Vassalboro school board decides on two “leftover” issues

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The annual prize for Pi Day winners at Vassalboro Community School is the chance to throw a pie – whipped cream in a graham cracker crust into the face of a teacher or the principal. On Pi Day 2024, sixth-grade winners Mariah Estabrook (second from left) and Sarina LaCroix (third from left) so honored sixth-grade math teacher Stephanie Tuttle (left) and Principal Ira Michaud (right). (contributed photo)

by Mary Grow

At their March 19 meeting, Vassalboro school board members decided the two issues left undecided in February (see the Feb. 22 issue of The Town Line, p. 3) and continued review of the draft 2024-25 school budget.

Board members voted unanimously to approve a three-year contract with Jennifer Lizotte, who runs the daycare at Vassalboro Community School (VCS). The decision was accompanied by expressions of goodwill and approval from school administrators and Lizotte.

School personnel said the daycare is well run, Lizotte is cooperative with them and school staff whose children attend are happy.

Lizotte thanked school personnel for being helpful and understanding. She thanked the board for the three-year contract, which will let her plan ahead.

The present daycare space fits nicely with staff and enrollment, Lizotte said. She and board members talked about possible installation of a ceiling fan in the area for the summer term.

Superintendent Alan Pfeiffer said after discussion with Shelley Phillips, director of maintenance and grounds for Vassalboro and Winslow schools, the daily rent will be raised from $25 to $28. This figure will be reviewed annually.

The second month-old issue was whether to increase school board members’ stipends, currently $40 per meeting. Pfeiffer said many comparable boards’ members are rewarded more generously.

Board members voted unanimously not to change the figure. Several said they had run for school board without knowing there was a stipend.

No one could predict whether more money would encourage more residents to run for the board. Pfeiffer was doubtful, saying the number of volunteers for local positions has been declining state-wide.

Budget discussion covered two major accounts, administration and tuition. Pfeiffer emphasized that some figures are estimates.

For example, he does not have 2024-25 insurance costs and is guessing how big the increase will be. The state will calculate and release 2024-25 high-school tuition costs in December 2024; based on the last two years, Pfeiffer has penciled in a six percent in­crease.

In other business, Principal Ira Michaud said Vassalboro’s average daily attendance is at 94.9 percent, slightly below the state’s recommended goal of 95 percent. He explained the two types of absences, excused (when a parent calls in to say a student is ill, or the family is going on a trip) and unexcused (when no explanation is offered). Especially in the second case, he said, teachers are encouraged to call the family to see if the school can help.

Board member Jessica Clark alerted the rest of the board to the legislative bill LD 974, titled “An Act to Establish Minimum Pay for Educational Technicians and Other School Support Staff.” If it becomes effective, in 2025 some educational technicians could be paid more than teachers, she said.

Pfeiffer said the bill, if it becomes law, will have a “significant” monetary impact state-wide. He hopes if the legislature approves it, state funding will be provided.

Clark said Vassalboro’s legislators, Rep. Richard Bradstreet and Sen. Matthew Pouliot, told her the bill is likely to pass and advised her to address her concerns to Governor Janet Mills.

Principal Michaud’s report included thanks to the Vassalboro Parent-Teacher Organization for supplies for two recent events, Bubble Day and Pi Day.

He said school counselor, Gina Davis, introduced Bubble Day, with students outdoors blowing bubbles, as an observance of the first day of spring.

Pi Day, the annual observance of the “mathematical constant that is the ratio of a circle’s circumference to its diameter, approximately equal to 3.14159,” drew 34 contestants trying to remember as much of the endless number as they could. Michaud said the winners were, in third place, fifth-grader Ashlynn Hamlin; second place, sixth-grader Mariah Estabrook; and first-place, reciting 167 digits, sixth-grader Sarina LaCroix.

Board members plan to continue budget discussion at their regular meeting Tuesday evening, April 9. Pfeiffer is considering scheduling an additional special budget meeting.

VASSALBORO: WPA officials explain work planned for Webber Pond

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by Mary Grow

Vassalboro select board members’ March 21 meeting featured a discussion with John Reuthe and Rebecca Lamey, from the Webber Pond Association (WPA), about the health of Webber Pond and associated water bodies.

The water level in the Vassalboro pond is controlled by an outlet dam. Water quality is influenced by run-off from surrounding land and, Reuthe explained, by inflows from Three Mile Pond, Three Cornered Pond and Mud Pond.

