency personnel to find the right address in a hurry, said no; but if only most houses were visibly numbered, it would be helpful.

On an earlier article, Sullivan pointed out that the proposed cemetery budget of $49,500 is a substantial increase over the current year and more than double the $24,000 appropriated in fiscal year 2020-21.

There has been an unusual amount of tree damage from storms, and the cost of mowing will go up, replied Curtis, who is a member of China’s Cemetery Committee. Hapgood added stone repairs and the plan to hire a summer intern to catalog and photograph graves and create a computer file.

Up and down the Kennebec Valley: Wars – Part 13

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Capt. James Parnell Jones (left), Capt. Charles W. Billings (right)

by Mary Grow

Civil War

Henry Kingsbury lists four men who served in “the late war” in the personal paragraphs in his chapter on Benton in the 1892 Kennebec County history.

Stephen H. Abbott enlisted from Winslow and served six months with the 19th Maine; he moved to Benton in 1872 and served as postmaster from 1890 and for three years as a selectman.

Gershom Tarbell was in the 19th Maine for three years. Albion native Augustine Crosby was in the 3rd Maine, credited to Benton. Hiram B. Robinson was in Pennsylvania when the war started and enlisted from there not once but twice; he fought in 37 battles and returned to Benton in 1865.

Kingsbury does not mention Benton-born Frank H. Haskell (1843-1903), described in on-line sources as enlisting in Waterville June 4, 1861, when he was 18. Sergeant-Major Haskell was promoted to first lieutenant in the 3rd Maine Infantry after being cited for heroism during the June 1, 1862, Battle of Fair Oaks (also called the Battle of Seven Pines) in Virginia. His action, for which he received a Medal of Honor, is summarized as taking command of part of his regiment after all senior officers were killed or wounded and leading it “gallantly” in a significant stream crossing.

Another Civil War soldier from the central Kennebec Valley who was awarded the Medal of Honor was Private John F. Chase, from Chelsea, who enlisted in Augusta and served in the 5th Battery, Maine Light Artillery. As the May 3, 1863, battle at Chancellorsville, Virginia, wound down, Chase and one other survivor continued firing their gun after other batteries stopped and, since the horses were dead, dragged the gun away by themselves to keep it from the Confederates.

Grave of Horatio Farrington

At least 40 China residents died of wounds or disease, including, the China bicentennial history says, the five oldest of Mary and Ezekiel Farrington’s seven sons. Horatio, age 27, Charles, 25, Reuben, 20, Byron, 19 and Gustavus, 18, died between June 1, 1861, and Oct. 30, 1864.

Records do not show how many Civil War veterans were permanently disabled, the author commented. She retold the story told to her by Eleon M. Shuman of Weeks Mills about Jesse Hatch, from Deer Hill in southeastern China, who (for an unknown reason) fought for the South and came home so disfigured from a powder magazine explosion “that his appearance frightened the neighborhood children, but his friendly words and gifts of apples made him less terrifying.”

One of China’s best-known Civil War soldiers was Eli and Sybil Jones’ oldest son, Captain James Parnell Jones. As the author of the China history pointed out, pacificism is a central Quaker tenet, but in 1861 some Quakers decided ending slavery and maintaining the Union outweighed religious upbringing.

She quoted from the Jones genealogy an account of James Jones (who was 23, married with one son) and his 18-year-old unmarried brother Richard at a troop-raising event.

“Richard immediately raised his hand when the call came but James walked over to his brother, pulled down the raised arm and slowly raised his own. ‘Thee’s too young, Richard.’ ”

Jones was in the 7th Maine, first a company captain and from December 1863 a regimental major, as the troops fought in Virginia and at Gettysburg. In 1864, in the Battle of the Wilderness, he allegedly replied to a demand to surrender his embattled regiment with, “All others may go back, but the Seventh Maine, never!”

Jones was killed in the fighting around Fort Stevens July 11 and 12, 1864, as the 7th Maine helped defend Washington.

From Clinton, Kingsbury listed Daniel B. Abbott, born in Winslow, who served in the 19th Maine until June 1865 and after the war bought a farm in Clinton and became commander and grand master of Billings Post, G.A.R. (Grand Army of the Republic, the Civil War veterans’ organization that was disbanded in 1956 after the last member died).

