City Council - Regular Meeting

call this coun uh meeting of this El City Council to order. Uh first on the agenda, can you talk louder? Oh, sorry. First on the agenda, pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance

to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Okay, next on the agenda um is the Rob the rules of order. This body uh has adopted Robert's rules of order and that's how we um proceed with our meetings. Uh following Robert's rules. Uh agenda item number four, adoption of Elder City Council minutes from the following meetings. April 9, 2026 special meeting and April 20, 2026 regular meeting. How would the council like to proceed on the adoption of the minutes? Councelor Shay

make a motion to accept the minutes as written. Second.

Second. Any further discussion from councel? Seeing none, all those in favor? Oppose? Unanimous. Okay. Agenda item number five, presentation of awards. We have two awards to present tonight. I don't know if any of our recipients are here, but we'll we'll present them anyways. City of Ellsworth proudly presents this certificate of service to Cheryl Flanders in recognition of 10 years of service to the Ellsworth Public Library. Your devotion to duty and loyalty to the community have contributed to the improvement of the city of Ellsworth. presented this 18th day of May, 2026. Thank you, CHERYL. The city of Ellsworth proudly presents this certificate of service to Tony Ryan in recognition of 10 years of service to the police department. Your devotion to duty and loyalty to the community have contributed to the improvement of the city of Ellsworth. Presented this 18th day of May, 2026. Thank you, TONY. OKAY. NEXT, we have the proclamation for the National Fallen Firefighters Memorial Day. Whereas the United States Congress and the President of the United States have designated the day of the annual National Fallen Firefighters Memorial Service as a day of honor day to honor firefighters and emergency service personnel who have sacrificed their lives to save others by lowering the American flag on all federal buildings

to half staff. And whereas on average of 80 average of 80 firefighters courageously make the ultimate sacrifice in the line of duty each year across our nation. And whereas the firefighters and emergency service personnel of the city of Ellsworth play an essential role in the protection of lives and property within our local community, standing ready to respond at a moment's notice. And whereas the city of Ellsworth specially, excuse me, specifically honors and recognizes the ultimate sacrifice of Deputy Chief Robert Bobby Door Jr. who passed away in the line of duty on May 5th, 2021, and whose legacy of service and dedication continues to inspire our department, our department, and our citizens. And whereas it is of a m major importance that we increase our efforts to reduce deaths, injuries, and property losses from fire through education, training, and community risk reduction. Excuse me. Now, therefore, I, the mayor of the city of Ellsworth, do hereby call upon all citizens of Ellsworth and upon all patriotic, civic, and educational organizations to observe the day of May 3rd, 2026. A little late on this one. In recognition of the patriotic service and dedication dedicated efforts of our fire emergency service personnel by lowering American flags and all buildings to half staff, I respectfully encourage these same organizations as well as the citizens of Ellsworth to remember all fire and emergency personnel who made the ultimate sacrifice and service to their community and to pay respect to the survivors of our fallen heroes by participating in bells across America for fallen fighter fires firefighters. Toll, pause for a moment of silence or read a special passage to honor the sacrifices of these public servants and their families. Light the night for fallen firefighters. I encourage all residents and local businesses to light their homes and storefronts in red on this evening as a glowing tribute to

those who have given their all. I further encourage appropriate services in ceremonies in which all of our citizens may participate to honor fire and emergency services personnel, past and present, who by their faithful and loyal devotions to duties have rendered invaluable service to our community and its citizens. Witness thereof, I have set my hand and caused the seal of the city of Ellsworth to be affixed. Signed this day, 18th day of May, 2026. Sadly, Maine lost another firefighter, Andrew Cross, this past Friday at the fire and explosion at Robins Lumber in Sears. I know Mr. Cross, his family, and the first responders and their families injured on Friday are all in our thoughts and prayers. This is not the only tragedy our community is dealing with. The city of Ellsworth's thoughts and deepest condolences are with Kelvin and Tammy Moat, their family, friends, and all those who know and love Grayson. This is an incredibly difficult and heartbreaking time for many within our city and throughout the community. Kelvin and Tammy have long been part of the Ellsworth family through their service, friendships, and deep connections to this community, and we are grieving alongside them with the loss of Grayson. We are grateful to the many first responders, search teams, volunteers, and community members who assisted throughout this difficult situation. The funeral service for Grayson will be held on Saturday, May 23rd at 1 p.m. at Ellsworth High School. In le of flowers, donations may be made to the Grayson Moat Scholarship Fund at the Superintendent's office at 11 Avery Lane. In addition, a community fundraiser to support the family will be held at Helen's restaurant on Wednesday from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. The event will

include a benefit spaghetti dinner and silent auction. Those wishing to donate items for the silent auction may do so through Machai Savings Bank by dropping donations off at the Ellsworth Public Police Department. We would ask everyone to continue keeping Grayson and the Mote family in their thoughts and prayers. I would invite everyone now to join me in a moment of silence.

Thank you. Number six on the agenda, city manager report.

Thank you, Chair Lions. Um, a few things today. I'll uh we've got our our next workshop coming up here for the city on June 1st, Monday at 6 p.m. Uh there's a few items there. We're going to talk about affordable housing production uh and a tiff committee for formation which we'll discuss a little more detail there. We'll also have a discussion of the Ellsworth city seal, the historic seal in the building u for uh kind of some planning and progress on next steps uh as well as a data center discussion which a few counselors have reached out about that they'd like to discuss a little more in workshop before bringing any potential items to city council meeting. So we'll have those. Uh, another one which I think I'm going to add is uh a discussion on the Ellsworth Dam relicensing and the recent um uh water quality certification denial from the uh state of Maine's D. I believe uh public comment on that denial is uh is through May 25th. Um I have some pretty significant concerns uh about what that denial means. I think um that I'm still trying to gather some answers to. Uh, I think, you know, this would be a very significant event if Brookfield um decides not to move forward uh with providing energy and um and the requirements that main DAP is asking for. I know we had a a a workshop event where a group uh talked about some of the economic impact and um potential on the Leonard Lake Dam removal and what that could mean. um moving forward and and in some ways I thought that was you know an interesting presentation but also um you know it's really hitting to be a lot more real in this not just the Leonard Lake um but the uh the Graham Lake dam these you know as mentioned by myself at that meeting there's over

$100,000 a year 110,000 I think from that dam owner that could be lost in tax revenue the tax revenues lost in and those dams not being here one or the whether um in terms of the people who have been living on them for generations now would be extraordinarily substantial. Oftentimes I think the city you know we don't technically have a role to play in this process. I think that's one of the really difficult things here which is you know from my general read and I'm still trying to get more reached out to the um FK the federal uh energy regulatory commission. I'm going to reach out to our our legislative representatives as well to get some more information. But, you know, we've kind of heard from some of the environmental groups in the D on their hopes for salmon passage, but you know, in the the NPR or main NPR article kind of notes that it could add between 40 to 140 million on to the dam owner of these requirements over the next 30 40 years. So, there's sort of this, you know, I get it. There's um one side really wants the dam and the dam's gone. there's fish passage which could be better. Um I get that the other side they have a business that they need to run and to make it um and then you have kind of a layer of regulatory changes and approvals that are you know are changing that in ways that I don't quite know. Um I've often said that Ellsworth's really lucky that it has such a great industrial mix that we don't have like a risk of one or two mills shutting down and the economic base of the city um being substantially disrupted. This would be I'd say that one piece. Um, so I think we need to talk about it more at workshop. I'm hopefully going to have more answers um from some of the players involved in this. Um, so I'm hoping, you know, I can't quite tell if I'm Chicken Little and the sky is falling on this one or if I'm, you know, crying wolf and, you know, this is going to get rellicensed and it's kind of much about nothing. So I I I hope to have better answers on

that for the community and for the council. Again, I know that D's initial public comment period is through May 25th. Um, so I encourage folks to reach out and I think it's something the council and and staff needs to work on um even more uh on the more positive side of things. Um just a huge thanks to the grand and uh all the groups um who did the Dancing with the Stars uh which was an incredible community fundraising event. Congratulations to Senator Graowski for winning the judges award in the dancing. Congratulations to uh um Momo from Momo's Cheese Takes, which I recently found out stands for Motormouth. And I um have a lot of empathy for that nickname. Thought that was my name.

Yeah, you know, maybe three of us can be the Momos uh Momo triplets um of of Ellsworth. And then a huge thanks to Kenny Mo from our fire department. I will say there was a brief moment where I thought that the dance was going to be a little too risque and we'd have to involve our HR department. Um, fortunately that was not the case. He did incredible. He didn't win, but we're so fortunate to have people that um really committed their time and efforts into this amazing community event to help support that incredible organization. Um, and really happy there. And then from an internal just thanks uh just such an incredible thanks to Sarah Leco, our our um our librarian. Uh she has an incredible team and they're always kind of working to do things better there. I would also note that it's during this budget process, but my last few as well. Um she's never asked for more staff. Her budget increases are always the smallest of any department. Uh you know, her service demands to be frank are, you know, are increasing pretty dramatically. They have to deal with homelessness as an issue. They have to deal with when the school is shut down to the summer. There's an increase in demand. They're holding an incredible amount of events. Um and like how her and her staff deal with all these issues um on such meager resources is incredible. And and not to mention the fact that um the effort they led to renovate this very old building which is much in need um was just uh approved to be put forward by both Senator Collins and Senator King uh which you know bodess pretty well for the full $3 million that both senators have put into their appropriations request. So, I know she did an incredible amount of work um both with talking to this council, but putting together those packages. Um so, I think hopefully in July is around what I'm told we may find out about that, but um really really big thanks to Sarah Leesco, the library, and all of the staff for the incredible work they're doing there to um um to not just think about what else needs now, but the future um in doing so in a very fiscally

responsible way. So, and that with that, that's the end of my city manager report. Great. Thank you, Charlie. Committee reports. You have a cemetery commission request.

Yes. And excuse me for the cemetery commission. We do have the nomination for Terry Cormier to become a member of the commission. I fully support that. I also before we get to that want to um shout out to the whole commission. They hosted a cemetery cleanup day on May 9th at Juniper and Beachland cemeteries. We had four members of the commission plus two neighbors to Juniper who came and cleaned up. Um, also a shout out to Tiffany Tate who did the maintenance on Juniper and to Parks and Wreck who did maintenance on Beachland last year. There was very little trash that we needed to deal with. It was a matter of breaking and cleaning up. Um, but it was a great way to um, explore the cemetery some more. We found one gravestone that was off to the side on the other side of the access road. So the um the folks on the commission will be researching that and found two uh headstones that have been covered with moss and peeling those back. Do Vashan who is the head of the commission also very active on um what is the name of the website for find find a grave

and was able to get those both recorded. It was recorded that both men were in the cemetery but not where. So she was able to post a photo and the GIS points for the headstones. So, a little bonus beyond the cleanup. Um, and Wednesday is their next meeting and they'll continue to work on cleaning up with um the rules and the process and such moving forward. So, commission is very active and to te Terry's nomination, I want to read the last sentence out of her letter requesting to be um become a member of the commission. She notes that she had been a member of the uh Juniper Cemetery Board in the past and she said, "I'm so glad that the city is taking this on and look forward to being a part of the commission and making sure that there are good guidelines and care of our cemeteries and respect for our past community members and veterans who now rest there. So, she's going to be a very welcome addition to the commission."

Great. Thank you. Um, would anyone like to make a motion regarding Terry's appointment? Councelor Shay make a motion to appoint Terry Cormier as a member of the cemetery commission. Uh with a term expiring June 30, 2026. Is that correct? Yes. And I would second that. Okay. So it's just a month term. We have to re and then they have to re Okay. Okay. So, but this would be as a full member of the commission for that amount of time and then keep the cycle going. Okay. So, Pat has a motion. Do you have a second? I second.

You second. Okay, great. Any further discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor? Unanimous? Any other committee reports? Um, just just a minor a minor update on um Nolton Park. The um wreck commission is organizing the n is organizing the nolton park committee for the playground. Is that to welcome feedback and you know regarding the yes proposed for the playground? Yes. Great. Thank you

councelor White. Uh yeah, the Arbor Commission tomorrow is our fifth annual second grade planting event at the uh home Jordan Homestead preserve the nursery that's there. The event unfortunately is not open to the public. Uh but 80 kids from our second grade class can plant 80 trees in the uh in the ground there. And uh it's the best day of planting of the year. It's a lot of fun. And then um we do have an open event for the community. There's the nursery cleanup event that is this Saturday, May 23rd from 10 to 12 at the same nursery there on the Bayside Road um which is led by the ARP Commission and Freshman Bay Conservancy where we'll be cleaning up um winter damage to the trees, the irrigation system, laying landscape fabric, and spreading mulch. And participants are encouraged to wear boots, gloves, and weather appropriate clothing. and bring water and all tools will be provided there.

That's it. Thank you. Any other committee reports?

Okay, seeing none. Next up, citizens comments. Um before we get into comments, I'm just going to I just wanted to state something for the record. Um, recent social media posts have stated that the city council is considering expelling a council member as as part of tonight's city council special meeting. This is not true. The expulsion of a city councelor can only happen if the city council follows the procedures in city ordinance chapter 40, section 12, item two, which sets out certain notice and public hearing requirements before expulsion can be considered. The purpose of tonight's special meeting is for a discussion and potential action on a possible counselor violation of the Ellsworth code of conduct pursuant to city code city ordinance chapter 40 section 12 item one. Again, expulsion of a city council member is not being considered as part of tonight's special meeting. The special meeting will follow this meeting. The special meeting that will follow this meeting is not a public hearing and public not comment will not be entertained during that meeting. If the public would like to provide comments on that matter or any other matter relevant to city business, you're free to do so now during public comment. Each speaker during public comment will address the council once for a maximum of three minutes. We ask that you provide your name and town of residence before you speak. The council will not engage in dialogue with the public during public comment. So, with that, I'll open the public comment section and invite folks to come up to the DAS.

Good evening, Gordon Workman, city resident. I've got a couple items. Uh, one item. I just was informed tonight that I could ask the council for me to get a legal opinion on the renewal of a license. I do believe should have been a new business license between Serendip lower upper I guess you can call it lower main street uh state street up to mid state street because I think that was done incorrectly. So I'd like to get a legal opinion on that or the le or the the city's attorney's opinion on that please. Secondly um nonprofits we just talked about that in the workshop. Our tax dollar it goes to the city for city operations period doesn't go to to nonprofits. It's the way I look at it. We earn it. We give it to you. If we want to so give to nonprofits we can only not by factor of our tax dollar being given out. Thank you on that one. Uh recreation department. A lot of people was at the park this weekend. Bathrooms are not open yet. That would be a good thing if we could get those open now because it there's a lot of people there. Um, another item is uh shoot forgot the other item. Too many items in my head. So, I'm going to going to go right to the last item. How much How much time we had?

You got a minute and 20 seconds.

