City Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening, everyone. I'd like to call this meeting to order, please. Thank you.

Item two is adjustments to the agenda.

I need to add accepting Victoria Gantz's resignation from the Energy Committee. We can put that right at the end. Would that be 16? Do you need to speak up, please?

Sorry?

Do you need to speak up? Hold on. That's the problem.

You're on, Brian.

Just maybe speak up.

How about now?

Bring me down a bit. Just my channel. Thanks.

We have two adjustments. Yeah, accepting Victoria Gantz's resignation. And no minutes for the public hearing. Sorry, what? No minutes for the public hearing.

Right, and the OOB, HB, we delete because there is a public hearing. We have no minutes to it.

You're putting it under 6T, the acceptance of Victoria's resignation?

Yep.

Do I have a motion to that effect?

I'll make that motion. I'll second.

It's been moved and seconded. Any further discussion on the motion? Hearing none, roll call please, Sarah.

Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.

have some changes with respect to how the state records. And you'll see there's a map in there to expand their premises for increased services.

Anybody from the public like to speak for or against? Seeing none, I'll close the public hearing. 3B, renewal of liquor license for Horn Run Brewing. Anybody in the audience like to speak for or against that? Seeing none, I'll close that. We're on item four, public open forum.

Since you haven't voted me yet, Victoria Gantz, I'm here representing the Energy Committee.

And since you haven't voted for my presentation yet, the Energy Committee is going to do another window dressers bill this year. We have folks who have already done audits. We have much less money. Our funding was cut severely. The build is going to be sometime in November, and we are looking for volunteers both for the committee and for window dressers for the actual build. If you are interested in either, please get in touch with Jeanne Peacock. Because we have less funding this year, we're going to do less number of windows, 10 windows per household instead of an entire household at one time. And the folks who have had an energy audit already will be top of the list. So they will be the first folks offered window dressers, window inserts. And then if we don't use all of those insert slots with the audited folks, then they will All right.

Thank you, Victoria. John? John?

Oh, jeez.

Feel free just to take it right out.

For me, it actually is. Thank you, John. My voice is so loud, it probably carries the guitar in place. The benefits of being a theatrically born person. So, I'm standing in front of you to give an update. It's really hard to get actual time time. The project that I have been working on has reached two plots.

Plot number one is that there seems to be no or any emails that seem to have been sent out from the city to the grant managers, making it impossible for us to receive any grant funding this year. John, can you be clear what you're, I'm not sure what you're talking about. The grant for automatic snow removers for our sidewalks. For the people who don't know, I've been working on this project for two years, and in the process of these two years, trying to get all of the paperwork together for April. The last date that it can be submitted to my understanding is August 1st for any type of 2027 funding. So if we do get a grant out, it will be 2028. The problem that we're going to run into is twofold. Number one, we are processing currently a voter amendment to restrict support that will have a direct effect to how much we can actually get if it goes through what I've spoken to earlier about unintended consequences.

Currently, each one of the individual machines counts as a data collection computer, and the whole system

overall management, and I'm not really sure under the ordinance how that would work. I haven't really gotten into it, but with the amount of sidewalks we have, the buildings that we use, it would definitely go over the 12,000 square foot collection.

So that's something special

The other problem we're running into is we are now three years behind. The Department of Transportation of Canada has been running a similar program within the province of Ontario, which is now being expanded to Quebec and to Saskatchewan to clean the sidewalks they have been testing

This year, five communities in Ontario will be getting upgraded equipment to clear their streets.

This equipment is an autonomous snow plow that runs at about 15 to 20 miles an hour. And it can clean a mile of street in about 15 minutes. It is electric. It can be ran on a power grid or it can be run on autonomous power, such as a generator or a If we had looked at the proposal that I had drafted up that had been at some point two or three years ago sent to council and the city manager, we were asking for $150,000. This year, that would have moved up to $250,000 just because of inflation. And right now, as I see the project, we're going to be looking at $260,000. thousand dollars that includes but is not limited to the autonomous plows themselves which are really really great if you've ever seen these things in action they clear driveways in a matter of minutes blowing snow up to eight feet in the air to a direction anywhere that you choose they're really really lovely things that would include 10 of those units it would include 10

units. That's a 5x3 solar panel that can be plugged directly into the power grid. That will cover the times that we lose power here in Eastport when the solar panels are plugged into the power grid.

When they are not producing power for the objects, they will be producing power that goes back directly to the grid that the city receives funding for. It would also include new computers and equipment as well as interns from the University of Maine Robotics Department. That's how the grant had currently been drafted up.

That was the cover letter that was drafted up three years ago that has been sitting somewhere in city hall waiting to go out in email.

So as it stands right now, we're looking probably at 2029 before this project should even be off the ground because of our delays. Having said that, there's a similar process going on in Michigan, in upper state Michigan,

Because these devices are so successful at removing snow, it cuts down on the municipal's cost. Thank you. I don't remember who said that. But it also cuts down on the municipal manpower hours.

You have to spend an incredibly less amount of time for manpower hours. If the project got upgraded to include one or two of these new wonderful autonomous... vehicles for cleaning streets, which would have been the obvious next place for it, you would be looking at a significant reduction in the manpower hours, and the project literally pays for itself within a decade. So I am hoping, by bringing this to the council's attention today, that the communications will start flowing again since it hasn't flown since May, and we can get on this for the fiscal year 2020.

people who give back to me, I would appreciate that very, very much.

And thank you for letting me give the update.

Thank you very much, John.

If you have any questions, I'm here for questions. I have a question, please.

John, I have a question. What's the lifespan of one of those machines?

We'd have to be going on period right now because this technology is so new, but the lifespan currently... probably somewhere between 10 and 15 years, the same as you would expect for a normal snowplow.

Thank you, John. Anyone else from the public? Gene? I think these are long, this is a public forum. We can have a discussion with John on all of the issues, but we need to move on to the council's meeting. I'm sorry, John, but we have time. We do have time, and we will be discussing it, and we'll make sure that the emails start following. Thank you. Thank you, John.

from 144 County Road. Thank you very much. I have two quick questions on the agenda. One was I'd like to understand why we think we need another police cruiser from Fort Fairfield.

Have you spoken to the police chief yet? No. Okay, you should. Okay.

We'll discuss that agenda.

Yeah, we will. But any of those questions you can certainly ask.

