Town of Poland Maine - Minutes 12/14/06

In attendance were: Buffy Morrissette, Scott Segal, Joan Spitzform, Patricia Nash, Fred Huntress, Stan Tetenman, Rebecca Moran, Jim Porter. Guests: Larry Moreau, Poland Planning Board Chair, and Bill Willett, Poland Code Enforcement.

The meeting was called to order at 7:05 p.m. by Chair, Buffy Morrissette. This writer was elected secretary for the evening in lieu of Rebecca, who arrived late.

Patricia first brought up discussion regarding the emails that had been circulated early on, and asked that this does not happen again. Stan suggested that we agree to stick to the agenda for each meeting. Scott stated that while emailing is great for committees to bounce ideas and share information, private thoughts and concerns should be shared privately. Stan suggested that at the end of each meeting, we discuss topics for the next meeting that will become the agenda.

Larry Moreau reminded members of the Community Right to Know Act and to remind us that any and all emails pertaining to this committee are open for public scrutiny, and that we should be mindful of that.

Scott brought up the fact that if we break into sub-committees for any part of the plan, emailing would not be recommended, we should call a meeting through the proper channels because it would have to be considered a public meeting.

Buffy then asked guest speaker, Larry Moreau to speak to the committee. He started by saying that we as a committee are a sub-committee of the planning board. I will highlight his main points to us:

2. Our time-line in relation to Town Meeting in April 2007, is crucial. Some issues are more important than others to have ready by Town Meetings. Parts of the plan that the state finds lacking include, statistical information and items like the high school not being included in current plan.

3. We should focus on the obvious parts of the plan and the stats for Town Meeting. Bring the stats up to date, remove all items in the plan that no longer apply (high school, etc.) and present it at Town Meeting.

Stan asked Larry if we needed to have a public hearing to review the plan and its changes prior to Town Meeting. He didn’t think so. Larry stated that the stats could be completed by the committee in time, but that our Vision Statement would need to be developed with the help of a consultant after the budget is approved in June or July ’07.

Scott shared his thoughts on the positive benefits of having a Comprehensive Plan. For example: if a company wanted to develop a business here in town, they could use our comprehensive plan to aid them in their presentation to the planning board. They would already know the town requirements, etc. and it would make for a smoother transition for all parties.

A. It was recommended that we should work hand-in-hand with the Economic Development Committee in developing our Vision statement so that we are on the same page with our plans for Poland. She then informed us of some of their plans and suggested that perhaps we could ask them to come speak to us at a later meeting.

B. Rebecca recommended that the committee adopt Robert’s Rules of Order as our meeting guidelines. Larry Moreau recommended that we could also contact AVCOG to inform them that we are developing a new committee for the town and ask them for a copy of the condensed version of Roberts Rules.

A motion was made by Rebecca that we adopt Roberts Rules of Order, Patricia seconded. Discussion followed with Stan suggesting that perhaps we should be recognized by the Chair prior to speaking so that the discussion does not get out of hand. It would help to keep to the order we establish. Scott would like to see the ending time be 9:00 p.m. for our meetings and asked that the chairperson keep us to task, and felt that by adopting Roberts Rules would help us accomplish that.

1. Larry pointed out that the 2007-year runs from July 1, 2007 through June 30, 2008. All budget requests must be submitted prior to February 8, 2007.

Rosemary Roy, Assistant Town Manager, would like our budget request for the next 3 months to be submitted by January 2^nd. Rebecca will be getting those figures together and submitting them to Rosemary for the next Selectman’s meeting, December 19^th.

Patricia asked that the budget figures be either mailed, or emailed to us prior to being submitted to the Selectmen so that we are all aware of them.

Bill Ouellette recommended that we develop a calendar of events for the next fiscal year and base our consultant times, etc. from that timeline. He is willing to meet with whomever is available on January 4^th at 10 a.m. in the town office. He also recommended that we not forget to use the town bulletin board located at town hall for our announcements.

This part of the agenda was moved to the next meeting for lack of time this evening. Buffy recommended that we look at the website that she forwarded to us via email if we wanted to see the type of information they had access to at the meeting.

Buffy met with the Planning Board after our 2^nd meeting and they have provided her with names of resources we could use in helping us develop our Plan.

1. Surveys – John Maloney recommended that there were other ways to obtain information from the townspeople other than surveys. We may want to look into neighborhood group meetings, perhaps with a survey that they can complete at the end of the meetings.

Patricia handed out copies of the AVCOG Poland Population Projections and the Senior Housing Survey results that were done by the Poland Senior Housing Committee. These will be reviewed for next meeting.

Buffy asked if there was a piece of the plan we would like to focus on for the next meeting. It was suggested that we start with the statistics and elaborate on the data that Rebecca has been gathering. We can divide up the areas that she has not gotten to at the next meeting.

It was decided that the minutes should be at Town Office the Friday prior to the next meeting in order for them to be available and mailed to all committee members by the following Thursday in time for the meeting.