Oh, good. Maybe I'll remember it. So I elected Mr. O'Halerin for our city council to represent the tax people of Ellsworth. He's doing exactly what I I elected him to do. He's looking out for the Mr. and Mrs. taxpayer and the citizens. He's doing exactly what he's supposed to do as far as I can I can see because he's our voice. He works for us. So that's that's one other thing. Shoot. What was the other thing? Oh, the dam. Get a hold of your representatives. Tell them to take the solar money that's being given to the solar companies and to the the windmills and divert some of those funds to the dams for the fishways because they don't do it. That's where it should go. That's a renewable resource. Solar, wind is not. They're going to go down. They need maintenance. So, that's where you can get start with right there. Thank you, sir. Have a good day.

Every uh Jim Pendigus, a citizen of Ellsworth and every time I think I'm not going to talk, I talk. But I have a question specifically of the council. Since it is on the agenda that we're looking at the expulsion of Mr. Howland. My question is how was the information completed and disseminated to the other council members so they could make this decision? Was it conference calls in person written documents or talking amongst one another? Because if it is any of those without the president's presence of Mr. O'Halan, you could be in violation of that. So, I don't know if you're going to answer my question or not, but I would like for you to know that I think there's people in here that would like to know how it was compiled and how did you get it amongst one another. I think that's very important that we find that out if it's ever disclosed. Thank you.

Thank you. David Chimera from Ellsworth resident. One of my issues with the town and we we moved up here eight years ago from Massachusetts. Now I feel feel I'm living it all over again. Um, one thing, you know, I keep hearing from the town like now they want to put in these crosswalk lights down on Main Street and across the street from the uh library because apparently the white lines which aren't painted and the little cone you put in the middle of the street isn't good enough for the out of towners to stop. I don't know what you think. What makes you think that a light is going to make them stop? They don't stop for the cone and the painted lines. Then I read in the paper, well, this is coming from grant money. Well, I don't know where the grant tree is that, you know, floats off these dollar bills, but it's coming out of my pocket one way or the other. And you don't seem to be able to refuse a grant. If it's even suggested to you, you can't wait to spend it. I don't want to know the dime spent on anything that's not in the budget. I don't know how often you people meet and how often this room is used, but I was astounded when I came in here and saw this desk and the nice plushy chairs you get to sit in. Who paid for that? I did. with my taxes that got raised over $1,000 last year. If I seem to be a little poed, I am

because I left Massachusetts to come up here for a different way of life and now it's happening all over again both at the city state level. And for all of you who didn't vote conservative, this is what you get. So you deserve you deserve what you HAVE and I'm sick of it. And as far as Mr. for Howlerin goes. I don't like the way he votes all the time, but we voted him in for some hope there'd be somebody on the com on the council who would have some conservative views rather than just spend and spend and spend and and that that that grant tree doesn't exist. Right here is where it comes from. David door. I live at 186 Bayside Road. I moved here six years ago from Bucksport. When the mill shut down, they raised our taxes. When they figured it out, they lowered our taxes. I sold my son my house who was still paying $1,800 a year. I moved here paying $2500. I'm over $5,000. I voted that man in. He deserves to stay here. That's what I got to say.

Ralph Jordan, citizen of Bayside. I didn't vote for you the first time, but then I came to these meetings more often. I saw what you were concerned about. I saw that you cared about the people of Ellsworth, and I voted for you the last time. He's the only one of any of you that will walk through that door and walk into the audience when you get in here and say, "How you doing? What brings you here tonight?" I had a little opportunity to talk to Stephen just a while ago. We talked about a lot of things that had to do with Ellsworth. A lot of things that we've seen over the years. I'm just going to list a couple of them just because I love this town. The Hancock House, that beautiful hotel that used to set across the bridge, the trees that used to hang over High Street, Main Street. We've seen so much of this stuff come and go that it makes you makes me sad. But the way Steve talked about it makes me believe more than than any time before that he loves the people of Ellsworth. He serves the people of Elsus because of that love. And the other thing that struck me was when we talked about all the things we saw, the Brookside Hotel that burnt, the coalyard that burnt, the railroad station that used to run through this town, the hilltop house, all those things that we stay here and we love this town for. The irony wasn't lost that None of you except with the exception of Mr. Sheay there have ever seen that. So you cannot know the level of that man's dedication to the people of this town. One other thing. If you're going

to do something to improve this town, here's a here's an idea to start with. Make the city manager position a person who has to live in the CITY OF ELLSWORTH. HELLO, MY NAME IS Tammy Walker and I live at 20 Atlantic Highway. This is my first meeting that I've ever been to and the reason why I'm here is because I want to be a voice for Mr. Howerin. He has been a voice for everyone in this room. He has gone above and beyond um to do anything that he can for the citizens of Ellsworth. So, it was my duty as a voter and as a citizen to come here and speak for him. I want to thank you, Mr. O'Hallerin, for not just sitting there to be in a seat. You're actually there because you're listening to us. You're being our voice. Our voice has been silenced. It's been silenced on um social media. We're not allowed oop sorry. We're not allowed to talk on social media anymore. We stop that on Facebook. How fair is that to the people that can't be here? Not fair at all. So then we go to YouTube. Can't do anything there either. We can't We don't have a voice. Who's our voice? He is. He is the only one that stands up and he says what he does and he does what he says. I am I'm so tired of our taxes going up. I'm tired of um people not getting their money. If it wasn't for Steve, that family would not get their money. So, thank you. Thank you for all you HAVE DONE FOR US. WE LOVE YOU.

Good evening. Uh my name is Tiffany Gasper. I'm a resident of Ellsworth. If anyone knows me, they know I'm very active in our community in varying different aspects. And this council is a constant topic of conversation in the poor decisions that are being made. The way the council is voting on constant new spending is egregious. It is not sustainable at this rate. We are spending like we have the money to do it and we do not have it. The amount of lawsuits brought onto the city in the last few years is unnecessary. Steo Howalerin has listened to the taxpayers for years now and his constant reelection is a reflection of that. what is happening and has happened feels more like retaliation for the carst fund situation and because he constantly asks the tough questions and he doesn't just say yes to every penny spent. I feel as if he is the only one thinking about priorities and the funds to support that. There has been vast issues within the city and Steve O'Halerin is not one of those on a larger scale. The largest scale is our financial state, our infrastructure, and our schools and local businesses and community spaces that already exist. Spending time and money on investigative reports to punish a standing elected counselor is not acceptable. It has been time and time again council has gone against what a fair amount of citizens have wanted. We pay your stipens and you do not listen to us. You are not we are not a retirement community. We are an active bluecollared community. And with that I would like to remind the counselors that you are subject to recall as well and it is not a very difficult process. And so maybe this serves as your notice.

My name is Rebecca Maddox Wilbur and I am a citizen of Ellsworth, formerly of Ellsworth Falls before Ellsworth Falls was discontinued. Um, and I still live in Ellsworth Falls, ironically. Oh, I wanted to say to Steve, you're the only person except for Mr. Sheay that I trust and I voted for you both times for a very good reason. Because some of you know that I was here numerous meetings in 2019 trying to save the old Tyonic Fire Station, the last vestage of Ellsworth Falls besides the Union Congregational Church. Um, and that should have happened.

But I hate coming here. And I'll tell you why. Because we brought all the evidence that anyone should have ever needed to stop that building from being destroyed. minutes and everything.

But I had um an aneurysm, a hemorrhagic stroke in March of 2019. And by the time I got back to Ellsworth, I was just getting clear enough to look at my phone, which I wasn't supposed to do for six weeks because my brain was healing, and see that that building had hit the ground the day before. Just so you all know the bell from that tower that was there, that is in the possession of an Ellsworth firefighter. That belongs to Ellsworth Falls, whether it's called Ellsworth Falls or not. Um, that building didn't matter enough to be saved, but that bell mattered enough to be stolen. And that should sit in Ellsworth Falls. Steve and I will talk about that someday. If you don't all remove him for doing what every single person here, as far as I can tell, appreciate you for doing, Steve. You tell the truth and you ask questions. And when you ask them, you listen to the answers. And I don't know what all this is about, but I can tell you that as a person who pays a ridiculous amount of taxes for a house that's falling down around me and has zero road frontage, only an access road to it, pushing $6,000 now. Um, that is not our tax assessor. That is the money that y'all are spending that require the mill rate to go up that jeopardize me. I'm almost 65 years old. I've been working since I was 15. I am retiring from the Ellsworth school department in June for good reason and will get another job and will always have to have a job unless I sell my house in Ellsworth because I am paying way more than what it is worth in actuality. And that's not because of the tax assessor.

That's because of the mill rate. That's because of the spending. And every time I come and sit here, I hear item after item come up that's not in the budget. Well, we've got to have this and you know, if we don't, we're going to have such and such and this. How much is it? Well, it's, you know, 800,000. It's 300,000. It's thousands and thousands. And you know what? It gets the yes. And you know who says no, Steve? Because it wasn't in the budget. Ma'am, you're and the world is not going to end if we don't get another firetruck that's got all the new gadgets or whatever it is.

Ma'am, your three minutes, new, you know, all the time. All the time, people keep saying, "Why don't you run for counsel?" I'll tell you why. Because I value the quality of my life more than to sit here and to stand what what you, sir, put up with all the time. Mr. O'Halerin. Ma'am, you're up that you got reprimanded in front of all of us and I have never been so appalled in my life. I supported what he did and I know the car family. Ma'am, you're you're three you're at four minutes. If you can may please.

Okay. Well, that's that's not permitted. Ma'am, if you thank if you could wrap up your statements, that would be appreciated. Paris family got what they should have got and he was chastised for bringing it up, but you all were not doing it and you wouldn't have. HE may Hi there.

My name is Cheryl Hughes and I live here in Ellsworth. Thank you for allowing me to speak. Um, I want to address the matter with Mr. O'Halerin. Um, this does seem to be the beginning of a process to try to remove Mr. O'Halerin. I understand that some may not like his outspoken manner and I understand that some may not agree with his views. However, he is a duly elected official that is in office by the vote of the people. In fact, he received the second largest allotment of votes in the past election. I dare say the next one he will receive the most. Mr. O'Halerin represents nearly half of this city by political affiliation. As I am sure you are aware, elected officials are responsible to answer to their constituents for how they spend our taxpayer dollars and for the decisions that they make regarding changes to our laws and regulations and so forth. They are supposed to answer any questions their constituents may have regarding their leadership decisions over the town. It is their job to keep the public informed of important events and situations in the town that may have a positive or negative effect on the people in the town. All elected officials should remember that they are voted into office by their constituents and they can be voted out. That is what makes us a democratic republic. If an elected official feels that he does not need to answer to the people who put him in office, this would be more like a dictatorship, which we are not. There are surely times when a person's

conduct is so unlawful that the town manager or town council may have to censure or in extreme cases remove someone for severe infarctions of the law. But that is a very rare occurrence. If there is evidence of such action, if a board member has spoke uh has broken the law and there are criminal charges pending, then a board should openly inform its constituency of what types of criminal behavior led to an investigation, what the person was investigated for, what the investigation's outcome was, and if these findings were in fact so grievious that charges are pending, then one could understand that severity. But if this investigation started because let's say a board member does not like a person's views or what a person says or how the person says it, these are not reasons to remove a dulyeleed official and they certainly do not even meet the criteria to open an investigation in the first place. Otherwise, many on boards across the country would have needed to be investigated over the years. The removal of you're at your three minutes.

Can I have 10 seconds to wrap up? The removal of a duly elected official from office is a very serious matter and must meet a very high standard, especially when that official is one of maybe two on a board that represent half of a town in their political affiliation. Otherwise, the elections will be coming up. Let the people decide who will rule their city. Thank you. ANY other public comment? Oh, many of them.

I'm Christopher Barl. Um, I'm from Ellsworth for about six, seven years now. Transplant from Massachusetts like David and other I'm amazed. I see some real sour puss faces here tonight. I And I got to say I'm ignorant to it because I haven't paid attention. But Steve's made me pay attention. His uh antics or what you would call them have brought my light, shown me what's going on in town, and now I'm paying attention. And I can see someone isn't. Hi. Uh, I just want to remind you Steve's a businessman. I don't know if any of you are in your other lives, but government has to run like a business. Businesses live within a budget and make hard decisions that will better benefit both the business and the employees. And that's what it is. Um, I don't have a lot more to say, but thank you, Steve, for opening my eyes. Uh, and I hope some other eyes are opened a little more than they've been in the last couple minutes. Roger Gilly City resident. Um, these guys are all doing better job than I can do at telling you guys are doing a shitty job. Um, but I guess you know when Mr. Lions was getting going to get elected and was running, he said, you know, the parks, my son loves the park, wants the park. We got to do the park. This the park, that the park. Then he

votes against the park. So, we take $400,000 away from replacing the park and fixing it that it needs. Put it in a building that should be paying for itself, but doesn't. Um, that's all of our money that keeps paying for this building. Um, you know, so there therefore that tells me, you know, this friendly Ellsworth, we we want the next generation to want to raise their family in Ellsworth. Growing up as a kid, the cool thing about Ellsworth is no matter where you went. Um, I've known Mr. Allen's family forever. Uh, as a kid, they were friendly. You know, they'd buy your soda pop, lollipop, whatever you wanted. The whole town was friendly. You know it's you know like you know they stopped putting ads on TV of alcohol and cigarettes and stuff because they said it was attracting the kids. Well attract people that want to live in Ellsworth will be the park. The kids being able to grow up and see that they have a future. They want to bring their kids to Ellsworth because of they had a great life. Right now Ellsworth doesn't do anything for anybody. You guys uh want to spend money. you know, you don't really care, I guess, about the people. Um, and it's obvious, you know, you think, you know, because of Steve's thing, you think there's a lot of people here now. Wait till you take High Street down to one lane and you have everybody pissed off. UM, we we hear about um we need um you know, locked doors and stuff at city hall. Part of that's because of me. Um, I come in, I ask questions. Next thing I know, I got three cops escorting, wanting to escort me out of the building. Well, I paid for part of this building with my taxes. I just needed a clear answer. Couldn't get a clear answer. You know, it seems like now we have departments that that really are, you know, honestly suck. Code enforcement. We hire two

guys, do code enforcement. They ride around in one car together. What are they doing? They they've added multiple lawsuits on people and residents of Ellsworth and denying people over asking questions on on their permits. Um it it's ridiculous. And now you know we have our code enforcement telling somebody that they can buy a building and they can run their business. Now they're where the city is telling the people that they can't. There's another lawsuit. How many hundreds of thousands of dollars are we going to waste and you guys are going to keep okaying the spending and the spending and the lawsuits? What happened to code enforcement coming up and talking to people and say, "Okay, let's get compliant." Now it's let's take you to court and let's make you spend thousands.

Mr. Gill, you're at your three minutes. You're good. Thank you. Thank you. May I speak? Yes, you may. May I speak? Yes, you may, Mr. Brooks. Can you hear me? We can. Can you hear us?

You can. I'm I'm not sure where we are on the agenda. I was logged on here at six o'clock but I didn't get admitted till quarter after or so. So I'm not sure where we are. I came because I wanted to I wanted to speak to the matter of these grants grant application on the event on the agenda and I'm not sure just where we are. Do we we haven't got to that Mr. Brooks? Get by that before I got on here. Mr. Mr. Brooks, we haven't got to that yet. We'll uh when we get there, we'll give you the opportunity to speak.