Okay, but if they're going to be approved tonight, it's hard if we don't have the information.

Right. But the police chief's been in all week, I think.

No, he's not in this week. Okay, I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

He hasn't been in. But the doors are open. The police chief, the city manager, we're all willing to talk about any of this stuff. We don't need to do it here. But either way.

So that's going to include the MMA risk reduction grant too?

Yes.

So we can't get any answers before this is approved?

You can anytime. City Hall is open.

Okay, but at this point, I can't.

I would say no. We will be discussing it during the meeting, yes.

And it's an application? It's not an acceptance?

Yeah.

Okay.

Well, thank you.

Thank you.

And I certainly don't mean to be sounding harsh, Jean. That's not my prerogative. It's just City Hall is open and a lot of these questions can be answered before we even get here. So that we can do our meeting. Wouldn't it make sense to answer those questions for everybody who's in attendance at this point? We are going to answer during our meeting. We're going to be voting on it. And if Yes, you're right, it is. But the agenda has been posted since last Friday. Nobody's read it. But thank you, and I'm sorry, Jane, again, I'm not trying to pick on you.

Not a problem.

Okay, thank you.

Hi, everyone, I'm Bernie Robinson from the Elevated Sports. I'd like to say a few words about the voter approval measure that the council of lawyers have recommended that the city throw away. The voter approval measure, it's a sister petition to the AIE and Senator Bannon. We've watched the data centers all over the country circumvent local bans by rebranding themselves. So sometimes they're calling themselves remote co-location facilities or digital surveillance centers to get around the language of these local bans. For that reason, the voter approval measure would give Eastport voters the right to approve hyperscale development on our island. We use the largest building here as our litmus test. That's the former cannery building at just under 25,000 square feet. So what the voter approval measure was hoping to do was to give voters the opportunity to accept or deny industrial development that's larger than the biggest building that's already here. I think that's pretty fair, and it gives us cover in case no matter what a data center wants to call itself next year, the year before, the year after, it means that approval power still stays with the voters. Last week, the city lawyers at Redmond and Whitchell published a memorandum giving the council basically a blueprint to toss the voter approval measure on what I think are some pretty flimsy clinicalities. They argued that the voter-approved petition didn't define the scope of temperature change, which would count as pollution. But on reviewing Eastport's own city codes, Eastport's city codes don't define pollution either. So I'm not sure why a citizen's initiative is being scrutinized more than their own lawmakers are. The city attorneys also signed a case law for why petitions should be thrown out. That both cases were situations where an ordinance attempted to either change the threshold for a vote to succeed, that would be Brooks v. Town of Harbor, or whether the ordinance specified a vote must be, you must use a secret ballot, but a town conducted a vote that opened the best lunch at the town of Waldrow. Neither of our other simple measures want to do any of these things. I don't think they're relevant. Now, under the city charter 2.02 , the council has the power to amend any public petitions before adding them to the November ballot. City lawyers are paid out of our taxes, and I think they should work for us. Regular people shouldn't need to hire private attorneys to participate in democracy. Citizens' initiatives, it's right in the name. They're supposed to be accessible to regular people. And I think the council should honor the spirit of the petition and the will of the people here. They should have asked her to be lawyers to strengthen the policies instead of killing men. I hope the council does the right thing. I hope I'm wrong. I hope they do the right thing. I hope they make whatever ministerial changes need to be made, and they move the voter approval measure to November ballot. To give it to Council for Assistance to the petition to restart, I personally don't believe that will happen. I hope I'm wrong, but in case I'm not, The district committee is writing all of the objections raised in voter approval measure. This morning, we filed affidavits to repeat the signature gathering process. So this is a wildly popular initiative. We did it before. We'll do it again. So to the council, do as you will. I hope you guys do the right thing. If you don't, we'll be ready for that. To the community, you need 150 signatures to get this thing on the ballot. If you're interested in signing, you can find something with a blue folder just like this. There's a couple other books here who have them. And that petition is to sign, and we've mended the issues. So thank you so much.

I'll leave the AI to the professionals so they won't say anything wrong. But I wanted to voice a couple of things. The new patrol car that we're getting. Al, could you please state your name first? Thank you. Thank you. The new patrol car that we're getting, and I have utmost respect for all the in the city. But will this car be traveling 90 miles back and forth to home, too, so the citizens are paying for the fuel, the other, as does the chief? Or are we going to do something different with that? Something just to think about. I look at it and I see all the employees are part-time. Wouldn't it be good to have some full-time employees and give them insurance and benefits and stuff like that? Every time when they talk to somebody, they say, oh, they're part-time employees. It would be nice to have some full-time employees.

We do. Thank you.

Not enough. I asked for the financials the other day, the audit, and asked if they were audited. And I was answered back, they're working on them. Now they've got 2024 online. And they're working on 2025. But a lot of people emailed the city asking for the audited financials. They never got a response.

Yeah.

I'm not aware of that. Huh? I'm not aware of that.

The state auditor that lives in one of the missions. I'm sorry. I couldn't hear you. The state auditor that lives across, you know, down the street from me. She would show me how many emails and stuff. And I know I have in the past.

As you stated, the 2024 audit is online. It was given to us a month ago. We're doing the best we can, Alan. The auditor is behind. We have a 2025 audit underway right now. We're getting it out as fast as we can. It's online. We can provide you 2024. I hope that 2025, it's on the auditor's schedule. We're going to pay quite a bit for it. I hope to see it in I'd like to see it by December, but it's in their hands.

And I see the taxes went up and everybody feels it, and the sewers are going up also. Is the service going to be better, or is it just costing more for everything? Everything's costing more for everything. Yeah, it's more for everything, but the reason I say that, the houses that I build are 1,200 square foot. when they get assessed right after they're finished, and even the ones that I rebuilt, about these 1,200 square foot houses, they're getting assessed for about $3,800 in taxes for the 1,200 square foot house. But then I see the commercial building that sold for $799 on Water Street with a view, and they're paying $3,300, and it's been going on forever. So it's kind of a misbalance. There's a lot of money out there that should be collected, and it should all be even. So it's good for the taxpayer, but that's a lot of money just sitting out there every year that's not getting collected. You know what I mean? Even on the cost of solar.

