Vassalboro planners, town manager work on questionnaire to be mailed to town residents

by Mary Grow

When Vassalboro select board members and Town Manager Aaron Miller work on the questionnaire they intend to mail with the 2023-24 tax bills, planning board members would like to have three questions from them included.

At their May 2 meeting, board members spent almost an hour winnowing member Douglas Phillips’ list of suggestions to three and refining the wording. They agreed they would like voters’ opinions on:

• Whether Vassalboro needs a phosphorus control ordinance, perhaps similar to China’s, that would limit phosphorus-laden run-off from new or substantially revised development;
• Whether the town should have an ordinance that limits at least some types of commercial development to certain areas; and
• Whether the town should make greater efforts to preserve open space for conservation and/or recreation.

Board members deliberately did not go into detail at this stage; for example, they did not talk about what type(s) of commercial development could be affected. They did not want to stir up debate over “the z-word” – zoning – that Vassalboro voters have rejected in the past.

Board member John Phillips wondered if suggestions for more town ordinances might also generate negative responses.

Board chairman Virginia Brackett summarized the anti-regulation versus regulation dilemma when she said, “You can’t do anything you want with your own property and then complain when your neighbor does the same.”

Another issue before planning board members on May 2 was a request from select board members for recommended site review application fees for commercial projects. John Phillips read from a town ordinance that says the planning board makes recommendations, the select board sets the fees and both boards review them annually.

Discussion included whether applications for all types of commercial projects should be charged alike or whether some – medical marijuana growing businesses and solar farms, specifically – should have separate fee schedules. Board members made no recommendation.

There was consensus that the current $50 fee is too low to cover the codes officer’s work on commercial projects. Board members recommended application fees of $100 for a minor site review and $400 for a major site review.

The third issue was a discussion with Webber Pond Association President John Reuthe about water quality in the lake. Last summer, Webber Pond turned green with an obnoxious and unhealthful algae bloom (see the Sept. 15, 2022, issue of The Town Line, p. 1).

Reuthe and board members discussed many factors complicating work to improve water quality.

One is the condition of the outlet dam, owned by the Webber Pond Association. Reuther said the fishway at the dam admits migrating alewives, who carry away algae they’ve eaten when they leave in the fall; and association members open the gates to increase fall outflow of algae-laden water. He said the dam gates need easier-to-manage controls and the fishway should be rebuilt.

Another issue is identifying and correcting sources of phosphorus entering the lake. Reuthe considers camp roads a major contributor, but not necessarily the only one.

A third complication is that Three Mile Pond affects Webber Pond, and Three Mile Pond has shoreline in China, Vassalboro and Windsor. Improvements will require cooperation from all three towns, for example in enforcing shoreland regulations.

Reuthe said he and Three Mile Pond Association president Tom Whittaker have discussed water quality.

There are a number of other interested parties, including Maine Rivers (the organization instrumental in opening Outlet Stream to alewives), China Region Lakes Alliance, the state Department of Marine Resources (which owns the fishway) and the Maine Department of Transportation, whose planned replacement of a 1930s culvert on Whitehouse Road is expected to increase alewife migration.

Reuthe said the 2023 Webber Pond Association annual meeting is scheduled for the beginning of summer, instead of the end as in past years, to remind landowners of their responsibility to protect water quality.

Reuthe did not ask for planning board action, and none was proposed. He thinks a Vassalboro phosphorus control ordinance might be helpful; board member Paul Mitnik, who administered China’s while he was that town’s codes officer, called it “valuable.”

The next regular Vassalboro planning board meeting will be Tuesday evening, June 6 (the evening after the open town meeting). Codes officer Robert Geaghan, Jr., expects at least two permit applications, for a new business in an existing building, on Main Street, in North Vassalboro, and for a new building adjoining the Oak Grove chapel, on Oak Grove Road, just off Route 201 (Riverside Drive).