Thank you.

Good evening. John Lahan, Ellsworth resident. I really don't want to say too much more than what's already been said tonight, but I'd just like to thank the people for showing up tonight. Uh it's nice to see people that are willing to rally when there's a cause out there. I believe there is a legitimate cause here tonight and uh I think uh there's a lot of unknowns until we see that second meeting tonight and hear all the particulars going on. I really don't know enough specifics to address anything specifically, but by rumor and hearsay, it appears like it's a way to challenge Steve O'Harn and his first amendment rights, the way he has stood up for our town and stood up for the people. And I just am here to support Steve. I support Pat. I support people that are standing up what I believe is correct in the city of Ellsworth. And it's very encouraging to me personally. I come to a lot of the meetings, the finance committee meetings to try to keep a handle on what's going on in the city. And tonight, I've been very encouraged by the people that have showed up here tonight. Uh it's very really encouraged me. I'm a lifelong resident. I love the city of Ellsworth. I have fought at various times for different positions here in the city. Don't always win. Uh lose most of the time, but you know that's all right. Sometimes if you're right, you have to step up for what's right. So I'm excited to see the amount of citizens that are here tonight. and I encourage you to go home and get one more person to come to the next city council meeting. My goal would be to see the city council meeting moved up to the high school so everybody can get in and know what's going on in the city of Ellsworth. So, thank you very much, Steve. We love you. Praying for you. You're doing a great job. Keep up the good work. Thank you everybody. Some of the discussion seems to be Oh, this is Carl Brooks.

55. I'm not just a res. Go ahead, sir.

My name is Robert Grant. uh businessman in Ellsworth, hopefully retiring, but uh still have to work for obvious reasons. And uh uh I just want to say I have Steve's phone number and I have Mr. Sha's phone number. I would welcome you all to give me your phone numbers because I don't text, I don't email, uh I don't do any of that. But I'd like to have all your phone numbers, everybody. And uh my taxes at my house, 4 and a half acres up on the hill, $10,000 plus dollars a year. Okay. Nobody probably cares. I do cuz I'm trying to retire. Not my land. Not the land. just my house for $10,000. Four and a half acres. Now you figure that out. I would I would like you and you and everybody else there to figure that out for

you have a grant. What's that? You don't have a green tree

that it maybe one day but maybe once but it's over. I'm trying to retire is what I'm trying to say. I mean I don't want to work. I'm 69 years old. How long do I have to work? I'm 69 years old. I don't want to work anymore. And I think you all should be ashamed of yourself, the city manager and the rest of you and everybody up there for even considering to take Steve away from us. It It's wrong. And I'm sorry. It's wrong. And I just can't see it happening. I just I if you if you guys vote in any adverse way against Mr. Haron tonight, I will be here in the fall to take one of your seats and I can't do anything. I can't I can't I can't be open. But I will I guarantee you I will take your seats. One of them.

THANK YOU. CHRIS ROOD. I LIVE IN ELLSWORTH. Uh I believe that we're up here because that gentleman right there has transparency and wants everybody to know what's going on. And people don't like that. That's the way the government runs now. And I like how that government runs now. And I really think that as a businessman and everything like that, that gentleman right there represents everything that I believe in. And I'm sorry that you guys don't believe that. And uh that's all I can say. Rail service says everything. Thank you. I got one other thing,

sir. We're only Everyone just gets one one opportunity. Thank you very much. You're all the you the seat. I'm coming after.

Thank you very much. That was good.

Good evening. Rob Hudson, um Ellsworth. Um I'm not originally from Ellsworth. I got stationed up here after 911. Met my wife. We settled down here and stayed here. Um, I served on the Ellsworth VI volunteer fire department. Um, I served on school board the year I was on school board. No one took out no one took out papers to even run for the seat. So, I felt it was an important thing to do. But what I feel that I did always did every time like I feel Steve does is every vote or every motion was not based on a political affiliation. It was always based on what was best for those kids and for the city of Ellsworth, the taxpayers every time. And there were hard decisions that had to be made that that made most people not very happy. Um, but they had to be made. And when it came time for reelection, I was not reelected. And it's the only time in my life I'm I'm ever glad I lost something. So, I applaud what you're doing, Steve, and please keep it up. Thank you. Charles Lynch, president of Ellsworth. There's been a lot said here tonight and I couldn't agree more. I'm here to support Steve, everything he's done for the community and will continue to do. And I have a question for you, members of the board, the council. My wife and I are looking at retirement in the not too distant future. Am I going to be able to afford to pay my taxes? My mortgage will be paid off, but will I be able to

afford to live in my house that I built? I went in the woods, cut the trees down, had the lumber saw, built the house myself, but will I be able to stay there? Steve, thank you for what you're doing. May I speak?

Mr. Brooks, the matter you'd like to speak on has not happened yet, so we're going to um mute you and then maybe we can just bring him back in for that matter. That'd be great. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Brooks. Thank you. Clarence Grant, Ellsworth, Maine. Went to school with Steve. Uh, I just got to ask, who's been on the board for more than 70 years or who's been in Ellsworth for 70 years or longer? Raise raise your hand for me. 65, 60 years.

That's kind of my point. Okay. I don't know what's going on with all the particulars with Steve. I've known him my whole life. uh not a better person I can't think of. Do I agree with him all the time? Hell no. But we're good friends. Uh he answers my call, I answer his call. Uh I voted for him. Uh a lot of people in this town voted for him. And I'd like you to look around here. There's a lot of people here that are over 50. And the last two council members that got voted in, not the last two, but they're they're also around that age because the people of Ellsworth can't had enough. You know, our taxes I'm same thing. I'm behind them. taxes might who who cares. I'll get straightened out. It's not a laundry list where he'll give out. But um I think he needs to be treated as equals I'd want one of you guys treated. And I don't mean to point or be inconsiderate to anybody, but pretty much everybody said what needs to be said around here. But if and you guys don't really have to listen to us, but I suggest you do because if you don't, the worst city c next city council meeting is going to be worse. And not in a threat of any way. People will show up. THANK YOU VERY MUCH. OKAY. WOULD ANYONE else like to provide public comment?

I hope so. Mr. L, anybody out there in the hallway? Would anyone in the hallway, if you can hear me, like to provide public comment? Okay. Uh, with that, I'm going to close the public comment portion of the agenda and we will move on to I'll just Yes, we'll move on to agenda item number 10. Nine. Nine,

excuse me. Um, councelor comments. Would any counselors like to provide comments on the meeting um or anything regarding to city business? If you do, I'd ask you likewise to keep your comments to three minutes or less. Um, and uh, thank you, Councelor Helerin.

Wow. I'd like to thank everybody for coming out here tonight and uh, supporting this event. I'd like to tell you a little story if I may. I fell down and hit my head in 2021. And when I woke up, I had nomination papers to run for city council. And I went to the Grand for the first time as a candidate. I'd never been to candidates night. And wow, I I was blessed or cursed with a seat here at this city council. And one of the first things that I did was, of course, you get uh you go through the process and um you get sworn in and and the city manager takes you on a tour and part of that tour was the sewer treatment plant. And mind you, I I don't know anything about anything when it comes to the city. I'd never followed city politics. So, I go to this tour and there was an individual at that sewer treatment plant telling me that this is an enterprise account and how much money that they make. And I listened to that. And when I got back to city hall after the tour of many facilities, I asked to see some financials.

And the financials said that that enterprise account lost $460,000 in the most current financials, which was two years old. And I'm like, wow, this is government. So then I went to the first regular meeting and I get handed a paycheck right out of the blue. The clerk hands me a paycheck and I'm like, I don't want that. Oh, you have to take it. And so I took it because I didn't know if I could take it or not take it. So I took it and I'm like, what am I going to do with that? So I gave it to the library, okay? Which I have done every year since I've BEEN to handle that. But those two events shaped my behavior. Number one, we got a department telling me that they're an enterprise account making money. And the accountants that we paid to research that in an audit says not true. We're losing 460 grand that year. Secondly, I just got elected and I'm being prepaid for a year. I'm like, where does that happen? Who prepaids somebody in advance for a year? And I'm like, is this what government is about? I I was in complete shock, not knowing anything um about how it worked. I was just horrified. Absolutely horrified. I've made payroll every Friday for 38

years and I didn't know how this place was doing it. I can tell you that. So, one thing that I noticed is that when you go to the Grand and it's it's candidates night, the people stand up and give you their ideas, okay? And what they think is right. And people make decisions. They vote yes, no, maybe, whatever. So from that day forward, I'm like, "Wow, th this is a this is really really out of control." So I began to put the spotlight on government. And maybe all government's this way. I don't know. I never been involved in government before. So I began to put the spotlight on. And I realized that people didn't like that. They didn't like the spotlight on them. And I was encouraged to vote along, to get along. Some of the original members that were here when I got elected the first time encouraged me to be a unified council. Be a unified council. Make sure everybody votes along to get along. Well, I listened to that advice very politely from three senior counselors in a private setting. And when that meeting was over, I went, I'm not here to vote alone, to get along. I'm here to represent Mr. and Mrs. Ellsworth. And I used to call Mr. and Mrs. Ellsworth stockholders. And the council at the time was upset by that behavior.

So I changed it to Mr. and Mrs. Ellsworth because that's who I am here to represent. Now because of that I'm not welll liked at city hall.

Me someone's failings. I I'm not wellliked at city hall and I had a surprise given to me that they wanted to discuss with me in private, not in public, my ethical behavior. Steve, just sorry to interrupt. We're at six minutes and we are going to be discussing that matter. the special meeting. I think your comments might be Let me finish. Can we be there at the special meeting? Yes, we can. Yes,

let me finish. Good. Thank you. So, anyway, here we are.

I get surprised with an ethics investigation and I said right there, stop right there. I want this in a public setting. I want everybody to know my exact faults, my rough emails, my bad behavior, everything that I have done wrong. According to city hall, I stood up for this family. And that's why we're here tonight. I I brought that subject to this council in August after 2 years of chattering about it behind closed doors at finance meetings saying this is wrong. Take what's yours and give that family the rest. In August, I put that on the agenda and nobody would second that. Therefore, we couldn't have the discussion. So, I had to take to outside behavior to inform you what was going on. And then because of you and the public push back that they got, suddenly it's a new topic on the October agenda. And guess what? The car family got their money back. Now, in closing, I would like to say this. I would like to thank everybody

that's here that's not here for tonight. I would have liked to have clapped when you complimented me. I couldn't do that. But I'm here to say thank you. Wear a tie. I paid $20 every meeting not to wear a tie because that's the rules.

Why? I don't know. But to all of you, THANK YOU. IT WOULD BE NICE IF somebody would please respect the man sitting in the middle sitting and looking the other way. Agenda item. Are there any other counselor comments? Councelor Shay, if you could please keep it to three minutes or less. Oh, yeah. I'll try.

Just Just so you know, I'm I'm with Mr. and Mrs. Ellsworth. I I'm I'm really I don't want to spend your money. And if I do spend your money, I'll give you very very good reason why. But the answer is no. We're not spending any more money. And I want you to keep your rights to come up here and speak. I'm, you know, probably I'm going to be just like Steve and then city hall and public works and the rest of them aren't going to like me. But I WANT for the amount of taxes that you pay, you should get excellent service. Okay.

And you need to be informed and you have always have that right to call me and talk to me. Okay? Because I'm here. Thank you.

Those are the two I have right there. Any further any further public or counselor comments? All right, seeing none, we'll move on to agenda item number 10, unfinished business. Council order number 042605, public hearing and action on the proposed adult use cannabis overlay zone in chapter 56, unified development ordinance, article 3, zoning districts to establish the location of adult use cannabis stores. Believe we have our urban planning development director, Danielle Gift.

Hi, good evening, council. Um, yep. We're bringing this back to make be now that it's been properly noticed. Um, we've went gone through all the steps and you can see that laid out in your memo. So, now it's to um formally adopt the adult use cannabis overlay zone and um amend chapter 56 article 3 to include it. Any questions?

If you could just give a little background. I know folks in the room and um and those listening on the may have the background of why. Yeah, I'll read directly from the memo because that does provide background. Um, so there was a 2024 referendum to allow adult use cannabis stores in Ellsworth. City recently, city council recently adopted revisions to chapter 14, which is our licenses and permits chapter, and chapter 56, which is is the unified development ordinance, um, article 8 performance standards of the city ordinance. Um, and I included the planning board report. I think I did. Oh, maybe I didn't. I'll send that to you. Sorry about that. Um, but that's in the memo from previous meetings. The planning board discussed the recommendation of this overlay zone in their September 25 meeting and officially voted to recommend adding the zone to chapter 56 article 3 at their March 31st, 26 meeting. This is the final step in the process to amend the city's ordinance to allow the adult use cannabis stores. Um, and so we have done the proper public notice for this final piece of it. The next steps um the license application period did open on April 14th. It was open for 30 days. The next after that is that any applications that are deemed complete should go before city council at the June 15th meeting. If there are more than three applications, all of them will go before city council for a conditional approval and that's pending a successful drawing in a lottery that will be held the following week. Um so that is where we are. Thank you council. Any questions for Danielle regarding uh the overlay? No. I would just note that um yeah that thank you Mr. Williams um always our parliamentarian exopicio u for noticing the uh the public hearing requirement change. Um and the staff has now done that and I can support moving forward with this now.

Great. Thank you. Um, this matter is noted as a public hearing. So, I will open the public hearing if anyone from the public would like to speak on the adult use cannabis overlay zone. Please feel to approach the DAS and provide us your name and um, please keep it to 3 minutes or less. Uh, my name is Robert Grant Senior. I watched that on TV. Uh, I was under the impression that you told the man on Main Street that he could open the store. That's it's a different matter, sir. This is Well, can I can I I can't talk then. We have We are bringing up a the marijuana license later if you'd like to speak.

I will be right back. Thank you very much. Would anyone else like to speak on the overlay? Sir, wouldn't this Yeah, but wouldn't it what you was going to discuss kind of goes with this agenda as well, though? Um, not I think it'd be best fit for the license if people want to speak then if best fit or can the man talk. No, he said no. I think we're going to again the goal of the agenda is to have people speaking on the relevant topic. I believe that relevant topic would become later.

Um, anyone else like to speak about the overlay zone for adult use cannabis, not medical cannabis? Seeing none, I'm going to close the public hearing. Council, how would you like to proceed? Councelor Smith. Thank you. I'll move to approve the request of the planning and urban development director to amend chapter 56 unified development ordinance article 3 to include an adult use cannabis overlay zone as presented effective immediately, which would now be uh May 18th, 2026. Thank you, Kevin. Do I have a second? Second. Any further discussion from council? Council,

I would just say I I appreciated the conversation that we had um in past at the workshops to be able to see where these that were voted on by the um residents where it makes sense for them to be and I think this it's good to have this final step done. Great. Thank you, councelor Howerin. How does this affect the next topic of agenda? Um, I'm concerned that shoving this ahead of business license here could have a negative effect. Um, tell me about that.