Mr. Council President, we've talked about this before. I feel some impulse to help explain. try to avoid making sure we don't turn this into a debate. If I may, I'll just give some information here, and if we need to go deeper, can we speak offline? Quickly, we are in desperate need of a revaluation. Part of what you're talking about is having to recalculate the factors that go into assessment. I know you've sat with Wes for many, many hours, so you put in a bunch of stuff, you get a number at the end. So we have, now that we've completed the taxation process, Wes has the post-tax process of dealing with people now, that is our next priority, is to move forward on the re-evaluation. Realistically, one to two years just to be able to get someone started, because there's so few people who are doing it, and we'll do it out here, but we've accumulated so many people before, but I'm not going to speak to any particular property versus another, but the general sense that things might be out of whack,

That's why we do the revaluation. But when a house sells or is fixed up like Washington Street, that was $1,800 a year on that house for 15 years. So we can discuss this offline.

At this point, we have to look at the individual property and see what happens.

listings what they sold for and go from there and all he has to do is push the buttons that's what he told me that's why he does all mine you know what I mean at this point I'm not going to get into the thing but like I say it's a level of money alright that's all I have Alan thank you for your comments anyone else from the audience okay yep

I just have a quick one. When I was on the disability committee, our one thing that we really tried to get through was the crosswalks, and we're about to get thousands of people who aren't familiar with our city. There's no crosswalks. I wondered if you could...

I understand how he answers to Brian, so I wondered if Brian could... We have been working on the crosswalks on Water Street. We've been staying off the crosswalks on Washington Street because both of those ADA ramps are being rebuilt as part of a sidewalk project. We didn't see any point, it may sound silly, but the reflective paint we use for that stuff is expensive. It's over $100 a gallon, so we were saying, and we had typically in the past painted the white for school. So we are hoping we're going to be paying them right before school now when we get those two rebuilt. But that's why we haven't done it before.

I wonder about the one, because that's a biggie by the post office.

Yeah, the one by the post office and the one on the high street are both being rebuilt by the state. And they should have done it when they rebuilt Washington Street. But essentially they said, oh, they have a sidewalk ramp going. We're running late. We'll just lump it into that.

And the other thing is, I know you're on our side about the data center. I get that. But the next time you talk to our lawyers, you could ask, instead of saying, what's wrong with the petition, you could say, how do we fix it? They could give us professional, instead of us having to try to do it. That would be great. Thank you.

Thank you. Okay, John, I'll allow it. We've got to kind of wrap it up here and get going. Please.

The chair will walk right with me. I didn't expect that I would be adding this, so I apologize in advance. Having served on the same disability committee, it was that the best time to be painting crosswalks was at the end of May, not at the end of September. The reason being is that when you paint them in September, snow flies in October and the snow and the sand paints those things out so they're not there for the summertime and for the tourist season. It would be within the city's best interest to be painting them at the beginning of May. Just for people's safety as well as the best bang for your buck.

Very good point. Thank you. Anybody else from the audience? Seeing none, I'll close public open forum. Item five is action on the public hearings.

It's not any external stuff we talked about before. They're just reconfiguring their internal space to be more of a restaurant.

Would that reduce their need to go out into the room?

Make a motion we approve both.

ordinance what what 3a and 3b yes that 3a and 3b i'll second that been moved and seconded to approve both of the public hearings a being the amendment to the liquor license for yield hookers b being the renewal of the liquor license for home run brewing any further discussion on the motion Seeing none, roll call, please, Sarah.

Is there a date for the public hearing?

No, we're approving the public hearing we had.

Okay, sorry. Councilor Dana Cummings? Yes. Councilor Ray? Yes. Councilor Stephens? Yes. Councilor Seeley? Yes. Councilor Boone?

Yes. Item 6, new business, consider a temporary, 6A, consider a temporary moratorium on data centers and associated infrastructures. That was brought forth by Councilor Ray, and I appreciate all the work she's put into this. She's done much more than I. But thank you, Karen.

You're welcome. So in your packets, you had a draft, and then... This evening, I gave you an additional draft. So let's talk about the one I gave you tonight. The only change between what was in your packet and what is before us is section two, the duration. Because of the process that we're in and the potential to have to amend what the petitioner's committee did to make it stronger, Originally this said one, two, or three, the duration, and I just combined it. So it's now the duration is completion of the citizen initiative review process and adoption of permanent ordinance amendments addressing the matters or 180 days from the date of adoption. So that's the only change from what you had in your packet. And I would make a motion that we approve and I would be happy to speak to my motion.

It's been moved and seconded. Any further discussion on the motion?

The only thing I want to add to this is this is in no way, in no means is meant to be a replacement for the potential ban. This is a tool in our toolbox. This is a way to protect us if the process takes longer because we are going to have to. It is a longer process because we are going to Hopefully. One member of the board is going to work to make it stronger.

I would agree with that statement, Karen, and I'm not sure and I'm not going to try to remember because some of those things just don't happen anymore. One key thing that I feel sometimes here is There's no enemies in this room. We're all into this together. We all want the same results. We don't want the AI. We don't want the data center. We all want the same thing. So we need to just work together, and we can accomplish that. And like Karen said, make it stronger. Make it more effective. That's all we're asking. So that's my two cents. Any further discussion on the motion? We have a motion. Thank you, though. Hearing none, roll call, please.

Councilor Dana Cummings? Yes. Councilor Ray? Yes. Councilor Stephens? Yes. Councilor Seeley? Yes. Councilor Booth?

Yes. 6B, Councilor Seeley's departure from council.

as all of you guys know I'm leaving for a military deployment so I'm going to design effective September 30th future date I won't be able to attend any October meeting so I figured September 30th is probably the best time that'll give you guys plenty of time to put it on the ballot for the remainder of the term

Yeah, so our reading of the charter, as long as you accept it tonight, that gives us plenty of time in advance of the election to put the remainder of his term on the ballot, reading this as the occurrence of the vacancy. It's a future date that he'll be gone, but this way we know that that's what's happening. This allows you to keep the amount of time that the seat is left open at a minimum while meeting the charter requirements. Technically, you should probably look into appointing someone for the month of October. If you do not, you would actually be required to hold a special election in December to cover the month of October. In other words, it would be a meaningless special election. So you would have to wait until December to do it. It would effectively be for October, November, and December, since new terms would be effective on January 1st. But his seat would be filling an empty term, which would be effective the day after the election. His seat would be going for election for filling the remainder of his term on the general election.