The post was named to honor Captain Charles Wheeler Billings (Dec. 13, 1824 – July 15, 1863), Company C, 20th Maine, who was wounded in the left knee July 2, 1863, at the Battle of Little Round Top and died in a field hospital.

Clinton’s Brown Memorial Library website and a “Central Maine Morning Sentinel” article found on line describe the June 6, 2015, rededication of Clinton’s Civil War monument and the monument at Billings’ gravesite in Riverview Cemetery. The newspaper quotes speaker Bruce Keezer, then President of the Friends of Brown Memorial Library, as saying Clinton had a total population of 1,600 in the early 1860s; 252 men enlisted and 32 died.

The website says Billings was the highest-ranking 20th Maine officer to die at Little Round Top.

Billings left a widow, Ellen (Hunter) Billings, whose 30th birthday was July 1, 1863, and two daughters: Isadore Margaret, born in 1850, and Elizabeth W., or Lizzie, born in 1860. Another daughter, Alice, born in 1856, had died in 1860; and Elizabeth died Dec. 7, 1863. Isadore died in 1897, the day after her 47th birthday. Ellen lived until 1924.

Also from Clinton, according to Kingsbury, were Isaac Bingham, Rev. Francis P. Furber, Joseph Frank Rolfe and Laforest Prescott True.

Bingham had gone to California in 1852; he came home in 1861 and served two years with the 1st Maine Cavalry. After the war he moved back and forth between his Clinton farm and California.

Furber, a Winslow native who moved to Clinton in 1845, served in the 19th Maine for three years. A wound received May 6, 1864, “destroyed the use of one arm,” Kingsbury wrote. He was ordained a Freewill Baptist minister Sept. 27, 1885, after serving as a minister in Clinton and nearby towns since 1875.

Rolfe, born in Fairfield of parents who moved to Clinton when he was about three, served in the 2nd Maine Cavalry from 1863 to the end of the war. True was in the 20th Maine from 1862 to 1865 and was wounded twice.

Fairfield’s Civil War monument is one of the oldest in Maine, according to the town’s bicentennial history. The writers noted that its dedication day, July 4, 1868, was a scorching Saturday: the temperature reached 105 degrees in the shade.

Soldiers came from all over Maine. Ceremonies included a parade; cannon salutes; speeches, including one by Governor (former General) Joshua Chamberlain; dinner prepared by townswomen and served “in the old freight depot”; and a baseball game with a final score of 60 to 40 (the history does not record the names of the teams).

“The day was not without its tragedy,” the history says. A veteran named William Ricker, who had survived the war unscathed, lost a hand when one of the cannons went off too soon. Chamberlain promptly canceled the remaining salutes.

Kingsbury found that one of Sidney’s soldiers, Mulford Baker Reynolds (Aug. 5, 1843 – Aug. 3, 1937) served in Company C of the 1st Maine Cavalry from August 1862 to July 1865, “and spent about six months in Andersonville prison” in Georgia.

Reynolds married Ella F. Leighton on Nov. 23, 1881, according to an on-line source. Kingsbury wrote that in 1892 Reynolds was farming his family place in Sidney and he and Ella had four children.

Among the many Vassalboro men whose personal paragraphs in Kingsbury’s history list Civil War service is Edwin C. Barrows (April 2, 1842 – April 20, 1918). Educated at Waterville and Bowdoin colleges, he enlisted Nov. 19, 1863, in the 2nd Maine Cavalry.

Transferred in June 1865, he became second lieutenant (but acted as adjutant, the officer who assists the commander with administration, Kingsbury wrote) of the 86th U.S.C.T. (United States Colored Troops), serving until he was discharged April 10, 1866.

After the war, Barrows got a law degree from Albany Law School in January 1867 and practiced four years in Nebraska City, Nebraska. He married Laura Alden (Sept. 5, 1842 – Dec. 19, 1909) and returned to Vassalboro in 1872. By 1892, he had been a supervisor of schools in 1882 and 1883 and since then a selectman, “being chairman since 1887.”

Edwin and Laura Barrows are buried under a single headstone in Vassalboro’s Nichols Cemetery.

Vassalboro’s G.A.R. Post was named in honor of Richard W. Mullen of the 14th Maine, one of 410 Vassalboro Civil War soldiers, Alma Pierce Robbins wrote in her town history. After the war, town meeting voters appropriated money to the G.A.R.’s Women’s Relief Corps for Memorial Day services and veterans’ grave markers. The Post disbanded in 1942 and the appropriation was transferred to Vassalboro’s American Legion Post and Auxiliary.