Well, it should have no effect, Steve. The um, this adult use overlay applies only for adult use cannabis businesses. Um and it it only applies to the uh overlay zone which we've identified which is primarily High Street up to Merrick Merrick and um up to the top of the hill. The next matter has to do with medical cannabis which is a a separately regulated matter. So this will not affect the next matter. It will not affect the next matter. Thank you.

Any further discussion from council before we vote? You have a motion to second on the table. Seeing none, all those in favor? Opposed? Yay's carry. Number 11 on the agenda, public hearing and action on the application for renewal of the following licenses. Um the there are a number of licenses. I'd like to take the um the the medical marijuana license separately from the remainder of the licenses that we'll vote on. Um, so I would make a motion that we vote on separately the Rosenberg Smith Enterprises um, medical cannabis dispensary license. Would anyone like to advance that motion?

So moved. Do I have a second? Second. Any further discussion from council? Councelor Howerin. If you're going to separate one, why don't we separate them all? Treat everybody the same. I think for efficiency standpoint and the fact that the other ones I don't believe there are any issues regarding that Steve I think it makes the most sense um for us to separate it out councelor Shay um clear um primary organic therapy business is clear leaf that's medical marijuana if the two of them were separated from the other ones along with rose rosen

sure we can separate that one out and we'll do it separately if you'd like because they're both medical.

Certainly, we don't have a memo or anything regarding that business um or any other other licenses other than the um the Main Street medical business, Steve. So, I don't know if there'd be any separate discussion on that one. We don't have any relevant information in front of us other than that we've been told that they're all these licenses are ready for approval. Okay. Okay. So, we have a motion and a second for Main Street Medical to be voted on separately. All those in favor? All those opposed? Okay. All right. So, for public hearing and action on the application for renewal for the following licenses. Shimashi Incorporating doing business as Shimashi 139 High Street for renewal of a city class C L V license license vehicular and liquor. Renewal of estate restaurant class one, two, three, and four malt spiritus and Venus liquid or sorry liquor licenses assuming it's liquid liquor. Uh Primary Organic Therapy Incorporated doing business of CureLaf, Maine, three Merrick Street, SweetBe for renewal of a medical marijuana dispensary license, including a city vicular license. Creswell Investments LLC DBA Airline Brewing Company 173 Main Street for renewal of a class C class B license Vicular Liquor and Amusement renewal of estate restaurant class 2 and four malt and Venus liquid license. Scott Kenny doing business as Jordan's Snack Shack, 200 Downy's Highway for renewal of a city class B license. Vicular liquor and amusement and renewal of a state restaurant class 1, two, three, and four liquor license. Girl Ellsworth Incorporating DBA Hawthorne extended stay by Wam Windham one 215

High Street for renewal of a city lodging license. Zepa's New York Pizza 92 Water Street for renewal of a class a city class C license Vicular and liquor and renewal of a state liquor license class 4 3 and 4. LJN LLC DBA Forest Ridge Campground 40 flock flockamosen way for renewal of a city lodging license and corporate chefs LLC 21 Kingsland Crossing for renewal of a city class C license. Vicular and liquor and renewal of estate restaurant class 1 2 3 and four liquor license. As this matters uh notice is a public hearing. Open the public hearing. If anyone from the public would like to comment on any of the business license renewal applications um please approach the DS and provide any comment. Logically, city resident, I kind of like Steve's idea that these should be broke up into individual as you guys do them as a group of businesses. We've stood here and we watched a business get a license where they changed their business to add more to their business license than barely what they should be after they moved locations. We've watched the city approve a business license well after the guy that owned the business had passed away and the business license was renewed in that guy's name. Um, you know, so we we probably ought to pay a little more attention to what we're licensing for businesses if we're going to allow that. Um, we watched a a guy buy a building because he thought he could continue selling um his product at the building and now you're telling him he can't. I mean, you guys just open yourselves up for lawsuits and it doesn't even make sense. So, maybe a little more thought

going into some of this stuff would uh make a little more sense. Common sense would really work in in situations like this. Thank you. If I get to comment on the other thing sometime before it's over, just let me know when it's right now. Yes, sir.

Anyone like to comment public provide comment public comment on the licenses that were just read? No. Seeing none, I'll close the public hearing. How would the council like to proceed on these business licenses? Check with the clerk. Were all the applications in order and all materials were required and there's no concerns from any staff regarding any of these businesses? Great. Thank you. Make a motion to approve the business license renewals as presented. Second from councelor Smith. Any further discussion from councel? Seeing none, all those in favor?

Opposed? Unanimous. Okay. Roseberg Smith Enterprises DBA Main Street Medical 71 Main Street for renewal of a medical cannabis dispensary license including a city vitular license. I believe uh we have a memo on this matter from the city manager. Um and city manager Oh, I missed. No, I got to do the Union River after this, but um don't let me forget that one. Um, councelor or city manager Pierce, um, if you'd like to maybe give us some background on this one.

Yeah, thank you, Chair Lions. And I believe we have Robin, the the business owner here. I'd just like to first thank and apologize to Robin. Um, she's been excellent to work with with her entire time in um in city hall over the many years of being here. We've never had an issue um uh that I'm aware of. You know, I've only been here two years um with your with your business. And you know, I know the last meeting I was um kind of watching online. It was kind of hard to tell in a few areas um what was or wasn't moving forward. And I had my own kind of questions that I wanted to flag down. Um I think some of the circumstances changed between that meeting and now on this what was a new business application um which had twice gone through council for different reasons um and now it's a renewal. U so I'll I'm going to kind of just zoom out a bit. I know I gave a very extensive background memo. um they you know they thought marijuana was supposed to be fun but I've never um had spent more time more stress researching an issue which you know really

Can we can we please have everyone quiet so that we can hear everything I'm having a hard time hearing. Thank you.

Um you know I've uh it's been I think probably almost a 20 year um you know experience the city's had with medical and caregivers and then going to recreational. Um, so I really kind of had to zoom back a bit to, you know, to understand this. This is a complicated one. And, you know, I know Robin, uh, I believe they'll have you come up in a second. And if, um, if I haven't gotten things right on like the history here, feel free to correct me. And, uh, I'm still, uh, you know, learning and it's, you know, from what I put in my memo, uh, around 20 years ago, uh, you know, medical cannabis was passed in the state of Maine that led to kind of a new framework for medical cannabis. The city established a moratorum while they worked on a framework. Uh they ended up having one medical operation allowable in the city which has now become curle relief. um it was really left you know undecided I would say on what to do about the there's multiple licenses with this in this this category there's also a medical caregiver um retail license which uh allows a caregiver to operate a retail space with a set amount of patients that if they grow their own um products etc um servicing those patients the state's laws around those had changed a few times around I believe the um this originally came through as a glass shop uh and in Later we found out that the states your with boss lady genetics their retail license needed the city to certify um that they were considered grandfathered. This was last year. The city staff uh filled out that paperwork to note that this I think this business had been here prior to 2018 and we considered this retail uh caregiver license grandfathered. U you know I think there's some look back on when this was coming through. They probably should have established a framework for caregiver not just the medical side. Um but I can say my own piece of the messes I say um and there's a few pieces I think I have that I should have done better here. Um started

last year when um we rectified that with the state noting that it's grandfathered in for the retail caregiver license but then our our office uh because even though we don't have a retail caregiver um license we brought it forward I think at the last meeting as just well we'll put it in as a dispensed medical dispensary and then certify them with the state as a retail caregiver. I'd say that was kind of first mistake at least on my watch. Um, in that, you know, that's that's a discrepancy that needed to be figured out. That should have been the inflection point where I said, "Hey, we've got this grandfathering of this retail caregiver. We only have medical license. Our medical ordinance is pretty clear. We're only allowed one. Cure Leaf is that one. This one needs a separate caregiver license." And for the city council to kind of really take the opportunity then um to think about it. Then we kind of fast forward to fall. The there was a question raised with our staff on if the grandfathering provisions would hold uh moving forward. Uh I know that was a surprise to me at the last meeting. Uh and I think that's one piece of the confusion here was you know the the aspect of the retail caregiver versus dispensary and our legal council uh had some back and forth with the code office that gave sort of qualifications. Yes. But, you know, as long as nothing materially changes, something to that effect. Uh, and and that really should have been a point where also staff said, "Okay, we've got a gray area here. We're talking about a grandfather transference. Let's get the city manager's office involved. Let's get the business licenses from this is actually the um clerk's office license, not the code's license." Uh, so sort of another misstep. It comes forward and I think February is Marijuanaville um for a new business license. And honestly, at that time, we sort of are were pursuing a retail uh ordinance environment that we've just put together pretty strict standards on what, you know, blacking out the windows. Um this is what medical can or retail cannabis

could be. And when the transference happened, all of a sudden on Main Street, there's, you know, highlighter yellow and orange advertising product right on Main Street. It's really felt like it had changed its use. So again, we said, "Okay, let's put together some medical standards so at least we have the same standards if this new business would like to come in for medical, you know, which makes sense that you'd have for retail that there wouldn't be a different set of standards on Main Street." Um, as part of that review, we it starts to become apparent this isn't, you know, this isn't a there's a material change of use going on here. It's going from a smaller low-key retail uh caregiver license to more of a a full medical dispensary in some ways advertising to bring people into the doors. Um and and really sort of pumped the brakes, talked to our legal counsel a lot more. uh really try to figure out we all um many of you saw that meeting here last time around about you know what I wanted to look into more which was okay what how do I weigh that guidance from code which may not have been was a little too broad when code in my opinion um it should have include caveats but it didn't um it was a pretty blanket statement from code to to Robin that sure um you can move forward on this and um but in that process too as was mentioned at the council meeting we've never been able to find an ownership of this um location there might have been a purchase and sale and I don't know if you you'll be able to clarify when you're up here that was kind of presented and we took it at face value that this business had already been sold and that essentially they're they bought a business um once that became apparent. Um and it it it sort of to me reset things which is you know this this purported group that wanted to buy this business um they didn't own it outright at that point. they had a maybe had a purchase and sale, but now they've had two separate meetings where the counselors essentially denied this application. So I don't think I think the L el stop or the ESTPO where there's a legal term for this on if city gives guidance and if somebody buys something

on it, it could be considered holding. That may or may not have been true with this one. I think it could have been just through the point of the license application, but I feel like that's moot now that we know that the business um was not purchased or um Robin there was other things as well. They as part of the retail caregiver, they told our code office that they are fully vertically integrated. Um that they grow and sell all their own materials. You were all here in that meeting when the OCP violation for pesticides and their products was brought forward and they said they were not vertically integrated. They got those products elsewhere. It's another piece that could also trip the test on if you're not informed properly from staff or misinformed within the ownership structure or the um um your type of business. Um as we're looking at health and safety issues. Um, so now it's kind of what do we do going forward? I I this is a tough one. I, you know, I'm really looking to the council for guidance on um, as I, as I noted, Robin's been um, a great business um, and has had no issues there. There's been some issues with the business potential transference, but the city hasn't been perfect on this matter. You know, my, you know, it's really up to the council on on how they think that this is a policy. It's and our our attorneys here who after Robin speaks maybe can also provide guidance but uh you know really feels like you know the we've this business has been operating there for some time and would the council like to um move forward with allowing it to be a second medical dispensary with all those aspects and full grandfathering of those licenses. I don't think we're allowing that for our retail cannabis license or others just to hold the license, which was a limited monopoly, and then transfer it in perpetuity. I think that might set a tough precedence. But, um, to continue to operate, I think we should probably establish a retail caregiver license. But, you know, there's a range of of options here for the council to consider. And I'm sorry we'll have to spend some time on this and to unwind um

some of my own mistakes on this. And I again apologize, Robin, um, for that. Um, and with that, maybe we can have Robin come up.

Uh, Robin Lawler, owner of Boss Lady Genetics. Um, I don't know where to start. I am the owner still. I held paper. Money has been transferred. I still own the building. So, um, it is still running under me. So, I'm here tonight hoping that you renew my license. I'm back. I moved to Texas. um uh based on money exchanged. And I just want to not to be rude, I just want to read this letter because that this is why I feel we're here. If this if it wasn't for this email, we wouldn't be here. uh is from Robert Grant and I waited a month and a half before I left for Texas uh to make sure because I know that I'm grandfathered and I'm uh downtown and so I was very respectful and I waited and if I didn't get this email we wouldn't be here today. So I just want to read it really quickly. Um good morning Robin. Believe it or not I just heard back from our our attorney yesterday on this matter. He said selling the business would not remove its legally non-conforming status. That's good. You are able to sell the business and it can still operate under someone else's ownership. So the last meeting I think that um it was there was a little bit of confusion because um somebody was saying that it's under you know that you we thought she could sell it. Things have changed but she's going to keep it under her ownership under her license. It's federally illegal. I don't want it under my license. So, um I just wanted to let you know I am back from Texas. Um and I thank you every all the uh residents because there are going to be he's coming after me. Uh you know there's a lot of legal issues. I think that it changed a few times. um you know

it was the health of the community and then all of a sudden on we're on the sixth month and it now um you're saying that I wasn't able to sell it. So regardless of all that I'm back. I just hope that you renew my license. Um it didn't work out but I I do feel that it it was complicated but it was very unnecessary that we're at this this point. Is there any more questions for me? Smith, I'd like to ask a question through the chair. What What is your intention now? Are you back to stay?

Yes. I'm here to take back my company. I'm not able to sell it. Um which I'm saying that I thought that I could. I know. I understand. So, I apologize that we're here. I think it's unnecessary, but I am back and I hope that you do renew my license. And your intention is that you'll live you'll stay in the area and continue on. Yes. Yes. Clarifying question for somebody. We're looking at a caregiver license renewal.

Yeah. Caregiver retail. Um well, that's that's the issue at hand here, which is we don't have a caregiver retail license in the city. And that's why my kind of guidance in here is that it's sort of you know if we want to move forward we have to decide this piece which should have been decided very long time ago on whether the um you know this type of use a caregiver retail under what conditions it can operate. It's um our ordinance only has one uh dispensary license. Uh we certified with the state that they were a retail caregiver grandfathered in for that piece. Um but then we also brought forward to the city council that they were um in to put forward them under a medical dispensary which shouldn't have happened. We should have at that point in time clarified the retail caregiver aspect of it. So um right now we don't have a retail uh caregiver license. um you know and so I think and I can leave it to our attorney that can provide more clarification on options for the council in that sort of gray area on you know granting a license under a condition that we move forward with um specifying the uh the retail caregiver rules as the city would want to move forward with them and then also the provisions on grandfathering. Um, and I think there's um some notes in your packet on just how um specific and you know, especially grandfathering, but as it comes to a license like this, um, which is complicated, that will that will take some time. So, that's kind of where we're at. I don't know if Tim P's, our attorney, has any more issues or discussion there. Attorney Peas, would you like to provide any comment? Good evening. Uh Tim P's uh city attorney. Uh just to uh clarify, and I don't want to get too far into the weeds, but grandfathering is another way of talking about a non-conforming use.