A history of water quality problems led to a management program developed by the Maine Department of Environmental Protection that includes an annual fall drawdown intended to flush excess nutrients down Seven Mile Stream into the Kennebec River.

Reuthe, WPA president, said warmer water has encouraged the growth of blue-green algae, also known as cyanobacteria, which can sicken people and pets.

WPA officers are working with Maine Rivers (the organization that led the opening of local streams to alewife migration) to develop a new watershed management plan encompassing the four connected ponds, Reuthe said. A plan written about 20 years ago, with help from the Kennebec Valley Soil and Water Conservation District, was not implemented and is outdated.

Because Three Mile Pond is partly in China and Windsor, Mud Pond is in Windsor and Three Cornered Pond is in Augusta, the effort will involve multiple municipalities. Reuthe and Vassalboro Town Manager Aaron Miller have already begun discussions with Windsor’s town manager.

Lamey said WPA will apply for a federal 604(b) grant, referring to a program that is part of the Clean Water Act, to begin the new watershed study. Vassalboro has several residents whose expertise will be helpful, including a grant-writer, she said.

Future plans include more dam improvements, Reuthe said, in cooperation with Maine Rivers. Although the projects he and Lamey outlined will be expensive, he assured select board members WPA is not –yet – asking for substantial town funds, only for expressions of support from the select board.

Reuthe told select board members the $5,000 voters allocated to the WPA at the 2023 town meeting was spent as intended, to make the dam gates easier to control and add equipment storage at the dam and to buy water quality testing equipment.

The public hearing on amendments to Vassalboro’s Marijuana Business Ordinance with which the March 21 meeting was scheduled to begin drew no audience. Board members and planning board member Douglas Phillips briefly discussed the changes, which include renaming the ordinance Cannabis Business Ordinance. The topic will be continued at the April 4 select board meeting.

Board members also postponed a decision on repaving the parking lot at the former East Vassalboro school, now the Vassalboro Historical Society headquarters. After reviewing three proposals with cost estimates, they referred board member Rick Denico, Jr.’s, questions about the project to the expertise of public works department members.

In other business March 21, select board members unanimously:

— Left the town office hours adopted in January as they are. Miller said residents who expressed opinions are pleased, especially with the earlier opening.
— Approved closing the transfer station on Easter Sunday, as has been done in past years.

Miller said he has no new information related to the Vassalboro Sanitary District’s finances. The district has a rate increase scheduled April 1 for its about 200 customers, who have told select board members they cannot afford even present rates.

Select board members have been working on the issue since before the Dec. 14, 2023, meeting which drew more than five dozen people to discuss reasons and potential remedies for the financial problems (see the Dec. 21, 2023, issue of The Town Line, p. 2).

The next regular Vassalboro select board meeting is scheduled for 6:30 p.m. Thursday, April 4.

Judson Smith accepted at Maine School of Science and Mathematics

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Jud Smith, center, flanked by his mother Lisa Libby, left, and his father Zachary Smith. (contributed photo)

by Mary Grow

Judson Smith, a 13-year-old eighth-grader at Vassalboro Community School (VCS), has been accepted for high school at the Maine School of Science and Mathematics (MSSM), in Limestone.

Jud is an honor roll student at VCS, a member of the JMG (Jobs for Maine Graduates) program and the Gifted and Talented Program and president of the student council. He played soccer last fall.

His father, Zachary Smith, said Jud has long been interested in math and science, partly because of his parents. Smith, with a background in biology and medicine, is a Psychiatric Physician Assistant, and his wife, Lisa Libby, is a pharmacist.

With his parents’ support, Jud went to MSSM’s summer camp for two years. Jud added, “They offered classes where you were able to launch rockets and calculate what distances they would cover.”

At MSSM, Jud intends to focus on chemistry. He is considering a career in chemical engineering, and looks forward to the “more challenging material” he expects at MSSM.

“It is a very high honor for any student to be accepted to this prestigious institution,” Vassalboro school superintendent Alan Pfeiffer said.

Vassalboro planners OK repairs to boathouse; two other applications postponed

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by Mary Grow

Vassalboro planning board members approved one of the three applications on their March 12 agenda and postponed the other two.

Approved were repairs to David Low’s boathouse at 8 Norton Road, in the shoreland zone on the southwest side of Webber Pond. It was damaged when a tree fell on it during a recent windstorm.