So the person could be sworn in in November.

That's why you're saying he could be sworn in in November because he's leaving the same way Karen left and was appointed his position to begin with. If there's a concern about this process, we can raise it, but I've looked through the calendar. The charter does not anticipate a situation where you would have a resignation that would be provided on a future date. Please and providing the way that he can serve as much of his term as possible while still providing the people the opportunity to fill the remainder of the term. The other option is to not accept the resignation now.

Well, if you make the resignation on September 30th, at which point you would not be able to go on the ballot, you would have to

well there are two things I'm sorry I did not think there was any question about when you fill I mean we've seen a couple of these when a seat goes empty and someone's in there they're appointed to the empty seat it doesn't wait until January the question is I am put in some way be able to put it on the ballot. That's why it's important we accept it and call it the occurrence to none. It has been counseled to express the concern in previous absences that they would like it to go to the ballot rather than be asked to apply. So that's my read right now. So I'm going to object to it. You may take your own path.

So we just need a motion to accept?

A motion to accept his resignation effective September 30th.

Is that a motion? I second it.

Moved and seconded. Any further discussion on the motion? Councilor Seeley, I will miss serving with you. It's been a pleasure, AJ. It's never easy to say goodbye. It'll be your next one. I know, but I mean, it's a permanent thing, and I do wish you well. I'm sure you'll be reading the quality times and keeping up as much as you can on it. Or Facebook. But thank you for your service. Any further discussions on the motion? Hearing none, roll call, please, Sarah.

Councillor Dana Cummings? Yes. Councillor Wright? Yes. Councillor Stephens? Yes. Councillor Seeley? I can't really follow that.

Councillor Boone? Yes. 5-6C holds September 9th, 2026 City Council meeting at Shedd High School Gymnasium.

I make the motion to hold the September 9th City Council meeting at the Shedhine Gymnasium. Second.

Move to the further discussion on the motion.

Y is the planning board will make their presentation to us and we'll be having a conversation about the ordinances. We assume it will be a large crowd.

Roll call, please, Sarah.

Councillor Dana Cummings? Yes. Councillor Ray? Yes. Councillor Stephens? Yes. Councillor Seeley? Yes. Councillor Boone?

Yes. We're going to get a lot more meetings in before the 30th, I guess. 6D, appointment of Rita Harmon as Deputy Tax Collector.

We just need to have a deputy. We ran into this one. We need a deputy in play.

Make the motion to accept Rita Hartman as the Deputy Tax Collector.

I'll second. Any further discussion on the motion?

Hearing none, roll call please, Sarah.

Councillor Dana Cummings?

Yes.

Councillor Ray? Yes. Councillor Stephens? Yes. Councillor Seeley? Yes. Councillor Moon?

Yes. 6E, Paul Terrio, 7-30-2026, resignation from the school committee.

I move to accept Paul Terrio's resignation from the school committee. I second.

Thank you. Any further discussion on the motion?

When do we have the conversation about replacing them?

So, as opposed to the council, where we have all sorts of deadlines that we just negotiated here, the charter is quite lax about what happens to the school committee member. You have the power, which I guess is a little unusual. Power over responsibility. Power over responsibility to name someone to the remainder of the seat. The seat does go up in the next election. So, unless you've got someone you're considering right now. There are no deadlines, there are no requirements. It just says you will go.

So should we be asking for people to submit their letter of interest?

I would point out that the school board itself has not had a regular meeting since his resignation. So my guess is that they're having one tomorrow. And my guess is the school board will come forward with a recommendation. Not that we have to listen to it, but that's probably what... That's what they will do. Having spoken to a school board member today.

I would still ask for one that's of interest.

So the motion is to accept the resignation. I guess we can discuss the building of that seat when the time comes. Any further discussion on the motion? Hearing none, roll call, please, Sarah.

Councilor Dana Cummings? Yes. Councilor Ray? Yes. Councilor Stephens? Yes. Councilor Seeley? Yes. Councilor Boone?

Yes. 6F, accept membership of Greg Gordon's, the Airport Advisory Committee.

Is this a request of the Advisory Committee that he be joined? Both of them are. Both. Okay. I move to accept the membership of Greg Gordon to the Airport Advisory Committee. Second.

Moved and seconded. Any further discussion on the motion? Hearing none, roll call, please, Sarah.

Councilor Dana Cummings? Yes. Councilor Ray? Yes. Councilor Stephens? Yes. Councilor Seeley? Yes. Councilor Boone? Yes.

6G, accept membership of Jeremy Cooper to the Airport Advisory Committee.

I move to accept the membership of Jeremy Cooper to the Airport Advisory Committee. I'll second.

Moved and seconded. Any further discussion on the motion? Hearing none, roll call, please, Sarah.

Councillor Dana Cummings? Yes. Councillor Ray? Yes. Councillor Stephens? Yes. Councillor Seeley? Yes. Councillor Boone?

Yes. 6H, acceptance of an FAA grant EPM-NEG-3-23-0053-027-026. In the amount of $185,062 for the purchase of a snow removal equipment for the airport requiring a $4,870 in local match. This and the next motion are for equipment that we discussed during the budget committee.

approval, whatever process. So I want to make sure, there was some question about whether I actually had to bring it to you based on that. So I brought it to you anyway. So these are, both of these were anticipated in the budget. It's slightly higher than the AIT match that we have in there, but we talked about potentially drawing non-fuel funds if that was a concern. So that will be covered from the airport budget. And if people want more discussion about what the equipment is like, I'll refer, maybe we can refer to Victoria.

It's a huge loader that's going to have a brush and also a snowblower attachment. It comes with a bucket. We'll just park that. But that will make quick work of cleaning that runway in the wintertime. And when we have slush and ice on the runway, hopefully the brush will be able to get that off and or the snowblower before it has the opportunity to freeze and just shut around. So that's why we purchased it.

And I believe the reason it's in two pieces, essentially, we had some money and then we went and passed some other money and put it all together, but it came through just two different lines. So both of these together cover the whole thing.

And these are, they have already been awarded, we just need to accept them. Correct.

Can I make a motion that we accept items 6H and I as printed? So that Billy doesn't have to read those numbers.