The Waterville G.A.R. Post, chartered Dec. 29, 1874, was named in honor of William S. Heath, who was killed in action at Gaines Mill, Virginia, on June 27, 1862. The first post commander was General Francis E. Heath, the second General I. S. Bangs. Francis Heath was almost certainly William Heath’s brother (variously identified as Frank Edw. and Francis E.; died in Waterville in December 1897), I. S. Bangs the author of the military history chapter in Edwin Whittemore’s Waterville history.

Ernest Marriner added information on William Heath’s life in “Kennebec Yesterdays”. In 1849, he wrote, Heath was 15 and “somewhat tubercular”; his father, Solyman, thought a trip to the goldfields in California would be good for him.

Young Heath “did survive the rigors of the terrible trip across plains and mountains, worked a while in a San Francisco store, then shipped off to China, from which distant land the anxious father soon had him returned through the intercession of the United States government.”

Back in Waterville, Heath graduated from Waterville College in 1853. When the 3rd Maine’s Company H was formed in Waterville in April 1861, Heath was captain and his brother Francis/Frank was first lieutenant. By the time of his death, William Heath was a lieutenant colonel in the 5th Maine Infantry, Marriner wrote. Francis ended the war as a colonel in the 19th Maine, according to Bangs.

Linwood Lowden, in his Windsor history, wrote that Charles J. Carrol, one of seven Windsor men who fought in the Battle of Gettysburg July 2-4, 1863, was mortally wounded. Three more Windsor men, George H. B. Barton, George W. Chapman and George W. Merrill, were killed May 6, 1864, in the Battle of the Wilderness.

Windsor’s Vining G.A.R. Post, organized June 2, 1884, was named to honor Marcellus Vining. Post members met every Saturday night in the G.A. R. Hall, which was the upper story of the town house, Lowden said.

At an 1886, meeting, “a Mr. Bangs presented a picture of Marcellus Vining” to the organization. Kingsbury added that the Vining family donated Marcellus Vining’s army sword, “his life-size portrait and an elegant flag.”

Lowden believed Vining Post continued “well into the twentieth century.” Windsor voters helped fund the G.A.R., usually at $15 a year, he wrote. In 1929, however, “$30.00 was appropriated for G.A.R. Memorial and paid to the Sons of Veterans.”

Kingsbury wrote that Vining was born on the family homestead on May 2, 1842, third child and oldest son of Daniel Vining by his first wife, Sarah Esterbrooks of Oldtown (Daniel and Sarah had three daughters and three sons; after Sarah’s death, Daniel married Eliza Choat, and they had six more daughters).

On Jan. 25, 1862, Marcellus Vining became a private in the 7th Maine. He served for two years, during which his “ability and courage” (Kingsbury) earned him two promotions. On Jan. 4, 1864, he re-enlisted in a reorganized 7th Maine. On March 9 he was made second lieutenant of Company A, and on April 21 made first lieutenant. On May 12 he was wounded at Spottsylvania, Virginia; he died a week later.

“A captain’s commission was on its way from Washington to him, but too late to give to the brave soldier his richly earned promotion,” Kingsbury wrote.

He continued with a paraphrase from a letter Vining, knowing he was dying, wrote to his father, saying it was better “to die in the defense of his country’s flag than live to see it disgraced.”

Kingsbury concluded: “Thus the oft-repeated tale—a bright, promising man with the blush of youth still on his cheek, willingly laid down his life to preserve that of his country.”

Main sources

Fairfield Historical Society, Fairfield, Maine 1788-1988 (1988)
Grow, Mary M., China Maine Bicentennial History including 1984 revisions (1984)
Kingsbury, Henry D., ed., Illustrated History of Kennebec County Maine 1625-1892 (1892)
Lowden, Linwood H., good Land & fine Contrey but Poor roads a history of Windsor, Maine (1993)
Marriner, Ernest, Kennebec Yesterdays (1954)
Robbins, Alma, Pierce History of Vassalborough Maine 1771 1971 n.d. (1971)
Whittemore, Rev. Edwin Carey, Centennial History of Waterville 1802-1902 (1902)

Websites, miscellaneous

China planners shift gears on ordinance amendments

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by Mary Grow

CHINA, ME — China Planning Board members have abandoned their plan to have three ordinance amendments presented to voters at the June 14 town business meeting.