Elwin “Al” Gero, who is in charge of the repairs, explained plans to board members. Board chairman Virginia Brackett told Giroux he also needs a building permit from codes officer Jason Lorrain.

Mark L. Brown presented preliminary information on his plan to develop a remote campground on part of his property on Taber Hill Road. Board members and Brown discussed the beaver dam that has created a wetland on part of the property; the different state agencies whose regulations and standards are involved; and what documents Brown should submit for a local permit.

The third application was from Paula Stratton, to open a business at 913 Main Street, in North Vassalboro, in one of two buildings owned by Raymond Breton. Neither Stratton nor Breton was at the March 12 meeting, and board members found the application incomplete.

They tabled the application and asked Lorrain to ask the applicant to answer its questions in more detail.

Several retail businesses have been in and out of this building and its neighbor in recent years.

In other business, Lorrain said Tim and Heather Dutton’s permit to re-open the East Vassalboro store was issued Feb. 7, 2023. He was unsure how much progress the Duttons have made.

Brackett recommended he invite them to apply for a six-months extension (which can be followed by a second six months, if needed), to make sure the permit does not expire.

Board member Douglas Phillips shared the select board’s proposed amendments to Vassalboro’s Marijuana Business Ordinance. If the amendments are submitted to and approved by voters at the June town meeting, the planning board will have some responsibility for implementation, he said.

Board member Paul Mitnik proposed the board prepare a local ordinance to increase water quality protection in Vassalboro’s lakes. After others suggested possible methods, he offered to have a preliminary draft at the board’s April 2 meeting.

Up and down the Kennebec Valley: Ponds named after people

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by Mary Grow

Webber Pond

Returning to early settlers who had ponds named after them and related topics (discussed in many recent articles in this series), your writer starts with a reader’s question: is Webber Pond in Vassalboro named for Charles Webber, mentioned at the end of the Jan. 11 article?

Vassalboro historian Alma Pierce Robbins’ account of the Webber family’s early days in Vassalboro says firmly, “Maybe”; and if not Charles, almost certainly a family member. Other sources offer an unusually wide variety of conflicting information that adds up to the same answer.

In her chapter on Vassalboro’s first families, Robbins compiled a list, using as sources the 1792 town valuation report (compiled by Charles Webber and two other assessors) and the 1800 national census.

From these sources she named five Webbers in Vassalboro by 1800: Charles and Charles, Jr., Eliot, Hannah and John. If an on-line genealogy is accurate, Charles was Charles B. Webber – few other sources use any middle initial – and he was one of Vassalboro’s first settlers.

On the town website, 11 Webbers are listed as buried in the Webber family cemetery in Riverside. One is Charles, born c. 1741 and died Nov. 20, 1819, identified as a veteran.

Riverside is the section of southwestern Vassalboro that used to be one of the town’s villages, first called Brown’s Corner and located on “the river road” north of the Augusta line. The river road was the current Riverside Drive/Route 201, approximately.

The 1856 Vassalboro map shows Brown’s Corner as an intersection of the river road and an east-west road crossing it at a right angle and going to the Kennebec. The intersection is south of Seven Mile Brook, between the brook and the Augusta line, and has a cluster of more than a dozen buildings.

Kennebec County historian Henry Kingsbury wrote that early 19th century buildings there included a tavern, a store, a post office (“which in 1826 did a total business of $33.25”) and a Grange Hall. There were successive mills closer to the river, and at the landing two local men “built several small vessels.”

Among those who came to Vassalboro before Charles Webber, according to several sources, was his brother, Joseph.

If your writer found the right Joseph Webber, he was born in York, Maine, July 24, 1727; married Sarah Sedgeley of that town on Jan. 10, 1754; and died in Vassalboro, Sept. 9, 1796. One source says he and Sarah had six sons and two daughters; at least three of the sons (Charles’ nephews) lived in Vassalboro or China.

Find a Grave says Charles Webber was born in January, 1741, in York. He married Hannah Call, born in 1744 in Amesbury, Massachusetts. After Hannah’s death in 1782 (Find a Grave says she “was buried on the first farm Charles owned”), he married Sarah Smiley (died in 1800).

An on-line genealogy lists 13 Webber children. Assuming it is (somewhat) accurate, Charles, Jr., was Charles B. and Hannah’s first child, born in Dresden, Maine, in 1764.

Their oldest daughter, Sarah (1766-1854), was the first white child born in Vassalboro. She married Judah Chadwick (1765-1816; probably one of the South China Chadwicks who have been mentioned previously, since the couple are buried in China’s Chadwick cemetery on Route 32 South [Windsor Road]).