And the way the law works is that so a use that is uh in existence and then law changes, ordinances change, and so forth. Uh the city can say, "Well, we're going to preserve the status quo. We're going to allow you to continue to operate in a certain way and maintain the status quo, not grow, not change, status quo. The question was asked last fall whether a non-conforming use, a grandfathered use, could be transferred to a new owner. The ordinance does not prohibit that. So, the answer is yes, you can do that. But that doesn't mean that you get to change the use, expand the use, and so forth. So that was the issue that I think the city ran into with the proposed new owner is that they changed the look of the operation. They changed the description of the operation vertical and so forth. And I think that is where the council said, "Wait a minute, that's that's changing things." I think the question before the city council tonight and I think the the manager laid it out is that for a long period of time, the owner who's here tonight operated the business a certain way and the city said okay to that. There's been some laws, changes and so forth and and I think uh the manager said going forward might need to figure that out a little bit better. But the question I think is the intervening weeks and months since the owner let it be operated by somebody else. Does that mean the grandfathering status goes away? And that is a judgment call that this council has to make. A business judgment. The law is not going to tell you that three months or six months of operating differently or how materially differently uh is going to make the difference between losing your grandfathering status or not. It's a judgment call that you get to make. Any questions?

Any questions for the city attorney? Council chair. So the really the question I have is there a huge difference between caregivers's license as far as the state's concerned far as medical or is it the same as medical there there's a lot of difference but I don't think that's the issue before you tonight.

Okay. I think the issue is, are you comfortable with allowing the owner to operate the business like she did several months ago and then I think going forward we can address the caregiver issue, dispensary issue and so forth. Council Martin,

could I have I'm just a little unclear on who owns this building now because with the last time the potential new owner was here, he stood there. I said, "Do you own this building?" He said, "Yes." I said, "When did you close?" He said, "In January." So, what what's the deal with the building? Um, I held paper and I own the building and if he didn't get a business license or he didn't make payment, I come in and take the business back. Okay. Um, and and is this an is has this been between you and Amicable? Is there going to be a court fight over the

I'm he I'm not sure for me. Yeah. So the So actually ownership of the business is not set in stone right now. It's Oh, it is. Yeah, for me. Yes, it is. For you it is. But yes. Okay. No, what he the only thing that he could do is come back after me for his first payment. Okay. All right.

And we haven't negotiated. I mean, we get along. He might I I don't know. It's I just got back from Texas, so I'm not sure. He can go that route. He I don't think so, but you just never know. But it's not going it's not going to affect my store. Okay. Because it was very specific um in the contract or the purchase and sale that, you know, it's based on and we we just assumed because of that email that there would not be a problem. But, you know, here we are. But, um, you know, he could gracefully just back out. Okay.

Thank you, Councelor Smith. I I have a question for the attorney based on what we're hearing.

In our memo, there are suggested motions for if you want to deny or if you want to. It's a very long memo. I'm trying to find where they are. um if you want to deny the license or approve it with conditions. My inclination and I look forward to hearing other thoughts is to find a legal way to allow the status quo to continue that her business model I think was a fit um for for the area and for what we're trying to accomplish here. So the guard rails that are outlined here. My sense again in waiting to hear from others is to find a way to make this work under the language and I want to make sure that we've got the language right tonight so that if that is how the vote goes, Robin has a clear path ahead of her to move forward with this business in that building. So, can you tell me if the can somebody tell me what page? No options. Okay. So, page 21 has um

22 has the proposal. Okay. Deny and then renew. Okay. The recommended language. Thank you. The bottom of page 22. Is that the language that will to your point continue the status quo of boss lady in a way that's clear and legal and everybody can move forward and there's other higher up above there are guard rails to put in place that make sense as well you talk about yeah yes you're very concise

and I I would say that guard rails are important, conditions are important because it helps everybody understand, especially when people change, what you can and can't do. Is it going to be perfect? You'll never anticipate every scenario that comes up. But this is a a lot better of an outcome, I think, if you want to go with approving it. Thank you,

senior manager Pierce. Yeah, just two notes on that because selfishly I don't want to be back in this chair again on this issue. To me that is, you know, let's let's create the caregiver retail framework. Let's have a, you know, a lot more discussion on how the grandfathering will work, not just with this retail caregiver, but as we discussed before, we're about to have up to three additional retail cannabis licenses. The city council and, you know, probably five or six workshops decided we don't want to have, you know, unlimited amounts of cannabis stores in Ellsworth. we'd like to offer, you know, up to three. These are essentially limited monopolies. In the case of medical um there's one allowed. In the case of this retail um operator, there's one allowed. Um or on the converse side of that, does the council consider that those who win the lotteryies for these limited monopoly licenses uh are they transferable in perpetuity? that is that effectively makes those licenses a lot more valuable um than you know if somebody gets the lottery for a retail or if folks that own medical they want to sell and um move it forward that's a much more valuable than I have this building that I would want to sell so I think that's worthy of policy discussion and that would be I think a big logical next step I'll work with Robin um to really you know like I said she's been a great business owner um it wasn't until this um new operator had come in and we started getting misinformation on ownership status, on the level of their vertical integration when we had OCP violations on pesticide use. Um that really became even more complicated. The staff and myself included wasn't perfect on surfacing these issues in the past, but we got to iron that out fully through. Um and you know, I would support that as well. And then I'll start working on those frameworks with Robin. So, and then we could probably bring it to a workshop as well to discuss the grandfathering clause, get um how the council would consider these moving forward. So, Robin has a little more per perfect clarity on how she can

continue to operate and if she'd like to sell it, would it be a new retail um uh operator that's licensed by the state that would come in under what conditions that this is how retail cannabis operation on Main Street would proceed? That's the way I would consider that. The second piece too is just um and I know Tim Piece because I know there's been discuss in the public and in this council too on the legal ramifications with the former person um operating for the business. I don't know if Tim if you wanted to talk about that to in my discussions with with the council this seems somewhat mood at this point in time. There was a pretty clear statement. You always take people at their word when they come into the office or when they're in front of a city council meeting. Um you know and if they would have said this is we have a purchase and sale. It's not contingent until that. That would have been good information to have. They didn't say that. I don't think until Robin told us tonight that it was contingent upon their business license, which they didn't get. It wasn't contingent upon the code officer's email saying they've got it and they own the business already. Um, so I don't believe that the estoppel really holds anymore. It's, you know, if that is accurate, Robbins had a purchase and sale upon the business license. They didn't get the business license. It's pretty clear it wasn't a staff member. It was the city council twice that denied those licenses. First under Marijuanaville, then under Mville. Um I don't think that there's legal liability there, but I do think that there's a responsibility to Robin um to uh you know to make her whole on this business um and to provide some really good clarity. As much as I want to work on housing and affordability and the budget, um you know, we got to make this one right, too. That's kind of where I'm landing.

One one more question. So, this recommended language for renewing with conditions, we don't we it doesn't need anything in there about possible future sales if this poor woman tries to sell her business again. Um, we don't need any any any language about I don't I don't think you have to address everything that you can possibly think of right now. I think you can address the big stuff. If you think that's something that needs to be addressed now, you can add it. Okay.

Okay. Um, this matter is noticed as a public hearing. So, I'll open the public hearing. If anyone from the public would like to provide comments, uh, please approach the Das in 3 minutes or less.

Robert Grant, Senior. Uh, I just I heard this on TV. I watched this on TV when it first come out. uh the man that was going to buy the business. What what I'm told what was stated here that he had a letter from the code office and you people somebody you somebody and you said it was okay. This is the only problem I got. I I'm 69 years old. I can handle my own marijuana business. I I don't need you people. So, what I'm saying is you sent a letter. You you you instructed the code officer to say this and he give the letter to that man in good faith is what I'm saying. In good faith. And now you're saying, "Oh, no, no, no. That's that that's not what we meant. Oh, this isn't the way it went. Uh, give me a break. I I don't care about the marijuana business. I'm not going to buy one. The other thing of the highest dollar value for the marijuana business, it that's extortion. As far as I'm concerned, that's extortion at the city of Elsworth level to to sell a license for profit. It's just wrong. It's wrong. And I don't care what anybody says. Nobody has to agree with me. I'm Robert Grant Senior. Nobody has to agree with me whatsoever. But what they did with that man that signed his name, didn't he sign he signed a document with you, right? He did it in good faith and you said, "Okay, in good faith." I'm here to defend you because you should have been

able to say your business by what the city attorney and the code office said. You should have been able to sell your business and that's why I'm standing here today. I have no fight in this game whatsoever other than fairness. Thank you, Robert Grant Senior. Uh my family's been here for a hundred years. 100 years as a taxpayer in the city of El.

Hi again. Um, you guys have made a royal mess of this to be quite honest. Um, that was a purchase and sale realistically. She had there was papers drawn up, money was exchanged.

Um, you didn't like the guy, whatever. It was like you just made your own rules on this because if you don't have a caregivers's license, you know, no offense, like you know, she brings an outside product, he was bringing an outside product. Like if there's no caregivers's license, it's like you're just making your own rules, which according to your attorney, you can do, so why couldn't you make your own rules for this guy? Like that's the thing. You guys are flip-flopping. You just really didn't want the changes that were happening on Main Street because you covet Main Street between you and the heart of Ellsworth, you know, and you have a specific look that you want for that. And then the other part of that is you talked about it in the last meeting was the 500 feet or a thousand feet to this like if she's taken she might have had ownership etc. But there was money exchanged obviously there was stuff you know with conveyant of it getting licensed which your code officer did state that you know yes you can get this license and have a business like where does he fall pursuant to this you know like start looking at who you have in positions because now this is another lawsuit that we're having to pay for and so if he hadn't said that you wouldn't be in this position and she wouldn't picked her life up, moved to Texas, and now has to move back and try to regain her business, which technically you guys should be looking at the same factors as feet from the schools and everything else that you're requiring him to look at when you're licensing this. Again, no offense, your business has always been nice, but that's the reality of it. You can't not be fair to one person and change the rules for grandfathering when you know he was applying for the license at that same business. like now you're just trying to like make amends and you can't do that. That's not fair. That's not right. And I understand why he was upset the way he was treated, the way his

attorney was treated and now the way that you flip-flopped on this, you know, and I get that the city manager has eaten crow a little bit about this. But you all should be because the way that you treated that man was unacceptable and he was bringing an outside product no different than she will be. So it's it's absolutely abhorrent behavior.

Hi Gordon Workman City president. I do want to bring up one point though. At during that whole discussion, he was told that he could operate under her license until it expired. You can't do that anyway. That's against the statute, operating under another person's license. But yet, he was told by the attorney as well as his counselor, he could. That was wrong. So, that is another mistake the guys made. So just keep that in factor of mind because this lady had to come back because she didn't have the money and he's hold paper. He owned the business. It doesn't have to be recording deeds. She's holding the the paper until he pays it off. That's when the transfer of the deed goes. So he owned the business and he was told he could operate under a new business license. Until then, he could operate under her license, which is totally illegal. Just so you know, because I've looked into business licenses and I really like to get an opinion on the State Street over on different locations. Thank you. Roger Gilly, resident of Ellsworth. As we talk about these business licenses, you know, sorry that you had to go through all this. It's a mess. Um, you know, I'd like to say that, you know, after the ridiculousness with the other guy that was going to buy the business, he ended up in the hospital. Pretty cool that, you know, he had to get that wound up with you guys to have to go there. Um, but as we talk about these business licenses, you know, uh, your lawyer talks about grandfathering. Now, I was told there's no such thing as

grandfathering anymore in the city of Ellsworth. Um, I own a business. I I own three businesses getting ready to start my fourth business, not in Ellsworth because you're not business friendly. But I would like to to point this out that the city of Ellsworth had charged me for a business for 10 years before I got my business license. Then they made an agreement with me that if I was to pay the taxes or this or that that and I had proof that I did business prior to them changing the codes that I could be grandfathered. I did all that and I have the proof. Then I find out that now that I have a business license, I can no longer have my business by city. Then I get looking. They they changed the zones in 2009. There's multiple businesses in Ellsworth in the same zone I'm located in that are doing the same thing, but they're not being having their license taken away. Um, you know, for instance, Buddy Saunders at Pat's Garage on on the sur road, he opened his business in 2012. The code changed in 2009. I was able to prove that I did business at my shop in two in 1998 and got paid for a job. That's how I got my business license. You guys have no clue on how these business licenses work. Her business was licensed under her. Somebody else took the business over. The business license are non-transferable. The same thing with the the house over here, the old nursing home. You know, that guy was told he was good to go. Then all of a sudden, it's a problem. He doesn't have a business license. you shut him down and he could only do with what he was had there for people at the

time. You really need to figure out how the business's license work and you really need to look at the paperwork where it says non-transferable and you need to do your research. Um, it's a little crazy, but like I said, I paid for 10 years on this business without even having a license. You guys took my money. you're unwilling to take my money, give me my money back, and now you want 112,000 because I have a business license. It's it's crazy. I mean, you're you're just going around in circles and and this is where the code enforcement because the city of Ellsworth is so broke, you guys are just suing people trying to get money to recoup somewhere. It's crazy. Any further public comment on this license renewal application? John Lahan, city of Ellsworth. All I know is what I've heard tonight about this issue. Seems like a very simple issue that we're making it complex and doing all kinds of different things. From the email that Robin read earlier, she had permission from the city to sell her business. I believe in Elsa being a friendly I don't think they are being a business friendly city that should take place if the new owner doesn't keep up with the standards or the rules and regulations you deal with him in that case but I don't think Robin should be prohibited from selling her business the way that city of uh letter email was sent to her and to the previous buyer to me that's the only issue she should be allowed to sell it to the person if that person doesn't meet the requirements by the state the city or whoever that's between him and you guys But Robin's caught in the middle of a bad situation in my opinion. I think it's simple. There's one issue. She should be allowed to sell it. Then you deal with a new owner on that. Thank you very much.

Ralph Jordan, citizen of Bayside. This is exhausting. We have spent way, way too much time on this. And I understand the caution that you're putting into this on the legal aspect of it, but you're just spending way too much time on it at this point. And I appreciate the city manager. You'll never hear me say that again, but I appreciate the city manager owning up to his part in in screwing this up. But the truth is, this has been halfbaked since the beginning. Give her the license.

Yeah. Um, hi. I'm Norma Goodwin. I had no idea I was going to speak today, so pardon me. My heart's racing and I've never done this. Um, I'm actually here to represent the three employees that work at Boss Lady. We're all very concerned. What's going to happen to us? Are we going to have a job? You know, I've been with Robin for almost three years. I've been her manager. I have been her right-hand man. And I am very appalled at all this. And I'm very scared. What's going to happen to me? What's going to happen to my two co-workers? Are we going to have to go on unemployment? Are are we going to have to find a new job? You guys aren't giving us much time. June 1st is when her license runs out, right? It's May 31st, right? That's not giving us the three people that have dedicated ourselves to her the time to go do anything. Sorry, but that's just my opinion. All set.