Well, I is just a continuation of it, but it is a separate part. Yeah, that fly needs to be dead, but he's alive. Any further discussion on the motion? It's $335,000 for the airport for a cost of $10,000 to the taxpayer. That's a pretty good turn on $10,000. It's more than that. It's $450,000 plus. $150,000 and $185,000. $335,000.

That's what I thought. I thought it was 259 and 194.

The motion, yeah. 185 and 150. Either way, any further discussion on the motion? Hearing none, we'll call through Sarah.

Councilor Dana-Connix? Yes. Councilor Ray? Yes. Councilor Stephens? Yes. Councilor Seeley? Yes. Councilor Boone?

Yes. 6J, acceptance of the community impact grant of $10,000 for the Eastport Community Window Dressers build.

Actually, Jay and Kate probably need to say that. Yeah, I think they should. Again, this is the Window Dressers program that Victoria spoke about in the open forum. It's a reduced amount of funding, but it's what we've got, and there is no local match.

Ferris Empower has put $5,000 toward that project, so the motion should be put six J and K. I make a motion that we pass items six J and K. Second. Moved and seconded. Any further discussion on the motion? Hearing none, roll call, please, Sarah.

Councilor Dana Cummings? Yes. Councilor Ray? Yes. Councilor Stephens? Yes. Councilor Seeley? Yes. Councilor Boone?

Yes. Item 6L, approval of application for MMA risk reduction grant by police department, $5,000 total for upgrading PD technology.

So this is a request for an application. We have not made the application. It has not been submitted.

We actually haven't started writing it yet.

you in advance so you're not surprised and then we ask when you accept. This is a standard MMA brand. What we are talking about doing with it right now is upgrading the cameras that are currently in use for the police department. I don't have a lot of detail. We're still putting it together.

Cameras at the PD?

At the PD that we have cameras that look out onto Water Street and into our parking lot and at the window with City Hall. We're also going to see if we can get money in there. There's been some requests for body cams on the police. So we're not entirely sure exactly what we're spending, but you would be notified of that when the time comes.

And there's no match required for this one?

There's not.

Okay. I make a motion that we approve the application for the MMA risk reduction grant.

Okay. Just a point of order. I don't think I read it correctly.

I have a motion. Do I have a second? I've been moved and seconded. Any further discussion on the motion? No, the council needs to ask the questions. We have a motion on the table. Sarah, roll call, please.

Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.

6M, approval of application for a housing community program ordinance amendment grant, $7,500 total.

This is a state program. Some of you may be aware the state has been making a great number of changes and requirements on... land use ordinances related to the housing crisis. They've made them, they've changed them, they've made them again. And all of them demand that you alter your ordinances. We have had neither the time nor the effort to put that together, and they all require legal review. Happily, there is a program, this one, that we can apply to to give us money to go through and do all of our revisions. The majority of this will go to our lawyers, to Reverend Winchell, to ordinances are in compliance. They won't be. There will be amendments that will have to come forward.

And again, this is an application.

This is an application that's not been accepted and there's no local match.

I move to approve the application for the Housing Opportunity Program ordinance under the grant. Second.

Moved and seconded. Any further discussion on the motion? Hearing none, roll call please, Sarah.

Yes. Yes. Yes.

Yes. Approval of contract adjustment for seawall engineering for sidewalk project.

So I'm not super happy about this one. But I'm not sure we have anything to do with it. The sidewalk project is going underway. It has been a bumpy ride. Those of you who may have noticed, they don't notice the parking lot. There's quite a bit of drainage, and then there's stone on top before you put the dirt on, and you go through all of that. We've had quite a run of pipes getting broken and some other things, and I've got some issues with that. This, however, is about whenever Sewell put their initial estimate together, they estimated a construction timeline that's about half what it actually is going to turn out to be. Sewell provides the clerk of the works, who is a guy that walks back and forth, protects our interests, makes sure we're doing things correctly. They had initially bid $45,000, give or take a few dollars, for that position. They now need twice that. Because it's a combination. No, it's not that they started late. I mean, honestly, there's an estimate in the bid package. It says this long. EMX says, no, it's going to take this long. And to be fair, at this point, it You know, it's frustrating. I inherited this project. The bid documents were done already. The estimates were there. We could not pay for it, in which case someone, like me, would have to go do it instead because this is a local project, administered project. So we are technically, the city, who's responsible for administering it. We have handed those responsibilities to our plan to sue. I will say the guy who's down there looking out for us is a great guy. I have no problem paying this amount for the quality of what we're getting. and concerned about cost overruns on this project. I believe this amount brings us right to, based on what we got from the construction, brings us right to the amount we thought we were going to be spending on the grant. So of this additional 45, we're paying 20% for about $8,000, $9,000. However, this is a project that once you hit the grant amount and you construct it there, you owe every dollar on top of that. So we have about $120,000, we have $120,000 set aside in our capital fund, which is actually more than we need for our local match, about $25,000. I will be keeping a very close eye on this, but we've accepted the project that's underway, and although I'm not happy with this kind of change, short of being willing to hire our own person to do this,

Well, dang. I'm really hating this sidewalk project. I hope it's beautiful when it's done. I hope it's done before you get home. So we are making a motion. To accept the contract adjustment. To accept the contract adjustment for the steel engineering for the sidewalk project.

Second.

The move is seconded. Any further discussion on the motion? Hearing none, we'll call please Sarah.

Councillor Dana Cummings? Yes. Councillor Wright? Yes. Councillor Stephens? Well, yeah. Councillor Seeley?

Yes.

Councillor Boone?

Yes. 6-0, approval of rate for part-time police for festivals and selected holidays.

This is a request from the police department to approve time and a half of the new services that get out. For part-time police that we're trying to pull to the 4th of July, specifically July 3rd and 4th, Pirate Festival, Thanksgiving and Christmas. These are days we have traditionally had trouble managing coverage. And while we had enough coverage on July 4th, July 4th was entertaining enough that night that a couple people say essentially, it's not worth it to come out for this. So this is a request from the police. It's a risk, but we'll see if it works. We'd like to think that, my understanding is that we've already kind of put out the work we think we might be able to do as the fire festival, and we're getting better response.

And how's it going to affect their overall budget?

They say they can manage this within the budget. It's not, so it's an additional $12.50 an hour for, I have to go do the hours off my head, but we're looking at, you know, less than $1,000 altogether, or maybe right around $1,000 if I get this right, an additional cost.