Then came Mary (1769-1837), James (1771-1823), John (1773-1847), William (?c. 1774-?), Nancy (1777-?), Samuel (1779-c. 1891), Hannah (1780-1860; married Amos Childs, whose gravestone in the North Vassalboro Village cemetery identifies him as a Revolutionary veteran), George M. (c. 1782 [or 1776]-1831), Joseph (1783 [or 1775]-1817), Benjamin (Feb. 27, 1786-1834) and Jeremiah (July 17, 1786-1820).

Obviously one of the last two birth dates is an error; and this genealogy contradicts Kingsbury, who said Jeremiah was Charles’ only child by his second wife, Sarah.

Sons who might have kept the family name in Vassalboro, according to this on-line genealogy, included John, who married there in 1793 (and died in Ohio); Samuel, who married in Vassalboro in 1801 (and died in New York); George, who married his second wife in Vassalboro in 1820; and Jeremiah, who married in Vassalboro in 1805.

Jeremiah’s wife is variously identified as Balsora, Belsora or Belsova Horn or Horne. Another genealogy says they had eight children. The town website says Balsora died in 1829 and she and Jeremiah are buried in the Webber family cemetery, along with a Belsora who died in 1866 (one of their daughters?). Belsora’s seems to have been the last burial in the cemetery.

On-line sources say Charles B. Webber was a veteran of the French and Indian War and the Revolutionary War. French and Indian War records that are cited list him in Nathaniel Donnell’s company in April 1757, and in January 1759 in Capt. Ichabod Goodwin’s company in Col. Jedediah Preble’s regiment. (These military leaders were from York, Maine.)

In the Revolutionary War, sources say Webber was an officer in the militia. He seems to have served under (at least) two local commanders, Captain Dennis Getchell, of Vassalboro, and Colonel Joseph North, of Gardinerstown.

Webber moved to Vassalboro between the wars. Robbins wrote that in 1764, Charles Webber bought, for “twenty pounds lawful money,” the west end of lot number 63 on the 1761 survey of Vassalboro by Nathan Winslow (mentioned in last week’s article).

Kingsbury said Charles Webber in 1765 was the settler on the third lot along the river north of the Augusta line, which would have been lot 53 on the 1761 survey.

Robbins’ and Kingsbury’s histories each include a version of the 1761 survey, with the shape of Webber Pond (called 7 Mile Pond in Robbins’ book, as China Lake is listed by its old name, 12 Mile Pond) quite different.

On the survey in Robbins’ history, Seven Mile Stream comes from near the south end of the pond and enters the Kennebec through lots 61 and 62. Kingsbury’s version has the stream exiting the pond a little farther north and curving father south to enter the Kennebec through lots 57 and 58.

Referring to the 1800 census, Robbins wrote: “Charles Webber had ‘400 acres under water’; perhaps he had taken over ‘Webber Pond’.” Some deeds, she immediately added, called the water body Colman Pond (see box).

Then she wrote, “At least the younger generation of Webbers left the river at Brown’s Corner, where the first Charles settled, and cleared the area at the foot of the pond….”

Kingsbury found that Charles Webber was one of the residents who in 1766 petitioned the land-owning Kennebec Company to build, or let locals build, a grist mill at Riverside so they could grind their grain locally. Later, he owned at least one manufactory: as mentioned in the Jan. 11 article on Seven Mile Stream, Kingsbury said sometime in or after the 1840s Webber acquired the machine shop close to the Kennebec that built “sash, blinds and doors.”

Kingsbury listed Charles Webber as Vassalboro’s first town treasurer, in 1771, and as treasurer again in 1776, when he was also town clerk; as selectman in 1773, for two years; as a member of the six-man committee that set up Vassalboro’s first nine school districts in 1790; and as a selectman in 1791, for four years (compatible with his being an assessor in 1792).

* * * * **

Another confusing note: Linwood Lowden, in his history of Windsor, says that the first mill in Windsor was Charles Webber’s, built before June 1804 on Barton Brook, which Lowden described as the “brook emptying into Webber’s mill pond.”

When Webber sold the lot in 1810, Lowden said, he reserved the right to build a mill on the stream “commonly called the inlet of Webber’s Pond.” Lowden surmised he wanted to prevent competition with his 1804 mill.