Any other public comment on this license? Seeing none, close the public hearing. How would the council like to proceed? Council Helen,

I'd like to remind everybody that in November of 24, the citizens of Ellsworth voted in a referendum to approve recreational marijuana. And I realize there's different levels of marijuana and different bureaucratic steps to all of these licenses. I think the real problem here is our government. Our government decided they wanted to get involved in this lottery system and complicate everything. And from day one, I have been a fan of the free market system. People don't like that. I don't want if I had my way, there wouldn't be any pot shops in town. But Mr. and Mrs. Ellsworth said that they wanted and I am not impressed that there has been all this meandering around and dancing and changing and laying out different areas at the expense of a business owner at the expense of a business buyer. And now we're back to a business owner. Let's keep government to Mr. Grant's point, let's keep government out of this. Let's approve the licenses. Let the free market system fix this. It's government entering into this process. That's the problem. We need to let businesses run their businesses. whether we like it or not.

Councelor Snuff,

thank you. Given that we are required by state law to work through certain processes, I will make a motion um in renewing with conditions and that is to remove renew the business license subject to written conditions approved by the city clarifying that the license is limited to the previously recognized medical care caregiver retail use only. that the license does not authorize a second medical marijuana dispensary and the use may not expand or materially change without further city review and that the business must comply with all applicable state licensing requirements, city ordinances, and any cannabis related performance standards adopted or imposed by the city.

Do I have a second? Seconded. Have a second. Any further discussion from council? Councelor Howerin, what does that do to you? That motion, what does that do to you? Does it do what you need or does it do what you don't need? You I This is not appropriate. Well, I think it's fine if you would like to approach the DS. I'm trying to understand if that language hurts you or helps you.

I'm here tonight just to get my license back. Um someday I would like to sell, but I I don't know. I'm very accommodating. Um, I would like you to be fair with me and I would like to know in the long term where I can go with it. I have the reason I moved to Texas. I have a grandbaby. We all have our issues. Sorry not to be a victim fighting for his life. He's a newborn baby. That's why I moved. And um I didn't want to come back. I was asked to come back to be at this meeting because usually renewals are you don't have to be here. So I'm back early and he's having surgery. Um, I just want my license back. But like you said, I would like to know what directions I can go from now that we've, you know, come to this down the road. And I I I do I am very accommodating. I will come back and run it like I used to. uh

but there you know there is a problem with um Frank Benny you know he's very upset I think it is unfair it's it's business um he was very accommodating too he he was willing to change his name which I wouldn't ever do he has 13 stores so to change your name is a big deal uh he just you know he had writing all over the window I'm like you I don't like that. But he took it off. So he I I I don't know. I just hope that you renew my license so I can go forward because it is a mess. It's complicated.

You're not being very clarifying on any of that. Use the original language that first got a license. Use that language. What language? Not what you decide. Status quo. Your lawyer said status quo. vote on it. So vote on the status quo license through she deserves to have her license back the way it was.

ABSOLUTELY. I believe the motion as advanced um gets her her license and um but it also just addresses that this issue is complicated and the city will work with you moving forward to provide clarity and um I do apologize for what you know what's happened. Um we've been trying to do our best and follow the law. It's complicated area. Um, but I support this motion. I believe it addresses the concerns of the business and I look forward to working with you. I think you're going to get your license and I look forward for the city working with you and we can find a a productive path forward for your business.

Would anyone else from the council have any other further thoughts or questions before we vote? We have a motion in a second. Councelor Smith, thank you. I just want to clarify again the question that I asked um the attorney is will the motion that I just recited legally allow the status quo for her business to continue with the guardrails and you said yes it is to address the questions we're hearing yes it sounds like Tim P's city attorney status quo with the conditions that you read right thank you

what are the conditions I mean convoluted Um, I've asked the public not to speak um unless during the public comment period. Sir, the public comment period is closed. Sir, I'd ask you to sit down. For revenue sake, what are the conditions? It was in the motion, sir. That was just read. The motion is very convoluted. There probably not 10 people in this room didn't understand that. Not one of them. Sir, would you please give her something that perhaps it should be interpreted? Sir, what does it say? Sir, please sit down. We the public the public just I come up. Why can't I stand here?

Public this is how we follow Robert's rules of order. We want to have an orderly meeting so we could get through the city's business. So we have a motion in a second. Any further discussion? Councelor Howerin?

I would like to ask one question. I want to see this lady get this license. I don't like these conditions that have been put on her. Um, I'd like to know what other conditions are going to be put on other businesses like this. I I just think that is totally unfair. Um, let's treat everybody the same. Let's not single out somebody and have all these conditions put on. What are you going to do to the tire stores next year? I mean, come on. Uh, let's let this lady get back to business. You've already messed up everything here. So, let's get it back to business. Let's take these restrictions off and renew the lady's license like you did on the rest of these.

We have a motion in a second. I'd like to uh We have a motion in a second. Any further discussion from council? All those in favor? Opposed? Motion carries. I didn't vote against you. I voted against the process.

Okay. We now are on to new business for a license of BH Lobster Company, DBA, Union River Lobster Pot, 8 South Street for a new city class C license, Victular and Liquor, and a new state on premise beer, wine, and spirits license. Um, I believe we have the new business owner here this evening. If you'd like to approach, um, we'd love to hear from you. Introduce yourself if you wouldn't mind.

Uh, hello. Uh, my name is Diwas. Uh, frankly, I was not prepared for this. This is my first business in Bar Harbor. And, uh, I have Oh, sorry. in in elsewhere. You have many in Bar Harbor.

I have few in Bar Harbor. Uh liquor and the process in elsewhere seems very different for the liquor license. So I was not prepared to talk. Um so introducing u I moved to Bar Harbor about 7 years ago. Um I have a few restaurants and uh lodging uh establishments um including um mostly in Bar Harbor but I have few rental properties in Ellsworth. So I do do business in Ellsworth not the specific restaurants. Uh this is my first restaurant. Um you know uh the business was in sale for a while. Um, I I got to I got interested in it. Talked to Brian, uh, you know, great guy, um, a great business, perfect location, great staff. Um, and you know, I decided to buy it. My plan is to keep everything the same. My plan is to keep all staff the same. um and which is uh happening almost it won't be I mean obviously it won't be 100% but most of them are um so uh just like how Brian operated it that's how it will be operated so the uh I'm requesting a license for the exact same use uh that Brian the previous owner had it for

great thank you any other questions for Dwas councelor Smith, I would just say this is intended as an opportunity to you for you to introduce yourself and your business to the council and the community. So, you did that very well and we appreciate you being here and investing in Ellsworth. Thank you.

Okay. Um, this is a public hearing. You can sit down if you like. Thanks. Um, did anyone have any further comment on this business license application? I don't think that counts. But uh seeing none, um council, how would you like to proceed on this business license? Councelor Shay

make a motion to uh give Far Harbor BH Lobster Company doing business at Lob Union Lobster Park 8 South Street and a new city class C license Vicular and liquor license and on and a new state on premise beer and wine and spirits license. We have a second. I'd like a second. Councelor Howerin like to comment further on the Would you like the second? I was going to second, but I'll set aside. That's fine. But I'd like to thank um

this council for not restricting this business license. Have a motion in a second. Any further discussion from council? All those in favor? Thank you. We're to agenda item number 12, council order number 0526000, public hearing, potential action on the request of the economic development director for the proposed installation, construction, and operation of a public restroom facility. I believe on this we have our our economic development director on No, I have a video.

We have a video that she prepared. She's um uh her daughter's graduation's happening and um since she's uh away, but Twila, as as always, has prepared a great um kind of video. She is might be on hand. She's in a kind of a spotty potential sales service area for um comment, so she might be available to answer some questions afterwards, but she prepared a video to um talk about the proposal. Thank you. Fisher economic development director city able to turn that up. Council chair lines. Tonight I'm proposing installation of permanent client controlled ADA accessible public restroom facility in the city hall closet parking lot. This would be owned and operated by the city. Can you pause it? Is there is there a way to turn it up on the computer?

It's not I don't believe. I'm sorry. It's turned up all the way. Yeah, that's at 100%. Oh, Jason's coming in to save the day. No, it's my fault. Please. You want to try that? Okay, let's try that. Sorry, I'll start it over.

Good evening. Twilight Fisher, economic development director, city of Ellsworth.

Council Chair Lions. Tonight I'm proposing installation of a permanent climate controlled ADA accessible public restroom facility in the city hall plaza parking lot. This would be owned and operated by the city of Ellsworth and funded with tiff monies from the economic development department budget. As we know downtown Ellsworth continues to experience increasing pedestrian activity, visitors and public programming throughout the year. However, public restroom access remains limited during evenings, weekends, winter months and special events. Historically, local businesses have absorbed much of the burden of providing after hours restroom access for visitors and event attendees. So, establishing this permanent public restroom facility would help reduce pressure on the downtown businesses while creating a more welcoming and functional downtown environment. The project also supports Ellsworth's role as a regional service center for Down East Maine and reinforces the city's commitment to creating a vibrant, accessible, and visitor-friendly downtown. The proposed location, as you'll see here, uh, in city hall parking lot was selected because it is centrally located, is publicly owned, highly visible, and within convenient walking distance of downtown businesses, public parking, city hall, and community um, gathering spaces. And this is also, as we know, uh, where the the bus comes through as well. And so it's convenient for um, transit as well. the facility uh if it's if this is approved tonight is anticipated to be operational by mid to late August 2026. Um oh, I'll just point out from this prior slide that you'll see in the budget that Buren would have to move the pool over 10 to 12 feet to make room for it and it would go in uh kind of where that shed is now and in front of where the uh dumpsters currently are. So in front of that fenced in area. As far as the layout, it is proposed to be about 20 by 20 ft. Um that includes a

storage area on the back side and it does provide two ADA accessible stalls that are right next to each other. Um our project total is just under 40,000. This is by far the cheapest option to do it in-house. Uh the one of the quotes I received which there were higher ones but one of them was around $75,000. So this is much much cheaper um to use our highway department to do this in house. And again versent power would have to move the pool and that's estimated to be about $7,500. It could be a little bit less, a little bit more, but that brings us about to 40,000. And this would come from um the Econ Dev line item that currently is for professional services, but the 30,000 that could go toward the public restroom project. And then um the rest would come from our TIFF unallocated line item. As far as timeline, we really actually if approved are near the end here. Um, I have been meeting with public works and with Highway to talk through this. Uh, I proposed this at the May city council workshop and this was public notice for tonight. We'll have a public hearing tonight as well and if approved, we could begin ordering supplies and arranging utility connections. Um, and everything would be with 60 60 net invoicing terms. So, we would begin paying it in FY27. And then construction could begin in June with a 45 to 60day turnaround. and we would hope to have that again uh in mid to late August. With that, I recommend that the city council authorize advancement of this downtown public restroom project, including the final design, budgeting, permitting, and installation activities necessary to complete it by summer of 2026. And at this point, um you might want to pause the presentation and the

recording. I will be um online to answer any questions. Thank you. Great. Um, is Twilight available, Sarah? I I am I'll be off camera, but I I'm available. Great. Thank you. Does anyone have any anyone on the council have any questions for Twilight?

And I should note that uh you know, I know this was discussed at a council workshop last month as well. We try to bring all of the items before they come before um votes on this matter. This was in the business attraction plan. The um the comp plan as one of the items I think when uh as Ellsworth is seeing a massive increase in tourism activity um and I know talking last year we've kind of used a porta potty to um to kind of make do um which hasn't been ideal. I have had more than one or two business owners uh give me a talking to about the need for a downtown restroom and how if not that they're going to send me the bill for all the toilet paper and the plumbing issues that they have to experience on a day-to-day. It kind of um you know you don't think of those types of things when you get all this increased activity but where people are going to use the restrooms and facilities um becomes very important. Twila, thank you for looking at all the options you could do here to um find the the best one that that meets our needs. This would be with um designated TIFF funds to support our economic development uh activity. Those funds are sequestered for just this uh type of use. So um that's kind of where we're at now on this one.

Great. Thank you, Manager Pierce. Any additional questions from council for any staff members? Seeing none, this Oh, councelor Jay,

I kind of disagree with having this done. I disagree with the fact that uh trying to get the public works to do the building. There's a lot there's a few issues that make sure that it's not encroaching on land owners property and a lot of people have said that we don't need it. Okay, thanks. Um, I'm going to open the public hearing. This matter has been noticed as a public hearing. If anyone would like to comment um on this matter, please approach the DAS and provide your name and residency and please keep your comments to 3 minutes or less.

Uh Steven Shay, resident of Ellsworth, I would suggest before you do any construction, you run your property lines. I've run those lines and I know where they are and I would make a suggestion that you hire a surveyor and run the lines. Secondly, we've gotten by and the city of Elswood have done quite well here for 150 years or so without having public toilet there. If you have a public toilet, it won't get that much use from to tourists, but it will get a lot of use from homeless people, people you don't want. It'll attract the area. So, you really better think this one over carefully.

Hi, I'm Laura Nason from Ellsworth. Um, I just want to say that when I was growing up, we used to be able to use the bathroom in the vestibule at City Hall. Um the rest of city hall was locked, but us kids always knew we could come here after hours, use the bathroom here. Um it would save the city a lot of money. We have that restroom that we could open to the public. We also have um a restroom at Nolton Park and we have a restroom at the um the town docks. And I don't see why we should spend almost $100,000 for tourists to use for a few months of the year. Thank you.

Um my name is Michael Hill. I resident of Ellsworth. Um so the the price of that was $40,000 to construct. Correct. What's the budget and how often is it going to be cleaned? Whose budget is going to pay for it? and who's going to maintain it. Um, have you looked at Bangar? Bangar paid a lot of money put in breasts. Nobody uses them except they find bunch of needles. Homeless people, the people they were constructed for don't use them. So, really, really plan out what you're doing because $40,000 to construct it or a little bit more and then you're going to m have to maintain it because if you don't, you're going to have homeless living there. Let's really look at what we're planning. That's the only thing. My tax dollars. I pay enough taxes. Um I live on Liberty Street. I'm doing renovations. You guys tax me enough. I don't need you to tax me to clean up after people that shouldn't be using them. Okay. Oh, hell no. This goes right back to spending money that we don't have. But I've been well informed tonight cuz I learned of a new money tree. It's called tiff. The tiff money. Where's the tiff money come from? And don't roll your eyes at me. You

excuse me, sir. I haven't asked you to please.

You're going to ask me all you want, but if she's going to roll her eyes at me, I'm going to reply. So, the tiff money, where's the tiff money come from, comes out of our pockets, like I said before, if it's not on a budget line item, we don't sp. And then you put it somewhere where we got to spend to have a pole moved. There's no place else for it. We're going to make some more money for Vers. Are you kidding me? And I would also like to know how often the police will be patrolling this because I do agree the homeless. When you go to the city library on the weekends, you have people stretched out on the couches lying there. They're dirty. They're filthy. They're in everybody's way. That's going to happen here in downtown Ellsworth. It's not going to be beautify this town and we need to have police protection there 24 hours a day if it's there.

Exactly.