After hearing objections and suggestions at a March 22 public hearing, they voted unanimously to leave the record open for written comments for two weeks and to reconsider parts of the proposed changes.

Their next chance for a town vote will be Nov. 8.

The proposed changes are to Chapter Two of the China Land Use Ordinance, which includes the principal regulations; Chapter 11 of the ordinance, definitions; and Chapter Eight, now unused, slated to become a “Solar Energy Systems Ordinance.”

The ordinance sections are on the town website, china.govoffice.com, under the Elections tab.

Comments on the draft documents should be emailed to codes officer Jaime Hanson at ceo@chinamaine.org, or mailed or delivered to the town office, 571 Lakeview Drive, China ME 04358, marked Att. CEO. Comments must be received by Friday, April 8.

Most of the Chapter Two changes are required by the Maine Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), which has so far given China’s ordinance only conditional approval. Chapter 11 changes are partly DEP requirements and partly for the new solar ordinance. Board members added Chapter Eight to define standards specifically for solar panels.

Most of the discussion at the hearing was over lot coverage by man-made constructs. State and town ordinances limit the percentage of a lot that can be covered. In China, the limit is 15 percent in three protected zones, shoreland (the focus of the discussion), stream protection and resource protection, and 20 percent in the rural zone.

Specifically, China’s ordinance has said for years that no more than 15 percent of a lot in the shoreland zone can be covered by “structures of all types.” It adds that “Impervious surfaces, driveways, parking areas, etc. do not apply to lot coverage.”

DEP required the last sentence be eliminated. The proposed new wording says, “non-vegetated surfaces shall not exceed a total of fifteen (15%) percent of the portion of the lot located within the shoreland zone. For the purposes of calculating lot coverage, non-vegetated surfaces include, but are not limited to the following: structures, driveways, parking areas, and other areas from which vegetation has been removed.”

The point of the limit is to minimize run-off into water bodies from development that pre-dates land use ordinances. Because of its history of poor water quality, China Lake is of particular concern.

The owner of a shoreland lot whose impervious surfaces (including structures) reach or exceed 15 percent cannot expand them. The proposed change, if approved by town voters as it stands, would increase the amount of a lot already covered, since driveways and parking areas would count.

The increase in lot coverage, said residents Brent Chesley and Michael “Mickey” Wing, would mean people who planned to add a deck or a patio or a car-cover would have to abandon their plan. Wing added that the effect might be the opposite of protective; for example, if someone wanted to move a garage farther away from the water, with a longer driveway, the driveway, and hence the relocation, might no longer be allowable.

Speakers said that China’s lot coverage requirements are stricter than the state’s. State regulations allow up to 20 percent in protected districts and 30 percent in rural districts, they said. They agreed that protecting China Lake’s water quality is necessary, environmentally and to maintain property values and the town’s tax base.

Former codes officer Scott Pierz pointed to difficulties deciding what an impervious area is. For example, does a woodpile count?

Depends, Planning Board Chairman Scott Rollins replied. If it sits in the same place for years, it should, but a temporary woodpile shouldn’t. Leaving some things to the codes officer’s discretion is unavoidable, in his opinion.

Chesley and others suggested other issues planning board members should address – for example, Chesley found a direct contradiction between two ordinance sections that had not been addressed. He objected both to the shoreland restrictions and to the 20 percent maximum lot coverage requirement in the rural area, recommending an increase to 30 percent.

China Lake Association President Stephen Greene commended planning board members for their hard work and transparency. He considers the balance between development and lake protection difficult to determine and maintain; there is “no perfect solution,” he said.

Other speakers asked whether the planning board should have given two weeks’ notice of the public hearing, and whether the town attorney had reviewed the proposed ordinances. Codes Officer Jaime Hanson said China ordinances do not require notice for this type of hearing. Rollins said if Town Attorney Amanda Meader has not reviewed all proposed changes, she will be asked to before they are deemed final.

A digression onto septic systems in the shoreland led to Hanson saying that a recent Maine law requires a septic system inspection as a condition of any transfer of ownership. Not even all realtors are aware of the requirement yet, he said; and it applies to all transfers, not just to sales.

The next regular China Planning Board meeting is scheduled for 6:30 p.m., Tuesday, April 12.