Other early sources, brought to your writer’s attention by Vicki Tobias, of Tobias History Research, confirm that Three Mile Pond was called Webber (or Webber’s) Pond in the first decade of the 1800s. Tobias shared an 1808 map, showing C Webber owning a lot abutting the southeast end of the pond.

(The map also shows I, or perhaps J, Barton and Elijah Barton owning lots east of Webber’s. See the Feb. 29 story on Windsor’s Barton family.)

Kingsbury has one more Charles Webber story that your writer found nowhere else. At the end of the section of his history dealing with early churches in Vassalboro, he described “one other place and kind of worship” that would be remembered “so long as the links of tradition can touch each other – the church and teachings of Charles Webber, who resided on the river road near Riverside.”

Webber’s former house was in 1892 Wallace W. Gilbert’s, Kingsbury wrote. Across the road, on “the James S. Emery place” in 1892, Webber built a “small edifice” late in the 1700s where he named himself pastor and preached.

The unusual feature, Kingsbury said, was that Webber could not read: his wife would read the Bible to him, and he would expound. Kingsbury quoted Webber’s introduction to a sermon: “If Polly tells me aright you will find my text….”

Your writer saves you the trouble of looking back in this article: the Charles Webber who is supposedly the subject had successive wives named Hannah, who died in 1782, and Sarah, who died in 1800. Might his nickname for one have been Polly?

Riverside preacher Webber often called on sinners to repent, saying, Kingsbury wrote, that “it was as impossible for one [a sinner] to enter heaven as it was for a shad to climb a tree.”

Kingsbury concluded: “His eccentricities and goodness survive him, as does the old church, which, on another site, is the residence of Freeman Sturgis.”

The Vassalboro Colemans/Colmans/Colmens

The 1792 assessors’ report and 1800 census that Robbins cited name John Colman, Joseph Colman and Owen Colmen; Robbins found in town records an 1802 reference to Owen Coleman; and she wrote that brothers Dudley and Charles Colman came to Vassalboro from Nantucket.

Dudley and Charles, she said, “settled land bordering Webber Pond, farmed and operated a sawmill” at the pond’s outlet. Kingsbury mentioned a Coleman sawmill, “later known as the Foster mill,” well up the stream close to the pond.

Dudley and his wife Polly (Jones) and Charles and his wife Mary (Bryant) each had eight children, Robbins wrote.

An on-line genealogy says a Revolutionary veteran named John Coleman (May 12, 1744-Sept. 22, 1823) and his wife Lois (Danforth) (June 19, 1743-Oct. 3, 1823), of Newbury, Massachusetts, settled in Vassalboro in the late 1700s with their older son, Joseph (Aug. 8, 1765-c. 1858). This source adds that they “settled in the vicinity of Webber Pond where Joseph reared a large family.”

Another genealogy, compiled in 1898 and including some of the Sturgis and Colman families, says Joseph married Mercy Cross, in 1787, and they had five sons and five daughters, born between 1791 and 1815.

It would be helpful to know when Colman or Webber Pond acquired each of its names.

Main sources

Kingsbury, Henry D., ed., Illustrated History of Kennebec County Maine 1625-1892 (1892)
Robbins, Alma Pierce, History of Vassalborough Maine 1771 1971 n.d. (1971)

Websites, miscellaneous

Oak Grove grants available

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The Oak Grove-Coburn school today, serving as the Maine Criminal Justice Academy.

The Oak Grove School Foundation is accepting applications for grants to support the education and cultural needs of students and non-profit organizations in the greater Central Maine area.

Recipients must be educational, charitable or religious organizations that are tax exempt under section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Service code.

Grant requests should be received by April 5, 2024. Funding decisions will be made in May and shortly after the funds will be distributed in July. Recent grants have ranged $500-$5,000. The OGSF has also provided seed money for initiatives that last up to three years.

Groups interested in obtaining application forms and guidelines can email ogsftreas@gmail.com or visit https://sites.google.com/site/ogsfoundationorg/major-grants.

Applications may be emailed or USPS to Oak Grove School Foundation, P.O. Box 23, East Vassalboro, ME 04935.

Select board gets 2024-25 budget ready for budget committee review

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by Mary Grow

Vassalboro select board members spent most of their March 7 meeting continuing to discuss the 2024-25 town budget, getting it in shape for budget committee review.

The Vassalboro Budget Committee is scheduled to meet Tuesday evening, March 19, Town Manager Aaron Miller said.

