Town attorney rules protest letter does not meet requirement for petition

by Mary Grow

The April 18 Vassalboro select board meeting was in sections. After an hour and a half discussing road work, Vassalboro Sanitary District customers’ communication and other matters, board members recessed for an executive session with the town attorney.

They then spent another half hour in open meeting talking about the draft warrant for the June 3 and 11 town meeting, before another short executive session.

The only action taken after either executive session was a prompt adjournment after the second one.

Proposed road repaving has been discussed repeatedly among select board and budget committee members, with information and recommendations from Brian Lajoie of the public works department. After the April 16 budget committee meeting, attendees thought they had agreed that the big project for the summer of 2024 would be repaving the Church Hill Road to the Augusta line.

At the April 18 select board meeting, Lajoie advised reconsidering. Central Maine Power Company plans to replace lines along that road, he said, and the company’s heavy machinery would chew up the new pavement.

Although, he said, CMP is supposed to pay for any damage, he still preferred to postpone the repaving.

Select board members therefore tentatively added back into the 2024 paving schedule several shorter stretches of town road. As of April 18, Art. 5 in the draft town meeting warrant allocates $570,000 for road paving.

The other road issue discussed was the state Department of Transportation’s (MDOT) planned replacement of the Meadow Brook bridge on Bog Road, about seven-tenths of a mile west of the four-way intersection in East Vassalboro.

MDOT Project Manager Gary Libby said the current schedule calls for the work to be bid out in December 2024 and done in the summer of 2025.

The plan is to replace the bridge with a box culvert. Libby described the culvert and the roadway above, which he said will have 11-foot travel lanes and three-foot shoulders, making it a bit wider than the current bridge.

Work will include installing a dry hydrant for the Vassalboro Fire Department. The department is to provide materials and oversee the contractor’s installation.

An on-line public forum in May, dates to be announced, will let residents ask questions and offer comments.

Libby expects work to start after June 15 and to take about six weeks.

MDOT’s proposed detour uses Taber Hill and Gray roads. Gray Road runs west from Route 32 to its intersection with Taber Hill, where traffic would make a sharp left turn to go south to Bog Road on the west side of the detour.

Board and audience members questioned whether trucks would have trouble with the sharp turn at the intersection, and whether increased traffic would be hard on Gray Road. Lajoie and others said Gray Road is scheduled for repaving this summer, and it does not have a very strong base.

Libby was willing to investigate a truck route following Taber Hill Road north to Oak Grove Road, where traffic could turn east and join Route 32 in North Vassalboro. The sight lines where Taber Hill Road joins Oak Grove Road would be one factor to consider, he said.

The Vassalboro Sanitary District discussion was sparked by what Town Manager Aaron Miller called a letter of protest from residents served by the District, who have repeatedly asked for help with high user fees. The document was intended as a petition, Miller said, but the town attorney said it did not meet requirements, and it lacked the needed 219 signatures.

Miller said he had advised the senders what to do if they wanted to submit an article for the warrant for the June 3 town meeting.

During the first part of their meeting, select board members:

— Appointed Albion resident Cindy Spaulding to the Vassalboro Cemetery Committee. Miller summarized her credentials and said current cemetery committee members were satisfied.
— Approved $15,000 in ARPA (American Rescue Plan Act) funds for the volunteer fire department for turnout gear (see the April 18 issue of The Town Line, p. 3).
— Agreed by consensus to postpone buying a new backhoe.

After the first executive session, they reviewed Miller’s preliminary draft of the town meeting warrant. As of April 18, the warrant had 41 articles to be acted on at the open meeting, scheduled for 6:30 p.m., Monday, June 3, in the Vassalboro Community School gymnasium.

Another three articles are to be voted by written ballot on Tuesday, June 11, at the town office, with polls open from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Local elections will be held at the same time and place.

Town Clerk Cathy Coyne reported two incumbents submitted nomination papers for two positions on local boards: Christopher French for a three-year term on the select board, and Jolene Clark Gamage for a three-year term on the school board.

Miller said veteran moderator Richard Thompson has agreed to moderate the town meeting, for the last time; he plans to retire after this year.

by Mary Grow

Vassalboro School Board members continued review of the proposed 2024-25 budget at an April 3 special meeting. At their regular meeting April 9, they discussed non-budgetary and budgetary issues, before joining the Vassalboro Budget Committee for a joint review of the proposed 2024-25 school budget.