China select board continues town meeting preparations

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by Mary Grow

CHINA, ME — China Select Board members continued town meeting preparations at their March 28 meeting, discussing at length three topics: asking voters to approve a moratorium on commercial solar development; the proposed 2022-23 municipal budget, with a focus on town employees’ pay; and 2022-23 expenditures of federal ARPA (American Rescue Plan Act) funds, which need voter approval.

At the annual town business meeting June 14, China voters will not act on a new ordinance to regulate commercial solar development, because planning board members have not finished writing it. (See related story here.)

Therefore, Town Manager Rebecca Hapgood said, she asked town attorney Amanda Meader about a moratorium on new solar projects, and Meader replied a moratorium would be a good way to protect town residents. The attorney was ready to draft the document if select board members approved the idea.

Three of them approved, outvoting the two who didn’t.

Wayne Chadwick objected immediately to “tying landowners’ hands for months because the planning board and the town didn’t do their job in a timely way.”

Blane Casey agreed. A landowner might lose his or her opportunity to lease property to a developer during the moratorium, he added.

From the audience, resident Brent Chesley said he thinks the draft ordinance really does need more work, for example, adding the requirement that a commercial solar developer provide money in advance to decommission and remove the installation at the end of its useful life.

He further reminded those present of resident Michael “Mickey” Wing’s testimony, during the March 22 public hearing on the draft ordinance, that the glass panels are considered hazardous waste until they’ve been sun-baked for 20 years. Wing, who runs the Waterville-based division of Casella Waste Systems, told the hearing audience that when a truck-load of panels got broken, the out-of-state supplier had to come and remove them, because the glass could not go to an in-state waste disposal facility.

Board chairman Ronald Breton agreed with Chadwick’s and Casey’s principle that people should be allowed to use their property as they wish, but he also agreed that Chesley had raised two issues needing attention to protect the town.

Breton, Jeanne Marquis and Janet Preston voted to have attorney Meader proceed with the moratorium draft. Casey and Chadwick voted no.

Hapgood expects that if the select board presents a moratorium to voters on June 14 and if voters approve it, it would apply only to commercial solar developments, not to panels for individual houses; and it would be effective for no more than 180 days from the March 28 action, unless the select board extended it.

Budget discussion briefly re-reviewed parts of proposed transfer station and public works expenditures, but the main argument, again resolved on a 3-2 vote, was over Breton’s proposal to add 1.5 percent to the previously-approved 3 percent wage increases for town employees.

Breton said the economy has changed since the early vote, and he has changed his position accordingly. He calculated if voters approve the additional pay, it would add $9,807 to the 2022-23 budget, not a major increase in an individual tax bill; and it would help employees pay higher living costs.

Casey started looking for other parts of the proposed budget that could be cut by a matching amount. Preston suggested using the $12,000 in the budget for select board members’ salaries; “none of us took this job for the pay,” she said. Hapgood expects increased revenues will cover the additional raises.

Casey and Chadwick again voted in the minority. Chadwick observed that taxpayers’ cost of living has gone up, too.

China has received $227,443.53 in ARPA money, Hapgood reported, and she expects a second payment in the same amount later in 2022. She presented a list of potential uses, some for the 2022-23 fiscal year and some for the following year.

After discussion, select board members approved recommending a total of $132,206 in expenditures for the June 14 ballot. The total might change, because Hapgood needs to confirm (or revise) at least one estimated cost.

Projects on the list as it stood at the end of the March 28 meeting are installing new generators at the town office and the old town house beside it; putting 911 numbers on every house; buying a digital sign to go in front of the South China fire station to provide town and fire department information; special payments to recognize employees who worked through the pandemic; a $5,000 fund for senior events; and a portable digital sign for speed control and for community announcements.

Hapgood said each expenditure would become a separate warrant article, so voters could approve or reject each one individually.

A new sign is proposed for only one of China’s three fire stations because only South China’s, on Route 32 South (Windsor Road), is on a state road, the manager explained.

The ARPA warrant articles were approved on a 4-1 vote with Casey dissenting.

Select board members briefly discussed other topics at the March 28 meeting.

They unanimously approved two revised schedules of transfer station user fees, one for residents of China and Palermo and one for users from all other towns. The new fees are effective April 1. All changes are increases, some more consequential than others.