But it's within their budget, right?

We're going to stay within the budget. We have a very large part-time line in the budget. Maybe this is a good time for me to address Alan's point about full-time police, but I'd like to get on there. During Open Forum, Alan Skinner made a point. Wouldn't it be great to have more full-time police? I wholeheartedly agree. When I started here, we had no full-time police. As we've been building the police department back, we had police in two full-time positions that we could fill. The first year and a half, two years, we could not keep those positions filled. It was really very, very difficult. And so we moved about this time last year, I think, to say, you know, we have a lot of people who are expressing interest to come down to Eastport and work part-time. Can we actually make that work? We are budgeted at about two-thirds coverage. In other words, the amount of money we have in the budget for personnel covers us about two-thirds of 24 by seven. We're covering 95% of our calls at that level of coverage, so I'm pretty proud of what we're doing. Having said that, would we like to have another full-time policeman? Would we like to offer benefits? We would. We're not budgeted for that right now. We are doing some, we're looking at some possible grant opportunities.

And that comes with a price to the tax dollars.

We could certainly, and round numbers, let's be as transparent as possible about this. Round numbers, a full-time employee, just off the top of my head, I'd say $100,000. Because when you take what they're being paid, plus their benefits, plus everything else, it might be, depending on who it is, maybe it might be a little bit more, but it's a chunk out of $100,000. So if that's right now, your taxation is at about $4.2 million, I want to say, if I looked at it. Let's say $4 million for round numbers. That's 2% of taxation to add another employee.

But you get rid of the part-time.

You get rid of most of it. That's correct. I took my glasses off, and now I can't see anything. Correct. And so this is worth talking about a bunch of minutes. We have some hope that things are stable enough here that we might be a more attractive destination than we were. But the market for police is still very difficult. I mean, that was one of the issues, that there was a line in the budget that kept being not filled. And it was like, well, why are we taxing for this? Well, what we tax, what we will be spending.

Make a motion we approve 6A as presented. I'll second that. 6O. Not 6A. 6O.

Moved and seconded. Any further discussion on the motion? Hearing none, roll call, please, Sarah.

Councillor Dana Cummings? Yes. Councillor Ray? Yes. Councillor Stephens? Yes. Councillor Seeley? Yes. Councillor Boone?

Yes. 6P, approval of purchase of used police cruiser from Fort Fairfield.

Yes. So we have in our cruiser fleet right now, we have one vehicle we bought new. The Tahoe. The one vehicle we bought, and I'm sorry, I do not have all the years in my head right now. I apologize for that. I should have looked that up. We have the one that we bought from Washburn that was three or four years old at the time we bought it. We have our hybrid vehicle, the white hybrid vehicle, which has just come out of warranty, which you may not have, but we've had some issues with that vehicle, and right now we have to take it to hand if we get a check engine light because of the nature of the electronics on that vehicle. Because of the relative age of the vehicles, I had intended to put a brand new vehicle in the fiscal year 28 capital plan. A brand new, and we were probably going to look at tacos again. Right now those appear to be the crown fix of the 2020s. When we bought our previous one, it came in at about $54,000, so I'm imagining that's going to go up. Without outfitting. Plus it costs us $10,000 to $12,000 to outfit it, to put it in the cage, to put it in everything else. So when Fairfield offered us this vehicle, it's old. It's a 1990. It's got 95,000 miles. 90? Yep. Just like our hikers. I'm sorry.

No, no, no.

It's like, Joe, I moved my boat. Holy moly.

I don't know what I said.

I don't know why that came out of my mouth.

2020. 2020.

Good God. Wow. 2020. Sorry, Brian. 2020. No, that was good. Bad, because if you didn't catch it, it showed up in the paper.

2020, 90,000 miles on it.

$22,000. Outfitting would usually run 10 to 12. The vehicle would It's in good condition. We know a guy who knows a guy who's using it right now. And we feel pretty confident. And our experience has been dealing with other departments that they're not interested in. given the trouble for it. No, the ACO vehicle we got from those points given us time. So this means I push off a brand new vehicle into fiscal year 29. We are, I will just acknowledge, we're doing a bit of a Washington County thing here, picking up a bunch of older vehicles and hoping they'll hold us together. This vehicle will stay in town. It's going to be the number one additional patrol vehicle. It's there, the hybrid, you know, sorry, I've got... The hybrid's battery fails. I had a more colorful way of saying that. If that battery fails, we could be looking at a five-figure repair bill, that sort of thing. So I just feel more comfortable having that additional vehicle. It's a bargain for a leased vehicle. It really is. It's a little bit of risk, as with any used car, but I think I'll forget it so much. And I would ask you that you approve to take this out of the capital.

It's 30 years newer. Wow.

I move to approve the purchase of the used police cruiser from Fort Fairfield and take it under the capital funds.

Second.

We move to second it. Any further discussion on the motion? Hearing none, we'll call please, Sarah.

Councillor Dana Cummings? Yes. Councillor Ray? Yes. Councillor Stephen? Yes. Councillor Seelig? Yes. Councillor Boone?

Yes. 6Q, accept donation from Sheep Cove Associates for Sky Hope.

500.

I thought that was for the airport, not for Sky Hope. What does it say?

I think it says... TVs and support systems for the airport.

That's for the airport.

It's not Skyhook. It's airport. Okay. And it's donated to the city.

Okay. How did that get here?

We will check with the donor and make sure that for some reason it's wrong or correct.

I believe you're correct. Yeah. Okay.

I move to accept the donation from Sheet Cove Associates for the airport for TVs and support systems of $500. Second. Moved and seconded.

Any further discussion on the motion? Only thank you. Roll call, please, Sarah.

Councilor Dana-Conings? Yes. Councilor Ray?

Yes, with appreciation.

Councilor Stephens? Yes. Councilor Seeley? Yes. Councilor Boone? Yes.

6R, accept perpetual care request by Judy Trott for Hillside West Cemetery section Memorial Hill, lot 143A.

Move to accept the perpetual care lot. Second.

Move to second it. Any further discussion on the motion? Hearing none, we'll call please, Sarah.

Councillor Dana Cummings? Yes. Councillor Ray? Yes. Councillor Stephens? Yes. Councillor Seeley? Yes. Councillor Boone?