Select board members suggested a few more changes. They and Miller still await answers to some of the questions raised at earlier meetings, like an opinion from the town’s auditor on how some money can be rearranged (see the March 7 issue of The Town Line, p. 3).

Road work for next year was again a major topic. Public works department staff provided information on needs for equipment, paving and other work and discussed preferred ways to meet them.

Vassalboro nomination papers available

by Mary Grow

Nomination papers for Vassalboro elective officials are now available at the town office.

Two positions are open this year: Christopher French’s term on the select board and Jolene Clark Gamage’s term on the school board end. Town Clerk Cathy Coyne said as of March 11, both French and Gamage were circulating nomination papers for re-election, and Burton Miller was circulating papers for the select board position.

Members of each board serve three-year terms.

Signed papers must be returned to the town office by 5 p.m. Tuesday, April 16, with 25 signatures of registered Vassalboro voters, for candidates’ names to appear on the June 11 ballot.

The draft municipal government budget after the March 7 meeting, plus Miller’s estimate of the Kennebec County tax, totals $3.872 million, an increase of more than $300,000 over the current year.

In other business March 7, select board members approved spending up to $6,000 from unappropriated ARPA (American Rescue Plan Act) money to finish paying for two additional heat pumps at the town-owned former East Vassalboro school building, now the Vassalboro Historical Society headquarters and museum.

Miller and board member Frederick “Rick” Denico, Jr., said they are still waiting for information on what, if anything, can be done to help Vassalboro Sanitary District (VSD) customers as they face another rate increase April 1.

Miller has been consulting the town’s attorney. Denico said Laurie A. Stevens, northern New England regional director for RCAP Solutions, submitted a report and recommendations, but he awaits answers to follow-up questions.

Stevens attended a discussion on the problem in December 2023, where she explained that her organization helps small towns with water and wastewater needs. RCAP Solutions is federally funded, so neither VSD nor the town is charged for services.

“Still in a holding pattern, unfortunately,” Miller summarized.

Board members postponed discussion of the town’s personnel policy to their March 21 meeting. Miller said staff members have given him suggestions for changes.

The March 21 meeting will include a public hearing on revisions to Vassalboro’s Marijuana Business Ordinance.

Vassalboro select board continues 2024-25 budget discussions

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by Mary Grow

Vassalboro select board members continued discussion of the draft 2024-25 town budget at a special Feb. 29 meeting, focusing on two topics.

Holly Weidner, of the Conservation Commission, joined a wide-ranging discussion of protecting water quality in Vassalboro’s lakes (see the Feb. 29 issue of The Town Line, p. 3).

With Brian Lajoie from the public works department present, board members continued discussion of that budget section, considering next year’s priorities and longer-term needs, like replacing trucks as they wear out.

The select board holds a regular meeting at 6:30 p.m., Thursday, March 7. Board chairman Chris French intends continued budget consideration to be among the items on the agenda.

The water quality discussion began with a recap of plans to continue the Courtesy Boat Inspection (CBI) program.

Weidner corrected the previous report: inspectors have not found invasive plants on boats about to be launched in area lakes. The number of non-invasive plant fragments declines, she said, as inspections make more boaters aware of the need to clean watercraft thoroughly when they move from one water body to another.

The state requires sponsors of bass fishing tournaments and similar events to provide their own boat inspectors, she added.

Town Manager Aaron Miller said a recent meeting with interested parties affirmed the agreement that the CBI program will continue, overseen by the Vassalboro Conservation Commission, with the China Region Lakes Alliance (CRLA) hiring inspectors.

Weidner said Vassalboro had a watershed management plan from 2005 to 2015, prepared with help from the Kennebec County Soil and Water Conservation Commission. Towns with watershed plans, like neighboring China, are eligible to apply for water quality improvement grants.

Watershed Management Plan

In a post-meeting email about the 2005-2015 watershed plan, Holly Wiedner said it was named the Webber Pond Watershed Management Plan. It covered the drainage areas of three water bodies: Webber Pond, which is wholly in Vassalboro; Three Mile (or Threemile) Pond, shared among Vassalboro, China and Windsor; and Three Corner (or Three Cornered) Pond, in Augusta.

Select board members expressed interest in learning more about the prior plan and why it was allowed to lapse.

Proposed public works projects include reorganizing access to the fuel pumps at the town garage, which are used by multiple town departments; buying a skidsteer and a trailer to move it, and updating other equipment; and saving up money to add a storage building on the public works lot on Bog Road.