For example, the cost of getting rid of king-size and queen-size box springs and mattresses doubles, from $5 to $10 each. The cost of disposing of a four-foot straight uncoated fluorescent bulb goes only from 12 cents a foot to 50 cents for the bulb. Twin and full-size mattress and springs charges and eight-foot fluorescent charges remain unchanged, at $5 and $1, respectively.

Casey reported on the recent Kennebec Regional Development Authority meeting at which he represented China. KRDA runs FirstPark, the business park in Oakland supported by central Maine municipalities.

There were “a lot of angry towns” represented, Casey said, because FirstPark hasn’t produced the revenue or jobs its promoters promised. However, he said, the message sounded positive: three lots are slated to become a solar farm (not a major source of jobs, he added); two or three other lots have potentially-interested buyers; and there was discussion of the possibility of selling the whole park to a private developer.

Select board members unanimously gave Hapgood authorization to seek bids on two mobile homes the town has acquired for unpaid taxes. They are located in a mobile home park on Chadwick Way, off Dirigo Road.

The manager said discussion of implementing the new trash-bag fees for Palermo residents continues.

Board member Preston said members of the China Broadband Committee (CBC), on which she represents the select board, plan a discussion with representatives of Direct Communications at the Wednesday, April 6, CBC meeting, scheduled for 4 p.m. in the former portable classroom behind the China town office. Direct Communications is the new owner of Unitel, the communications company serving Unity.

China select board members scheduled a special meeting for 6:30 p.m. Monday, April 4, to finish work on the warrant for the June 14 town business meeting. Their next regular meetings should be at 6:30 p.m. April 11 and April 25.

China budget committee, town manager review non-final budget

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by Mary Grow

CHINA, ME — China Budget Committee members and Town Manager Rebecca Hapgood spent two hours March 24 reviewing a non-final draft of the 2022-23 municipal budget.

Committee members made no decisions, but they got many questions answered. China Select Board members were scheduled to work on the budget at their March 28 meeting, and the budget committee is scheduled to meet again at 6:30 pm. Thursday, March 31, in the town office meeting room.

The public works account is one of the largest, at more than $1.4 million. Hapgood cited two important unknowns, one global and one local.

The global issue is where petroleum prices will go between now and the June 30, 2023, the end of the upcoming fiscal year. If the per-ton price of paving is too high when the town seeks bids, Hapgood said she would consider postponing scheduled work for a year.

The local issue is vehicle maintenance and repair. China’s driver/mechanic, Josh Crommett, resigned and has not yet been replaced. If his replacement can continue to do maintenance in-house, instead of sending vehicles out for work, the town will save money.

The proposed transfer station budget is more than $625,000. Hapgood explained proposed staffing changes and building maintenance issues. She told committee members two pending issues, whether to abandon the present RFID (radio frequency identification) system and go back to stickers and whether to build a guardhouse at the entrance, remain undecided.

Several other accounts generated brief discussion.

Committee member Michael Sullivan asked whether the China Broadband Committee was likely to make enough progress to justify a proposed $1,000 appropriation, or “Is their job impossible?”

Committee Chairman Thomas Rumpf replied that the committee’s reaching out to potential broadband suppliers seemed useful. After voters in November 2021 rejected the committee’s proposal to borrow money for expanded broadband service, select board members voted unanimously to authorize the committee to continue working.

Elizabeth Curtis asked why the Thurston Park Committee needed an appropriation from taxpayers in addition to the recommended allotment of Tax Increment Financing money. Hapgood replied that TIF rules did not allow TIF money to cover some necessary expenditures, like repairing washed-out roads or cleaning up storm-damaged trees.

Looking at the request for $49,500 for cemetery care, up from $34,000 in the current year, Hapgood said the recommended increase is to cover a backlog of maintenance and to pay a summer intern who will catalog graves. The town is responsible for taking care of about two dozen of China’s 30 or more cemeteries.

China voters will have a written-ballot town business meeting on Tuesday, June 14, with polls in the portable building behind the town office open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. As the budget committee meeting ended, Hapgood asked for members’ opinions on an open meeting, as in pre-pandemic days, versus a written ballot.

The reply was consensus that each has a major advantage and a major disadvantage. At an open meeting, people can ask questions, get correct answers and debate pros and cons; but a small minority of voters attend. More voters participate in a written ballot; but many are uninformed or misinformed about the questions they vote on.