Yes. 6S, accept perpetual care requests by Stephen and Susan Moore for Bayside West Cemetery, Section E, Lot 24 and 25. I'll make that motion.

Second.

Move detected. Any further discussion? Hearing none, roll call, please, Sarah.

Councilor Danny Cunnings? Yes. Councilor Ray? Yes. Councilor Stephens? Yes. Councilor Seeley? Yes. Councilor Boone?

Yes. 6T, accept the resignation of Victoria Gans from the Energy Committee.

And also the Airport Committee. She just came up and told me she actually needs to resign from both.

I move to accept the resignation of Victoria Gans from the Energy Committee and Airport Committee. Thank you.

Moved and seconded. Any further discussion on the motion? Hearing none, roll call please, Sarah.

Councilor Dana Cummings? Yes. Councilor Ray? Yes. Councilor Stephens? Yes. Councilor Seeley? Yes. Councilor Boone?

Yes. We are on number seven, Old Business. 7A is a request for placement of a memorial bench from Mary Gelada in memory of Grace Zawernemann.

I'm going to ask you to carry this one more meeting. I think we've identified the location, but I need to speak with Howie and confirm it all. We should be able to act on it.

Can we carry it to a future meeting so if it doesn't happen next week?

Since it's going to be coming close to winter anyways, we probably wouldn't place it until spring. So I think October will be fine.

October or September.

Well, no, I was just saying, I don't care what meeting, but I think the motion should just be to a future meeting so that if you don't have that next meeting, we don't have to discuss it.

But then you lose track of it.

Tara's on it now, so I won't have a problem with that.

Who has a motion? Move to a future meeting. Second. Any further discussion on the motion? Hearing none, roll call, please, Sarah.

Councilor Dana Cummings? Yes. Councilor Ray? Yes. Councilor Stephens? Yes. Councilor Seeley? Yes. Councilor Boone?

Yes. 7B, transfer of fiscal year 2026, boat excise tax to the harbor account.

Is that what this paper is? Yes.

Here's what happened. So this came up last month, and then we all kind of looked at each other and said, wait, what is this? So my understanding, correct me if I'm wrong, Tom, right, in the past there used to be a separate That's not true anymore. We just keep it separate in our accounting system, and it's automatically credited to the Harbor account as it's collected. So what you see before you is just proof that we've been collecting all of this, if you're curious, and there's no action to be taken. So we will not break it. It just happened to be on last year's agenda. Unless you know differently, but that's our understanding. Your council is required to transfer funds from fund to fund. So if I said, like we did last year, please transfer X amount from unassigned to capital, you have to do that. It's not the DB transfer because it's being credited to the right. So there's no ask. We're on item 8. 8A.

Minutes of previous meetings, July 8, 2026, regular council meeting.

I move to accept those minutes. Second.

Moved and seconded. Any further discussion on the motion? Hearing none, we'll call the police, Sarah.

Councilor Dana Cummings? Yes. Councilor Ray? Yes. Councilor Stephens? Yes. Councilor Seeley? Yes. Councilor Boone?

Yes. Item 9, City Manager's Report.

So let's start. Financials, you've got two financials. Both of you have the details that you have from TRIO, but I gave you my summaries for fiscal year 26 and 27. I'll keep you in the 26 probably one more month, and I think we'll have everything that should be credited there out. The top line number is after 100% of fiscal year 26, our net is 94. There are a couple of items I'm going to clear up here. I think we're actually in better shape than that for 26, but worse for 27. Our insurance number is very high, and I think that's because we credited a fiscal year 27 payment there, but I'll clarify that with Rita. Otherwise, I don't think anything has changed here from before I discussed these overages and everything, and we were on the river now many times. The fiscal year 27 one is less interesting because we're only 9% of the way through the year. I'll just point out right now payroll is ahead for two reasons. Tomorrow is payday, so we're already right at the beginning of the pay cycle. And all of July 4th overtime and extra expense is being collected there right now. So that should even happen as time goes on. ACO is high because we paid the pause lease. Hybrid is high because I think we just received the second billing for the year. We paid July, beginning of July, we paid August, beginning of August. Otherwise, we are currently in pretty good shape. This is maybe a good point just to acknowledge this. Indeed, tax bills went out. We came in at about 7.8%. We ended up coming in at about 7.8%. We had accepted expenses at 7.25%. But business tax... down. And I can go, we can sit down with Wes and talk about that, but that's part of what happens there is this depreciation. It is, however, also the one place I have spoken in this meeting before about how doing a re-evaluation doesn't like helping with the homestead exemption from the point of view of revenue. Everyone's homestead exemption goes up, and everyone's house value also goes up, and so that value of 25% personal property tax. That's why I've asked Wes to make it a priority. It is possible, we will discuss it, it is possible for the council to simply basically cross the board and say, hey, our ratio right now is 47%. The state says the numbers on our books for our values are less than half of what they're probably worth in the market. I'll talk with Wes, but you guys essentially can say, no, we're going to change our factors. That brings us up to 80%. That would help us. The only concern is, as Alan raised before there, if there are inequities now, if relative values of property have changed, you're not doing anything about that. All you're doing is just raising everyone up and people's valuations may look a little off. So we'll talk about how to address that. But we are already seeing that the Eastport taxpayers are great. We're already seeing significant, just in the last few days, people are paying their taxes right away. Thank you very much. I have good news and bad news on real estate. The good news is we are just officially listing our four foreclosed properties and the senior citizen center. They actually haven't like moved the website or anything, but a lot of said that notified and Mike Murphy is talking to people. We are collecting offers very quickly. I just want to say you can set it tonight or we can discuss it later, but I think, I don't think we should go to the next meeting to act on some of these offers. These are people are making cash offers on a, Waiting an entire month might not be the best idea, but I do think two weeks is reasonable. And I was going to suggest we hold a special meeting in two weeks to look at the offers and accept those we wish to accept.

Where is that printed? What houses are... Mike McPhee is our...

So Mike McPhee with Due East Real Estate is the city's realtor. He's listing them now. They just got listed this week. Are they on the city website? They're not on the city website. We're listing it through him.

But you already have offers.

We already have offers. But we're not going to act until next week, until two weeks from now. So go take a look.

He's contacted the budding property owners. Yeah. But you have to list it and you have to accept all offers.

But how do you have an offer before it's listed? That's what I don't understand.