The April 3 meeting, held despite an impending snowstorm, featured virtual participation by special education director Tanya Thibeau, director of maintenance and grounds Shelley Phillips, Vassalboro Community School principal Ira Michaud and assistant principal Tabitha Brewer.

The administrators explained their sections of the budget and answered board members’ questions.

At the April 9 meeting, Superintendent Alan Pfeiffer presented a draft 2024-25 school calendar, which he said is very similar to the current year’s calendar except that there are fewer early release days – nine instead of 14.

School calendar very similar to last year’s except there are fewer early release days – nine instead of 14.

Michaud said teachers need time to discuss educational issues among themselves, but he realizes having students come home early inconveniences many parents.

Board members considered late start days instead of early release days, but doubted that plan would be any less inconvenient. They also discussed having early releases other than Thursday afternoons; Michaud said consistency seemed to help families plan.

Two budget issues were the addition of a second school counselor, and the reductions made from the initial proposed budget to the revised version approved unanimously April 9.

Michaud and Pfeiffer defended the need for a second counselor. Pfeiffer distributed a paper administrators prepared supporting the addition.

VCS currently has 410 students enrolled, and one counselor. The American School Counselor Association recommends a ratio of at least one counselor for every 250 students, for adequate service.

Data from the 2023 Maine integrated health survey shows an increase over 2021 results in the percentages of middle school students who reported they had “felt sad or hopeless” for longer than two consecutive weeks or who had “serious thoughts of harming or killing themselves.”

A second counselor would allow more time for classroom work, building social and emotional skills, and for work with small groups and individual students in need of extra support.

Before 2022, VCS lost three school counselors in a fairly short time, the paper said. “All three cited the high student ratio” as a major challenge that discouraged them from staying.

Items deleted from the initial budget proposal included one teacher (by attrition); one educational technician; one bus driver and bus run (Pfeiffer said the change was in effect, after a driver resigned, and students were not getting home significantly later); new tables in the library; and new tile flooring in the lower-level classrooms.

Another move to save taxpayer dollars was allocation of $185,000, instead of the initially-proposed $135,000, from the school’s undesignated fund balance.

In other business April 9, Pfeiffer commented that some of the newly-installed ceiling fans were already being used as the weather warmed.

Michaud reported that Vassalboro cub scouts hosted the Kennebec Valley District Pinewood Derby at Vassalboro Community School the previous weekend, with “an excellent turnout.”

For the April 8 eclipse, glasses were distributed to all students and staff for safe viewing from VCS, on the buses or at their homes, Michaud said.

The next regular Vassalboro School Board meeting is scheduled for 6 p.m. Tuesday, May 21.

by Mary Grow

Vassalboro budget committee members reviewed the select board’s draft 2024-25 municipal budget at two lengthy meetings March 19 and March 26.

Both boards’ members are aware that many taxpayers cannot afford a large local property tax increase. They are also aware that the town is facing unavoidable higher costs in many areas. A theme of the meetings was what should be done immediately, what can be postponed and what can be considered unnecessary.

Town Manager Aaron Miller summarized major budget aspects in a hand-out at the March 19 meeting. At that time, he wrote, the select board’s proposed budget of just over $3.9 million was $358,393 higher than the current year’s. At the March 26 meeting, Miller said that increase would raise local property taxes by under one mil ($1 for each $1,000 of valuation).

However, the draft did not include the Kennebec County budget; Miller’s estimated figure represented a 10 percent increase. When the budget was presented at a March 27 county meeting in Augusta, the proposed overall increase in taxes to municipalities was 44 percent (varying by municipality).

County officials did not approve the budget March 27. Another meeting is scheduled for April 9, according to the report in the Central Maine newspapers.

Vassalboro discussions have not yet included the 2024-25 school budget. Local taxpayers funded almost $1.4 million of the current year’s $9 million school budget.

Miller’s summary named four areas with the largest proposed increases: the request from Delta Ambulance; setting aside funds in the assessing account to prepare for a town-wide revaluation; adding to the capital improvements budget; and adding one new employee, to be shared between the public works department and the transfer station.