The skidsteer will let Vassalboro keep its commitment to the state to plow North Vassalboro sidewalks after the state transportation department rebuilds them, probably this summer. The new machine will have other uses year-round.

For the new building, Lajoie and board members plan what they described as a 50-by-50-foot pole barn with metal sides and roof. Lajoie said it would probably sit on a paved area. Board members will not have a firm price until they solicit bids.

After another discussion of paving costs, board members agreed tentatively to leave the 2024-25 paving budget at the current year’s $453,300. French insisted on using $100,000 left in the current account (mostly because the price of asphalt was lower than projected) for next year, to lower the impact on local taxes.

French’s proposal was approved after a discussion of how to manage the transfer to keep the auditors happy.

Miller reported one town project is done: adding surveillance cameras at town buildings was completed Feb. 29, when the transfer station’s cameras were installed.

The manager assured Weidner the final version of the proposed 2024-25 budget will include information voters need to evaluate it, like what roads are proposed for repaving. Board members talked briefly about varied funding sources, including appropriations from the alewife fund (income from the annual alewife fishery) and the Tax Increment Financing Fund (TIF, taxes on the gas pipeline running through Vassalboro).

VASSALBORO: New hire proposal withdrawn; select board nixes KVCOG membership

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by Mary Grow

After reviewing pieces of the proposed 2024-25 town budget at their regular meeting Feb. 22, Vassalboro select board members scheduled a special meeting for 6:30 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 29, to continue discussion.

Two decisions were made Feb. 22.

— Town Manager Aaron Miller said he had postponed his proposal to hire a part-time town office staff member, given the difficulty of finding candidates for the position. Select board members did not argue.
— Paying for a membership in the Kennebec Valley Council of Governments was deleted. Board chairman Chris French said he saw no need for the organization’s help in 2024-25.

Board members reduced the proposed 2024-25 paving budget. They agreed to buy a skidsteer, to plow North Vassalboro sidewalks beginning next winter and for other, year-round uses, and to budget the first of three installments for a new loader. No public works department representative was at the Feb. 22 meeting.

They considered a proposal to offer family health insurance to town employees. Miller said five employees would be interested. French sees offering the coverage as a way to keep Vassalboro competitive in the job market.

There was consensus that adding family coverage to present policies is not necessarily the way to go; more options will be explored.

Conservation Commission spokesman Holly Weidner said the China Region Lakes Alliance (CRLA), for which $13,500 was recommended, is inactive for lack of an executive director. There is a proposal that China and Vassalboro lake associations take over the CRLA’s Courtesy Boat Inspection (CBI) program, with the Conservation Commission coordinating and getting the $13,500.

The proposed appropriation was labeled water quality and its place in the budget left undetermined while, Miller said, he “figures out what’s going on.”

Weidner said over the years CBI inspectors have found and removed fragments of invasive weeds on boats being brought to China and Vassalboro lakes and ponds.

Select board members’ recommended budget will be reviewed by the budget committee. Voters will make the final decisions at the June 3 annual town meeting.

The Feb. 22 meeting started with a public hearing on a revised solid waste ordinance, now renamed the Solid Waste & Recycling Ordinance. There were no public comments. This ordinance, like the budget, will need voters’ approval.

A second public hearing was on an application for a junkyard license for the property at 1499 Riverside Drive, which includes a junkyard and a business named ABC Fuel. There was agreement to consider the junkyard and the fuel business as separate, even though they’re on the same site.

Codes officer Jason Lorrain said although the application is for a junkyard license renewal, he considers it a new license, because, he said, former owner Olin Charette’s son is the current owner.

On Lorrain’s recommendation, select board members unanimously approved the junkyard license. Lorrain said the new license has the same conditions, like requiring screening, that previous ones had.

From the audience, planning board member Douglas Phillips said ABC Fuel needs a site review permit from the planning board as a new business.

In other business, select board members continued discussing with Lorrain, Phillips and Miller what changes, if any, need to be made in town ordinances to comply with the new state law commonly called LD 2003.

Intended to promote affordable housing, LD 2003 loosens density requirements in some parts of municipalities to allow one or two ADUs, Accessory Dwelling Units, to share a lot on which a single house currently stands.

There was agreement on two points: the law would not allow increased housing density along Vassalboro’s lakes and ponds, because shoreland zoning limitations would prevail; and the relevant document in Vassalboro is the town’s eight-page Building Permit Ordinance, not the Site Review Ordinance.