Uh Tiffany Gasper Ellsworth. Um so with this you guys require um licensed commercial people for electrical work for commercial tenants. Um anyone doing commercial building you require them to hold specific licenses. But on this you're saying oh we can build it with the city workers. How many city workers are professionally licensed to do the electric work, the plumbing, etc. Can you answer that? No. Okay, that's the answer then. So, you're requiring something different from businesses in town for them to pay more out of pocket to to get their business licenses by code, but you're doing something different for something that you want to spend money on um that would suit your needs. And judging by Facebook comments, which you guys can't see on your city page, but most people don't want this because they know what's going to happen. It's going to be like Bangor, just like everyone else has said. There's going to be cost and upkeep. What happens when someone damages it? Who's going to pay that? We are. Again, we are overspending. Open up the vestable during the days when people are out and about in evening. They're at restaurants. Stores are closed after a specific time. This is city hall. Don't you want them in here getting pamphlets about the great city of Ellsworth? Like this is again common sense things and you're overspending money we do not have. Hi, I'm Karen Arin and I'm a resident of Ellsworth. I live on the Bangar road. It's strategically very scary up there by the way. Anyway, there is a porta potty at Ellsworth High School right in the summertime because there are athletics

going on. Okay. There's a porta potty at the middle school. I think there's like three and I'm not sure but I think they should move it back by the track unless it's still up by the track because you know us old ladies we got to go. So, and then there's the bathroom at Demier Field. I've taken someone up there and I'm really glad that one's there. I don't know who pays for it. Maybe the Rotary does. Fix it. Just so you know, put it there. Oh, thank you. Complaint about it because fix it and try to say that little league is responsible for it. Oh, that's not okay. Little boy little boys don't need to clean the bathroom. They can barely hit it. Um, so let me see. Where else is there a bathroom?

Where else is there a bathroom? Tell me. The Nolton School Park has a nice bathroom. How many parties in there? At least a boy and girl.

Okay, so there's two there. The YMCA has a bathroom and people like to use the YMCA. We give money to the YMCA. They should be able to use the bathroom there. Okay. And then I think these town people, if they need a toilet toilet paper donation, I can bring in a few rolls. Okay. I will I will help you with your toilet paper problem. David door from Bayside Road. Look, I bandaged five restaurants in B Harbor, Maine. We put a sign up. It says, "You don't pay, you don't use the restroom. We don't need to spend $40,000 on a restroom. Why don't you ask Randy Sprag to put up one porter party? Makes sense to me. And he'd probably donate it. Roger Gilly City resident. This this sounds as crazy as when Charlie said um whether he was on it or just making a joke about putting a rotary at the bottom of Bridge Hill. It sounds as stupid as uh putting High Street as one lane. Um you know, we stand here, we've come here for meetings before. It's really nice to see so many people show up tonight. um over here by the old DMV building. We've listened to the people out here screaming at each other, fighting. I come down through here the other night, there was a guy pissing on the ground. I mean, the guys leaving the bar over here. They could do the same thing. They could hide behind the dumpster. I mean, how many parking spaces are we going to lose more in downtown Ellsworth? Um we put this parking space in over here. We shut down a road, take away six parking areas uh for people to barely sit there and use. and we pay the parks and wreck and everybody else to spend 4 days down there planting trees year after year cleaning it up, putting stuff there and then they have to take it all down. It's just a waste of money.

Um we're supposed to be four L's worth you know help the businesses profit like you know Tiffany said or somebody said that most of the businesses are closed but the restaurants and bars um I don't see a big traffic area that's not going into those places. Um, I I really think that you really need to to think about that and and $40,000 seems a little bit low to be hooking all this stuff up. Um, but as we've seen before, the city says, well, our our city garage can can do this work. They can't fix the potholes, but they can put in a bathroom. Uh, you know, so at at this time, I mean, how much more are we going to put on those guys? They bicker between each other now. You know, we don't utilize everything that we have. The bucket truck we wasted money on, bought a truck, can't use it. Nobody's certified to use it. The truck's not certified. How much more spending and wasteful spending when we're supposed to be friendly Ellsworth can we take? I mean, we can't keep paying taxes for nothing. I mean, anybody can do your guys' job. You know, I go to work first thing in the morning and don't come home sometimes until 2 in the morning. You know, sometimes midnight. I don't know when I'm coming home. I'm raising four kids. You guys all get to go home and and act like it's nothing. You know, you know, you don't make any more money than the rest of us. I don't see what the, you know, why you guys can't think with common sense. It doesn't make sense.

John Lennahan, City of Ellsworth. Just two points. First of all, there's a difference between needs and greeds. I don't think there's a need for these restrooms. I think this put goes into the greed category that we would do if we voted it through in the city of Ellsworth. There's a difference between private businesses and public. The people that need the restrooms down in down in Main Street or wherever you're putting this in are private businesses. That should be part of their normal operating expenses to provide toiletry facilities for their customers. It's not a city situation. That's a private situation in my opinion. So, I would encourage you to, this is one of the first times that I have seen in the last several meetings where the council can say, "No, we're not going to spend money. We're going to try to hold the f the spending down and help the taxpayers of the city of Elsas." So, I encourage you to vote no on this issue. Thank you. Hi, Gordon. Uh Gordon Workman's resident of Ellsworth. Uh we've taken a street away from our public because supposedly it's unutilized. Unutilized space use. That street is used constantly. There's more cars that go down that street than people. It's a It's a return area for the fire department.

I don't know why the fire department doesn't come to you and say, "Look, we use that all the time." But they don't. And if you're going to set and give that away to a small population of Ellsworth, then they can open their doors to their businesses and let someone poop in it. That's just the way it is. I mean, you give away that street, they got to give a little. I'm sorry. That's just the way it is. I think it's crazy to give that street away, but that's besides the point. Thank you. Lyn Kane, city of Ellsworth on Thursday afternoon. I was over at the library and uh the fire trucks had a heck of a time trying to get across the bridge with the traffic. If you put a restroom right there where the fire trucks need it, you're going to create accidents. If there are people that are homeless using it, you're going to have people wandering around that shouldn't be there. and there's going to be accidents with the fire trucks. That's a total safety issue and that's my opinion. Uh Christopher Barl Ellsworth, I think tonight you've got a relatively broad sample of Mr. and Mrs. Ellsworth. And what they're telling you is no, they can't afford it. We can't afford it. you can't afford it. Before you vote yes on something like this, I think you should even at least consider putting an online

poll so everybody can vote on it and tell you what their real opinion is. Yes or no? And I think you'll find out it's no. Further public comment.

Good evening, council. Um, my name is Car Romano. I'm the executive director of Heart of Ellsworth. Good evening, folks. Thank you all for being here. It's been enlightening hearing everyone's perspective. Downtown business owners have been asking for a public restroom access for more than 15 years, and Heart of Ellsworth has been advocating for this need from in one form of another for the past decade since we were established in 2016. We already recognize the importance of public restrooms in our parks. We have them both at Nolton Park and Harbor Park because we understand when people spend time in public places, basic needs matter. Downtown should be no different. Other downtowns in Maine, Camden, Belfast, Rockland, and Bar Harbor, just to name a few, have public restrooms for residents and visitors. It's not just a convenience issue, it's a commerce issue. Study after study shows that shoppers stay longer, visit more businesses, and spend more money when basic needs like restroom accessibility is available. Last summer in 2000 in 2025, Heart of Ellsworth partnered with Ray Plumbing and Heating. I'm sorry to the gentlemen who stepped out and and can't hear this. So, I'm hopeful that maybe a few of you here tonight can help relay this next part of what I have to say. We partnered with Ray Plumbing and Heating to test this idea. From July through October, portable restrooms were placed downtown in the municipal parking lot as a pilot program. Heart of Ellsworth paid the full cost of that experiment, not taxpayer dollars. Heart of Ellsworth's dollars. We are a 501c3 nonprofit entity. We paid more than $700 to test this out for this community because the because the downtown businesses have been asking us for years to do this. The goal was simple, to determine whether the need was real and whether the community would respect the resource. The pilot was successful. In fact, just last week, Ray Plumbing and Heating reached out to Heart of Ellsworth asking us if we wanted units placed back in the same location again this season. Before asking before

answering, I asked directly whether there had been any reported issues regarding cleanliness or misuse last year. The answer was no. Most importantly, during the entire four months the units replaced in 2024 2025, there was zero complaints called into Ray Plumbing and Heat's business. That says something important. A company entering the busiest season would not voluntarily ask to continue servicing an account if it had been a headache or a problem. Tonight's council order is about the installation, construction, and operation of a public restroom facility. From our organization's experience, the need has already been demonstrated. The community has already shown respect for the amenity and the pilot program provided this can work successfully in downtown Ellsworth. This is no longer a theoretical conversation. We tested the need. The community responded positively and the results were encouraging. I hope the council tonight will continue moving this conversation forward and consider this as an important investment in the long-term success, accessibility, and experience of our downtown. We're trying to be the friendly city. Whether everybody here feels that we are there right now or not, let's all work together to try and be welcoming, not only for our residents, but also for visitors who help these downtown businesses stay open and active and alive year round. Thank you for your for your time this evening.

Any further public comments?

Don Hudson, Ellsworth resident. Um, and I love what KA and the Heart of Ellsworth does in many many um ways to help our businesses. Um, but this sounds like this sounds like a responsibility to the people that it benefits. It sounds like if the city if the if the commerce or the businesses in the downtown don't want to provide or can't provide bathroom facilities and they need it for the people who are visiting and patroning their facilities then they could contribute money to building it and to maintaining it. Not not me. I have a bathroom. I have a bathroom and not to the people who are passing through on vacation because their bathroom needs aren't my problem. But but the increase in taxes is my problem. And so I think that it's I don't I I'm not sure that I'm I'm not sure if having a bathroom down there is the right answer or not. I know that me paying for it does not speak again.

So, no, we the rules are everyone gets to speak once. Appreciate it. We've got a lot more meeting to get through.

That's my point. Port to provide public comment, sir. Robert Gran, senior, by the way. Uh, I was under the impression, this is a little different, and I'm not opposed to anything, but uh I was under the impression that a business owner, uh, couldn't have a porta party in the city of Ellsworth. Uh, is that true or not true? That is true. That is true.

Uh why why does a city pay for them then? This is what my question. I mean fair is fair. I think a business they keep them clean like she said and everything's good. Why can't a business have one and this and the uh can't have one and the city can have one? Uh, I I got issues with this and I'd like to have an answer right now. Anybody? Public comment. It's not a question. It's not an exchange, sir. We can get Oh, really? Okay. Thank you very much. We're all seeing you. Thank you, sir. There you go.

Yeah. When do you answer questions? You can leave questions with staff and we can try to get back to you as soon as we can. Could I have somebody's phone number who wants to call me? Steve O'Haring. Yes, I have your number, sir. I just want to know understand, you know, tonight there's, you know, there's a lot of feelings, a lot of people uh here tonight. Um I just want to say that what we're the rules we're following are the rules that all most towns follow. Who follows the

rules we're following are Robert's rules of order. We're following standard procedures as far as public comment. I'm trying to provide everyone comment. Um so with that, I just just wanted to note that and I'd ask the I'd ask the folks here to remain civil and to allow us to operate our meeting as we get through it. Thank you very much. Yeah, I think I will be civil. I didn't say anyone wasn't. I'm just asking for the group to be, you know, please don't interrupt and allow us to get through the meeting. Thank you. Thank you very much. Any further public comment? Seeing none, I'm going to close public.

No, I already commented. This is separate from that. It's in regards to, you know, you're talking about the emotions and us being civil. And I think that's a two-way street. And we've watched counselor Carol roll her eyes and turn her back and be very disrespectful to most the people who have stood up here. And so I would like, maybe you don't see it because you're watching us, but I've watched it all night long. THAT'S RIGHT. I'M PRETTY sure

all right. Um, seeing none, no other further public comment. I'll close the public hearing. Council, how do you like to proceed on this matter? Councelor Smith, I have a question on one issue that was raised and I'll look to Charlie. The issue of licensing and making sure that the plumbing and electrical is done up to standards. How do we manage that? Could bring this to Twilight, but I believe in the the memo itself, it has a a line allocation to electrical, which I would imagine would be handled by an electrician. We don't have internal staff at that goes out to licensed profession.

I don't know. Twilight, if you're still on, if you could confirm that. Um, I don't know if you can hear me. The reception is a little bit spotty. We can hear you. Yep.

I think that's okay. I think that does raise a good question. I think the highway department is is qualified, but would we have it um inspected by a third party inspector to make sure? You know, I that is a good question. From my uh perspective, I thought it was a fiscally responsible way to consider moving forward. um and would save money by doing it in house. But I certainly appreciate the question and something we can look into as we're you know hear feedback from other staff maybe you know how to move forward in that regard. Um I I do believe that they are qualified to do the

it's not qualified. They have we lost her. So I don't know if that line item for utilities for or public works right now. So the line item for utilities is $4,200 plumbing and electric. That doesn't tell us if it's bringing in contracted. I would I would imagine Twilight would like that we would be contracting out for pieces of this work that we wouldn't be doing the electrical in house. But if Twilight doesn't know the answer to that question and that's um needed to then how can we bring that forward if you do not have Folks, can we please can we please not in when the public m hearing is closed, we ask that the public please remain quiet while we deliberate.

Ma'am, these are the Robert's rules of orders. Again, I'm not trying to This is how every meeting is conducted. We ask that when public do I'm going to call point of order. How about that? I know Robert. Okay. And I will tell you in your code, in your unified code that you go by, you are requiring businesses and elsewhere to use licensed um commercial electricians and plumbers, but you are not following the same rules for city buildings. That is not right. And you are violating your own code. Oh, so C Smith,

as I was saying, there's $4,200 in the budget. So, I guess to confirm or to require that it that that is done by the professionals who are required, which I if it is stated clearly in here, I'm not seeing yet.

Yeah. And you know, I could again I we just asked um economic development director. We didn't have an answer to that question. I think if it's Germaine here and you all feel this is not just a general budget but that you'd like more information on the specifics before moving forward we can come back at another meeting. uh council I think and also and I should be you know very clear on this you know as noted by a representative from the heart of Ellsworth um as noted previously this has been a long-standing request um I want to thank Twyla and the team you know she did look at a lot of other much more expensive options um that uh and and then due to the cost I know Twila is always very concerned about the cost of these things she was asked um by both the business community and this council to move forward with options that would be feasible. Um, you know, I'm sorry we don't have a specific answer on that question. Um, and it is always within the council's purview uh to either decide not to move forward on this proposal or if we'd like to not move forward on downtown restrooms in general. I think it's um worthy of of discussion. It makes it quite difficult um to have this conversation, but it's it's a good one to have. Heather Shay,

I disagreed about this in the workshop. I also disagree with building this. You know, that's a budgetary concern. So, you know, instead of giving Hardy Ellsworth some money, we could take that and maybe do that. But, you know, right now, uh, even before the meeting, no. And I make a motion to um not build a public restroom at the location where it is based upon the fact that where property lines and there's going to be cost overruns and we're not going to do it. I'll second that.