The last two were discussed at length. Budget committee members made no final recommendations, but straw polls indicated a lack of support for either, as presented.

The substantially increased Delta Ambulance bill for 2024-25 drew brief comments at both meetings. The 2024-25 request is for $110,475. For the current year, the service requested and voters approved $66,285.

Select board chairman Chris French sees no reasonable alternative to Delta. Neither the Augusta nor the Waterville-Winslow ambulance service will add Vassalboro, and a town service would cost $700,000 just for labor costs, he said.

Miller does not expect a revaluation for another four or five years, but recommends setting aside money in preparation.

Proposed capital additions include new and replacement equipment, building maintenance and a new building.

Equipment that select board members recommend includes a new skid-steer, with bucket and snowblower attachments and a trailer to move it, and a replacement loader.

Select board members recommend the skid-steer in 2024-25 because they expect the state will build the promised new North Vassalboro sidewalks this summer; the town is obligated to plow the sidewalks; the loader now used for plowing sidewalks does a poor job and is too big to work on the new walkways without damaging them; and hiring someone to do the work would cost more than buying a machine.

Phillips is concerned that in much of North Vassalboro, houses are so close to the sidewalk that snow would need to be blown into the roadway.

The skid-steer would be used year-round, Miller and select board members said. It would help with town recreational trail maintenance and with shoulder work on roads, for example.

The loader would replace a machine that is almost 25 years old with more than 12,000 hours on it, French said at the March 26 meeting. Miller explained why it is needed and why the proposed skid-steer could not do its work.

Miller’s introductory letter said the town has been offered “a three-year zero percent interest rate plan for both pieces of equipment.” Select board members have discussed asking voters for $79,000 a year for three years.

The new trailer is estimated to cost $12,000.

Also needing more discussion is how soon the town needs a replacement truck for public works and what size it should be.

The two boards continued the discussion select board members have conducted for months about heating and other equipment at the town office. French’s goal is to have the office continue to function through a major storm.

Heat pumps are installed, and generators have been purchased but not installed. Questions remaining include whether to replace the 23-year-old boiler (as a back-up), whether to add another fuel tank and related issues.

Proposed building reserves include adding to the fund for an additional equipment storage building at the public works lot, and starting a maintenance fund for the town-owned former East Vassalboro schoolhouse, which the town leases to the Vassalboro Historical Society.

Schaffer asked whether the “huge” sand and salt building could be used for storage, since Vassalboro uses less road sand than in the past. Discussion included whether a building that contains salt is suitable for machinery and whether better ventilation would help.

Two other pending projects are major transfer station renovations and replacing the culvert on Mill Hill Road, tentatively with a bridge. The transfer station work has a reserve fund; select board members propose starting one for the road. They hope grants will help pay for both.

The main reason for considering adding an employee is safety, French said. An additional plow-truck driver would let road crew members work shorter, less exhausting shifts in snowstorms; and when one of the two transfer station staffers was out, the other would not work alone.

To French’s additional suggestion that taxpayers would save money if winter overtime were reduced, budget committee member Dallas Smedberg suggested plow drivers might appreciate their overtime pay.

Earlier in the year, select board members considered adding a part-time town office employee. They have scrapped that idea, at least for 2024-25.

Discussion of pay increases for town employees was inconclusive. Miller and the select board recommend a 3.2 percent cost of living (COLA) adjustment, plus two percent merit increases (except for two employees who have been with the town so long they are at the top of the pay scale; for them, an equivalent stipend is proposed).

Smedberg commented March 26 that in his experience, it is unusual for people at the top of a pay scale to get anything more than an annual COLA.

On another pay issue, Smedberg asked why the fire chief gets a $10,000 annual stipend, more than any of the select board members, even if French’s proposed $500 extra for the chairman is approved.

Board member Frederick “Rick” Denico, Jr., replied, “We don’t get called out at night or weekends much.”

A Fortin Road resident came to the March 26 meeting to ask that her dirt road be paved, as a safety measure. It has been impassable in recent storms, she said, leaving three households without emergency access.

Budget committee members discussed whether and, if so, when the town could pave all remaining dirt roads, another issue select board members have considered.

The next Vassalboro budget committee meeting was scheduled for Wednesday evening, April 3, unless the forecasted snowstorm led to a change.