Miller said there are evidently two options: propose amendments to the Building Permit Ordinance for voters’ approval, or take no action, in effect leaving compliance with state law to the codes officer.

The codes officer, rather than the planning board, has primary responsibility for the Building Permit Ordinance. Lorrain has been studying the issue and presented some questions for select board discussion.

An ordinance amendment, if the chosen choice, would require a public hearing and a town vote. Renewed discussion was postponed until May, after board members finish preparing the 2024-25 budget.

Open letter to Maine legislators

The following letter was sent to all Maine legislators from Vassalboro Town Manager Aaron Miller:

Feb. 21, 2023

Dear Legislator,

I am writing to you today as a member of Delta Ambulance’s Board of Directors, Town Manager of Vassalboro, first responder for Whitefield, and resident of Alna.

Faced with inadequate funding, EMS agencies in Maine have struggled for years to keep their heads above water. In the years since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, many of those services have been pushed beyond their tipping point.

Staffing shortages were exacerbated by delays in new EMS clinician graduations and agencies were subsequently forced into wage wars to recruit and retain existing field providers. Payroll along with other operating costs rose to levels never seen before while insurance reimbursements, the backbone of EMS funding, stagnated.

The Blue Ribbon Commission extensively studied EMS services across Maine and identified a large gap between reimbursement and expenses. The Commission recommended a dispersal of $70 million each year for five years to all of Maine’s transport services. Despite the Commission’s recommendation and clear demonstration of need, less than half of the $70 million was approved for a one-time infusion, and only $10 million was allocated for emergency funding. Furthermore, transporting services like Delta were capped at receiving no more than $200 thousand – an amount that quite frankly will do nothing for sustainability.

For the first time since 1972, Delta, which currently provides 911 coverage to 13 towns in the greater Augusta and Waterville regions, recently instituted service fees of $15 per capita to towns receiving their 911 coverage. At the end of last year, Delta announced that the per-capita charge will increase to $25 per capita for 2024 and that by 2025, it will fall somewhere in a range between the mid-thirties to seventies depending on other factors. These numbers reflect the necessary changes to reach a break-even budget.

Just recently, municipal officials in the towns of Albion, Benton, China, Fairfield, and Oakland have cited a “fiduciary responsibility” to their citizens and are asking for a reduced rate of $20 per capita this year – an amount that cannot be accommodated by Delta. If the BRC’s recommended amount had been approved and released promptly, it would have allowed for a slower per-capita rate increase and lessened the blow to towns already facing financial challenges of their own.

The funding was announced seven months ago. Delta still hasn’t seen any of these funds despite a successful application submission which was not made available until December. Can you please let us know when we can expect to receive these funds? What are the plans to effectively address the statewide issue and how will this be accomplished in a timely manner?

Sincerely, Aaron C. Miller

Vassalboro school board members see small piece of budget

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Vassalboro Community School (contributed photo)

by Mary Grow

Vassalboro school board members got an introduction to some small pieces of the 2024-25 school budget at their Feb. 13 meeting. There will be more budget discussion at future meetings.

The Feb. 13 agenda included presentations from:

— Finance director Paula Pooler on three accounts, a $500 one that will remain the same next year as this year and two that are slated to be reduced by around $8,000, total, in 2024-25;
— Transportation director Ashley Pooler, whose presentation sparked a discussion of whether to apply to the state for a new school bus for next year (the preliminary answer is yes); and
— Technology director Will Backman, who explained a proposed $8,000 increase in the technology budget.

Another minor budget issue that generated discussion was school board members’ compensation. They currently receive $40 per meeting, a figure Superintendent Alan Pfeiffer said (and, from the audience, select board member Michael Poulin agreed) is less than other area school or select board members get.

Board members want to think about whether to propose an increase, so a decision was postponed.

Future meetings will deal with larger budget figures. This year’s Vassalboro school budget, as approved by voters at the 2023 town meeting, totals a little over $9 million.

Paula Pooler said spending remains on track, and the lunch program, which ran a deficit for some years, is holding its own. Pfeiffer said there are planned kitchen upgrades at Vassalboro Community School, now that the lunch program can support them.

After another discussion of the day care program Jennifer Lizotte operates at VCS, board members agreed to consider extending the lease for more than a year at a time, so Lizotte can make long-range plans with confidence. The topic will be on the agenda for the March school board meeting, scheduled for 6 p.m. Tuesday, March 19.