Albion, Palermo, Windsor, China talk merger (2022 April Fool’s story)

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by Mary Grow

By 2024, central Maine might have a new town named Alpawich, combining the present towns of Albion, Palermo, Windsor and China.

The new town would have an area of 179.41 square miles, Maine’s largest town by far. Its population will be less than Augusta’s or Waterville’s, however.

The impetus for combining the four towns came from Palermo, as a proposal to merge with China to form a town to be named Chipal. Palermo officials had two motives:

  • The two towns share the village of Branch Mills, the West Branch of the Sheepscot River that runs through the village and Branch Pond north of the village (although China has only a small piece of the west shore); by contract, Palermo residents use China’s transfer station; combination into a single town government would simplify life; and
  • China, coming well before Palermo in the alphabet, beats Palermo in all kinds of lists, from apple sales through grant applications to zoos (neither town has one).

Windsor selectmen then expressed interest. Windsor too shares the Sheepscot, and alphabetically is more disadvantaged than Palermo.

A tri-town Combo Committee formed in the fall considered the issue alphabetically and recommended talking with Albion town officials. When the response was positive, the proposed town became Albchipalwin.

Too long, the members of the now-quadri-town ComboComm said. They proposed, and all four towns’ select boards accepted, Alpawich.

“We don’t mind being on the end,” China’s town manager said. “After all, we’re the largest town, in both area and population. You’ve heard of the tail that wags the dog, right?”

A Palermo Select Board member replied, “Hey, no problem if China thinks they run the show. We’ve shared their transfer station for years without throwing garbage at each other.”

Rather than submit the proposed merger to town meetings on different dates, the ComboComm recommended a referendum vote on state primary election day, June 14, 2022. The ballot question in each town will ask voters to approve the concept of combining with the other three towns and to appropriate a soon-to-be-determined amount to let the ComboComm hire a merger consultant.

The members of the four select boards have agreed that a simple majority in each town will determine whether the town becomes part of Alpawich; and that a membership of two out of four will create the new town (with an appropriately adjusted name).

ComboComm members and the consultant will design the new local government, deciding how many select board members will run Alpawich; how departments will be combined; and how costs of new signs, stationery and similar essentials will be divided.

As the internet replaces in-person interaction, committee members envision a single, central municipal building. The site remains undetermined.

Alpawich Hall would have municipal offices in the center. The educational side wing would be the k-8 school, plus a public library, historical society quarters and a museum, if local organizations express interest in consolidating. So far, they have not.

The medical side wing would house a clinic, a pharmacy, a veterinarian and insurance offices. The rear wing would be home to Alpawich Public Works and the Alpawich Solid Waste Disposal Facility.

For now, the existing transfer stations in China and Windsor would serve Alpawich residents. Fire and rescue units would be left as they are, to avoid increasing response time.

Proponents cite many advantages of consolidation. Combined contracting – with town attorneys and auditors, for example — and purchasing should save money. Their combined road mileage should attract lower bids from paving companies.

Some members of each select board also anticipate a larger town having more clout with state regulators, like the Departments of Environmental Protection and Transportation, according to a source who wished to remain anonymous because they are not authorized to speak on the matter.

County commissioners in Kennebec and Waldo counties have no idea what to do if Alpawich becomes reality. Albion, China and Windsor are in Kennebec County; Palermo is in Waldo County.

“Mostly the county lines run with town lines, like through Branch Mills,” one Kennebec County commissioner said. “Don’t know’s I’ve heard of a town that was in two counties.”

School administrators see many potential complications in the proposed change. Albion is in School Administrative District #49, based in Fairfield; China is in Regional School Unit #18, based in Oakland; Palermo and Windsor are in Regional School Unit #12, based in Somerville.

The RSU #18 superintendent is the least upset. “If there’s no more China, then there’s no more China in RSU #18,” he said. “They’re the geographic outlier. Talk about dogs and tails – they’re a detached tail.”

Assuming voter approval, the legislature would need to create the new town. Legislatively, since redistricting, China, Palermo and Windsor are in House District #62 and Albion is in District #63. The four towns are in four different state senate districts. “So if our reps pay attention to their voters, that’s four proponents in each house right from the get-go,” a committee member observed.

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IF YOU BELIEVED THIS STORY, YOU ARE AN APRIL FOOL!