He's listed them. He hasn't put it on the website. He's already listed them.

As soon as we appointed Mike at the last meeting, he started receiving calls.

Right.

How do people know what they're worth?

How do people know what they're worth?

You'll see on the listing.

The tax information.

It's like any other listing. You'll see what we put in. point about why it might make sense in May. We have traditionally painted them in September, actually it was the end of August, because it's the beginning of school. The primary concern is that if you're having kids back in town, they're not always, oh, we don't hear our grandchild up there. That's what we've done. I'm not saying we have to do that in the future. Arguably, we should probably do it twice a year. We'll talk about that in Budget Committee because that's another few thousand dollars in painting time. But we're not leaving them alone because we don't like them down there. And we have... We were putting out, painting all of them, and then I did ask that we paint the ones on Water Street, the small ones along the west side. And I haven't looked and see how far we got with that, but they're all done yet or not, but I know they were working on them last week. And, with you guys should we get a date for a meeting so today is 26. the 26th if you want to set august 26 as a meeting well we should do it here we should probably do it here yeah we'll see if we so for now maybe just a motion to set a special meeting for august 26th um wait i mean and your call would

You guys can start without me.

At what time?

Five, I would tell you. I mean, that's the best I can get there. Five or six. I mean, I don't think it would be that long. So five would be all right with me.

Check if the building is available.

Don't check the mortgage. You don't know.

I'll let her know you said that.

You can.

Is everyone available on the 26th? I am. So, yeah.

I make a motion to schedule a special meeting for Wednesday, August 26th here at the Port Building.

No, no, no, no, no. What dates are available?

We could do it Thursday or Tuesday.

We could potentially move it to the airport building. It's a little noisy in there. It's a little difficult. But that's really the only other building we have available to us. City Hall is not ideal.

We could change the date. I mean, we could do it Thursday or Tuesday.

Bring chairs.

What? Bring chairs. Bring folding chairs.

Right, of course. We'll do Tuesday. We'll do Saturday.

Is it available the Tuesday or the Thursday around it?

And if the answer is no, we're going to just have to take this offline, I think.

Well... Thursday is open the 27th. Troubled it. Troubled it.

Karen?

Karen, you're good? Colleen, we've got quite a lot.

Colleen's excuse just went away. We'll schedule a special meeting for Thursday, August 27th at the Port Authority at 5pm.

Oh, a second?

Then move to second it. Any further discussion on the motion? Hearing none, roll call, please, Sarah.

Councillor Dana Cummings? Yes. Councillor May? Yes. Councillor Stephens? Yes. Councillor Seeley? Yes. Councillor Brown?

Yes.

We're locked in.

Okay. Item 10, Council Liaison Updates and Issues.

I have some issues with the ambulance. I need to bring up with the Ambulance Committee We lost a driver here, which puts us in situations. There are some situations with the vehicles out there. One of them isn't even registered. Not good. Okay. You and I need to meet. Yes. Okay. Indeed.

Thank you, Ms. Stevens. When is the next actual board meeting against the ambulance?

Last Monday in September. Okay. so I'll message you and see if we can get together, because I have a whole list of things.

Last month I forgot to mention how well the airport's been doing. Under Victoria, she's been doing a great job out there. Thank you. It's not always easy picking up a new task and trying to learn everything all at once. And the airport has been doing very well. In the summer months, we know we'll do much better anyway with fuel sales and all kinds of... A lot more activity in the summertime out there. So I certainly did not do that on purpose last month. Ignore that. And the Airport Association and the Airport Advisory Committee have been working a lot on the lease agreements between the legacy holders. Last night we had a meeting I thought it went very well. It passed narrowly. 3-2-1 was the vote. 3-1-2? No.

We got an email.

Oh, okay, yeah. 3-1-2. Either way, it passed. 3. I see it as two committees that were... strained before, starting to mend their ways and coming together. I'd like to see that continue. And I think in the overall scope of things, we're just trying to be fair to everyone. We're not singling out anybody. We're not... new lease hanger owners and legacy owners each have their own rights and their own make-ups and their own things. We just all need to be together on the same page. There was basically two corrections in the lease that was drawn up. Very minor. But definitely need the legal opinion just to have them review it. But I think we... We should go forward with it. That's only for council's update because I'm sure it will be coming probably in the next month's meeting or October. But I'd like to see it sooner than later. We've been going since May on it. So it's been trickling down. So hopefully we can get there. And senior center, I attended that one yesterday. They're doing extremely well out there. They're looking for a volunteer to do line dancing. And I did not do that. To do it or to teach it? To teach it and do it. That's not my thing. But... But if you have a chance to get into the building, they have a calendar right at the top of the stairs. It is full every day. Every day there's activities going on up there. The cardio drumming, the exercise classes, the dinners, every day. And they're already talking Halloween party and Christmas party. So it's quickly involving. The pool group has been doing well downstairs. I think this week they're starting a tournament. I think it's this Thursday. And I'd say probably on a Thursday evening, you've got 15, 20 people playing pool now. So if we can get the kids more involved, that's what their hope is, to try to get more kids out there. But it's a great resource, and people are using it. And that was a whole intent when we started it. So I'm glad to see that's coming along. And I guess I'm done with my updates. We are on item 11. I need a motion to enter into executive session.

I make a motion to enter into executive session personal matters, Title I, MRSA 4056A, in consultation with legal counsel, Title I, MRSA 4056E.

Then move to second it. Any further discussion on the motion? Hearing none, roll call, please, Sarah.

Councillor Dana Cummings?

Yes. Councillor Ray?

Yes.

Councillor Stephens?

Yes.

Councillor Seeley? Yes. Councillor Boone? Yes. Thank you, everyone.

I need a motion to come out of executive session, please.

I'll make that motion. Second.

The move is seconded. Any further discussion on the motion? Hearing none, we'll give Sarah a moment to catch up. She made the motion. A.J. seconded. I'm not she, Rhonda. No further discussion. Roll call, please, Sarah.

Councillor Dana Cummings. Yes. Councillor Wright. Yes. Councillor Steenham. Yes. Councillor Seeley. Yes. Councillor Boone.

Yes. Item 12, action from executive session, if any.

None.

Item 13.

I move to adjourn. Second.

That's quick.

All those in favor.

Roll call, please, Sarah.

Yes. Yes. Yes. Thank you.