Helen, if I could speak to that, I wanted to speak to it earlier. Um, there are some things, um, and this would be one of them that I think would be good for Ellsworth to have. Um, I'll go back a little bit into some other decisions that I have voted on that I really thought would be a good idea, but there's been so much wasted money in this town that perhaps we need to look at the whole picture here now. Would downtown bathrooms be nice to have? Absolutely. I'd rather have them than the electric cars we paid for.

However, Um, we have spent so much money. Um, there has to be no to things that we want. That's right.

Deser Smith, I would move to table this till the next um regular meeting looking at the two issues of ensuring that the budget is We already have a motion and the tableabling motion supersedes the standing motion. No, I made a motion. It's been seconded. I make a motion to move the question, folks. I please allow us to conduct our business. We will have for you. We don't work for you. It's my understanding that a tablely motion would supersede one motion. I move the question. Well, I think we can vote on

beg. We could go find Tim. Um I think we can vote on the motion and then if it's approved, then it's denied. If it's if it's denied, we can we can revisit we can move to table it. Yeah. So, we have a motion and a second to deny uh moving forward this project. All those in favor? Opposed? I would

mean I move to table the motion with direction to the staff that we address the boundary line and the um licensing components of the proposal before it's brought again. Do I have a second? I'll second that.

Okay, we have motion to second motion to table. There's no further discussion on the motion to table. All those in favor? Opposed? Matters tabled. Agenda item number 13. Public hearing potential action on the request of the economic development director to seek federal funding to develop a comprehensive safety action plan or to enhance existing plans aimed at reducing or eliminating roadway fatalities and serious injuries for all users. um a request to submit an application for the safe streets for all a US dot grant. And just to give a little bit of um history on how we're how we got to this request tonight, as you know, the city has a thriving communities program grant that we've received technical assistance for over the past two years, two and a half years, actually since October, I think, 2024. Um and recently, Stantech presented a high street corridor study to a stakeholder group. Um and then we followed that up with a stakeholder um meeting at city hall on April 28th and we provided feedback from that meeting and uh public considerations to Stantech and they um are making some revisions based on that and hope to have a final report to us in June. Uh but we still have technical assistance with ARCAP and so we are increasing stakeholder communication and we want to make the best use of our consultants technical assistance u in the remaining months we have with them. One opportunity that has come before us is the safe streets for all grant. Now this is a US DOT planning grant focused

on safety. The outcome for us in Ellsworth would be that we would have a comprehensive safety plan for high street corridor for the high street corridor and this would include because a lot of the feedback we heard was where's the where's the data where where's the in-depth traffic and engineering studies. So this report would include that um and we could also do a demonstration project to to further kind of test some of the safety concerns and possible solutions. Um the cost to the city is a 20% match. So if we apply at the $100,000 level, which is really on the low end, I mean this is this grant could, you know, be a million, but if we stay on the low end and do a 100,000, uh then the 20% match, which can mostly be in kind because of city staff time, um would still require about $10,000, uh and it could come from TIFF funds as well. And the grant deadline is May 26th. So, uh, pending council's approval of this tonight, we can we've been working on the application in hopes that this will be approved, that we can submit it. Um, but we would get that in on time and then hope to hear back uh later this summer. So for this item, I recommend that the city council authorize the city manager and/or the economic development director to submit the safe streets for all application by May 26, 2026. And again, um you can pause this recording and I'll be online to take any questions. Thank you.

Great. Thank you, Twi. Um do we know if Twi is still available?

Believe she is. I can't promise the um the coverage there. And I'll note that um the thriving communities initiative analyzing the high street corridor um was a thank you to Twilight was a a project previously engaged in by u the city to uh look at uh potential safety, accessibility, storm water, uh other aspects. Um that was fully funded by the federal government. We received uh some initial reports back, had some multiple community engagement sessions. I would say that the, you know, general consensus of those who showed up. Um, again, you never, um, you never know a general consensus on somebody unless you did actual polling um, was scientific surveying, but that was decidedly negative on a few aspects. One of which was, um, the road dieting and suicide lanes of narrowing down um, High Street. If I had it over again, I would have um you know at even at a very very early stage where they were doing some committee input on draft forum said like do not put that out. You know you to me that type of thing is just insane like the idea of closing down one lane. At the same time it's a plan before a plan before a plan. They just repaved High Street. I also a big believer in data and having the information that we need um to move forward on something and these types of uh more rigorous analysis and how we can improve accessibility and mobility. Right now it's like Frogger walking across High Street. Um I've had to do it a couple times myself where you do a mad dash uh across four lanes um and hope you make it to the other side to frequent a business. I've seen a fair amount of people do this over and over again. We do have some accessibility upgrades coming already through the mayor lane and the um courthouse extension road that's likely to have some pretty big intersection upgrades for at least crosswalks um and lights at that intersection. There's the one at high and um and Main Street that also needs attending to and this type of

project could allow us to have better data to um in the future. And when I say in the future, they just redid this road for you know I think it's you know tens of millions of dollars. There's no opening this road for five years. any sort of future steps is about preparing even further for um these types of improvements. So Twilight who has a lot of expertise in this while she wasn't involved in the initial thriving communities side of things, she has worked in other municipalities with these types of grants to uh uh to keep the work moving forward so that we can refine the plan, let these folks know that we don't like the road dieting proposals. Um there's also some questions in the Be Avenue which were brought up that really had more of a mixed reaction I would say. um that you know there's some folks that on Beiel Avenue that were highly opposed to closing that. There was one that um you know does not like it being a pass through from High Street uh and you know a further consideration of accessibility and safety on that side of things but really having the data to move forward and um also the data to pursue future grants build grants with the US Department of Transportation or others. Um this could be helpful but we also have a lot of projects in the mix. We have village partnership initiative with the state that I think is really a major major focus for us um that's um about really the main street um and kind of downtown area that's a big project. So, uh, you know, there's pros and cons to to moving forward here. Um, keeping the high street corridor under, you know, long-term sort of engineering consideration again at a, uh, cost of around 10 $10,000 in TIFF funding. um versus, you know, saying goodbye to that thriving communities partnership with the federal government and, you know, focusing on other areas and letting high street alone, at least from a uh further infrastructure and mobility aspect, is also an option for the council. And unlike the other one, you know, a tableabling is effectively a do not move forward with this grant. So, um, you know, I leave it to the council's

discretion. Great. on that. Any questions from councel for Charlie or Twi regarding the proposal? Seeing none, this is noticees a public hearing. Can I speak? Carl, this is your moment to shine. Perfect timing. Please go ahead, Carl. I Carl. Carl is Yeah, Carl. Go ahead. Hi. You can speak.

Go ahead, Carl. We can hear you. Okay, I've got two issues I'd like to address here. One is first is the matter of grants in general. We look we take a naive look at grants and this is free money quote unquote given to us by some government entity. But what we don't look at is what our real costs are on this. And you've heard done an earful tonight on taking some more fiscal responsibility. And the first thing we need to do with any one of these grants, and I suggest this is a place to start to get a little fiscal responsibility into this government, into the city of Ellsworth government, is that every time we look at one of these grants, we calculate what it's really going to cost the taxpayers in the end. And the problem is we're paying Twiller good money and she's has to spend time putting together these grants means she's got to do a bunch of research writing. She's got to spend your time on the council. her time. All of us citizens coming to the meetings have to are spending our time to discuss these grants. And you don't and we don't know what these grants are really going to cost us. And the problem is that there are these underlying costs to the city for any one of these grants, no matter how free it seems to be. Now, as a retired corporate officer, I can tell you that the city manager should be able to put together a pretty good estimate

of what those costs are going to be on the back of an envelope. It's not a big exercise. We don't have a financial officer to pass it on to. We don't need to pass it on to him. It's doable by the city manager himself on the back of the envelope. And I would hope that doing a little bit of that would begin to get some fiscal responsibility into this city because the city has been well pointed out by a lot of speakers tonight. The city has a long long a decades long history of fiscal irresponsibility. And by the way, I I'm sorry I didn't say who I was. I'm Carl Brooks, 55 Meals Avenue, and I'm a native and my family has lived in Down East Maine since 1760.

Wow.

Now, the other item, so I'm just asking with respect to grants on an ongoing basis to get a full cost picture before you adopt them. And the other thing is to speak to this particular grant. We just did this stante thing and of course you had an overflow audience of people saying just what a disaster they came up with. Well, this is understandable. If you spent some time as I have in the Canadian prairies and this is a Canadian prairie firm, then you perhaps could understand how they come up with this. But that's immaterial. The fact of the matter is that it's going in the wrong direction and then we're going to do this safety thing now. Uh we don't need it. All of these safety things which have been many times, this is not the first couple that have been done around here. They've been done many times over the years and they're always done as paliatives to say well we're working on the problem and we don't have to make a solution till later. The problem with safety in this city is that MDOT told you 80 years ago what the problem was and you have refused to accept it and they have repeated that offer since and you have refused to accept it. Very simply, the problem, the core safety problem in this town is the volume of traffic on High Street. And what MDOT has offered time and time again to do is to provide a bypass around the city to get that traffic out. If you want to know the numbers,

25,000 vehicles. Of those 25,000 vehicles, and this may shock you, but listen to the number, 20,000 of those 25,000 vehicles, in other words, 80% of them are passing through. Only 5,000 of those vehicles are doing business on High Street. the rest of them are passing through. If you took that 80% traffic off of High Street, you would reduce High Street accident safety problems by 80%. Right up front, you would also Mr. Brooks, if can you can you hear me, Mr. Brooks? More comment.

Okay, please wrap up. Thank you. you would reduce safety problems in other parts of the town where traffic is diverting to try to avoid high street. Thank you. Thank you.

So can anyone tell me in this hierarchy between the federal government's idea of of what Ellsworth should do? Has Maine DOT been involved and will they be involved in this proposal this submitt? No one knows that either. Can't answer your question. I mean Maine DOT kind of owns that street in a sense. I would think they would have some say in it, wouldn't they? She said she'd be there for questions. We'll take we're just going to count on the federal government and local city Ellsworth employees to decide what's best for that and main DOT is not involved. We can we can answer public comments concluded

and once public comment is concluded if we do have the answers readily available we will provide them to please be patient with us. Any further public comment? I do.

Robert Grant, senior. Uh, has anybody travel down high? Anybody on this board traveled down High Street? Taking a lane out of High Street is the is completely crazy. And there's I can't believe there's one of you that can say it isn't. as of Beiel's Avenue. I've heard Bees Avenue. Beiels Avenue is a disaster zone. It when I was a kid, it was the premier Yes.

development in the city of El. I know development, by the way. Maybe you don't all realize that, but I do understand development. And that was the premier. And it's gone downhill to the point it's impossible. most for uh most out of status uh or tourists don't know about Be's Avenue and even where it goes. I have been at Be's Avenue 100,000 times probably in my lifetime. I I've I've had a license I was 15 years old and I'm 69 and I live up there so I know it is a complete disaster that is on the city council to fix and I thoroughly believe that just like that man said that should be fixed. It's it's horrendous. Have you been up there? Any of you people you've been up Bills Avenue? You can't even keep your vehicle in the road. There's kids up there. I mean, it's a disaster taking a lane off High Street or or multiple lanes or whatever. I want to ask I want to ask council members. Is anybody in favor of that? I would like to have show hands. Is anybody in favor of taking a lane off High Street?

Could I have a Could I have a hands? Is anybody in favor of it? because you're going to vote on it little in in some point coming up. And if you think I'm here just to listen to myself talk, I hate being here, but I'm here because you guys have riled me up. Thank you very much. Robert C. Grant Senior, 69 years old. I can't afford my taxes.

Before I So if I ask a question, you can't answer. Is that what I'm understanding? So, I will clarify public comment is not a time for an exchange. Um, you can ask questions and at the end of public comment, if staff or city if anyone on staff has an answer to your question, we will provide it and if we do not, we will we'd be happy to follow up with you. Okay. Um, could I interject something if I may? Uh, we could answer your question, but we're not allowed to.

Okay. All right. Thank you. So during Mike, I I have a couple questions during this presentation and this whole thing which this road changing if you go to two lanes. Crazy. Um there was like a fund a tip fund or something that was mentioned at the end. What is that? I've heard it a couple times. Can someone explain to me what that is? Bureaucratic slush fund.

So it's our taxpayer dollars just sitting there for whatever someone feels that they want to spend it on. I'm all right. I'll look for an official answer after public comment, but I just want to understand what that is because I've heard it a couple times. The other thing is the firm that's kind of coming up with a solution of making that and the suicide lane and different stuff. I'm not really sure how that's going to make it safer to get across the street. You run out across the lane to get to suicide lane. Hold there until you can get across the other one. Frogger, I'm just asking. It's totally stupid. Is it the same firm that designed the the Walmart loop?

If it is, I hope you fire them. Uh, that's stupid, too. Let's Let's look realistic about the city and what's um transportation through. Let's not make it more difficult or more dangerous. Thank you. for those who wouldn't work in the city of of president. Um, now are they still are they still going to use the consultant firms that the US DO is going to fund? There's three that's listed. If they are, there's a big conflict of interest with one because that person receives revenue of $95,000 a year and she's sitting on council

from one of them. That's a big issue. Um, could you repeat that microphone, please?

Oh, there's there's three consultants that's on this and one is Hancock County Planning Department, one is Grow Smart Main. If they're still going to be used on it, then that's a huge conflict of interest because indirectly a person on this council receives funds from that nonprofit of 95,024 and 108,000 23. So that's a huge conflict of interest if that's the case.

Thanks. Good evening. My name is Cindy Meyer. I'm an Ellsworth resident and I attended the last meeting where this was discussed in depth and I learned many things in that meeting. One of the things I learned is that although this plan will impact traffic tremendously, traffic was actually not a component that they studied coming up with this plan. Now, I heard in this presentation that perhaps after input uh from the last meeting that now they were going to think about traffic. Uh but that to me is a little bit of a red flag. Something that the how it will affect traffic is really the main component of this plan and not having it be the main component of thinking and planning is I have a a little bit of a problem with that. Uh another thing I saw in that presentation is that child care was a component of this plan. And I don't understand how that came to be. Um, no one at that meeting was really sure about how that came to be, but I don't see how child care has anything to do with with this plan. Um, something else that came uh to came to light during that meeting is that the overall costs were going to be something like $3.52 million. And I think you can buy a lot of

crosswalks for $3.52 million. Safety is a great thing. Pedestrians should be safe in Ellsworth. And certainly it's a very hightraic area with a lot of tourists who are distracted, tired, and even some locals who may not drive the best. But I think that if you focus on safety, crosswalks, and whatever else that would encompass, I don't think anybody would have a problem with that. you know, be safe, have crosswalks and lights and, you know, whatever else you need, but taking away any travel lanes on that street has, and the word I'm going to use is what our dear Charlie used when he began to speak about it, which was insane. That just that that can't I can't believe that the council would even consider that. And one last point was that it came up um and someone mentioned it tonight. Has the state of Maine had a look at this so far? And the answer was no. So that all of the people working on this could spend all their time and attention working on this to get it to the point where the state of Maine finally has a look and says, "Are you insane? So I I just think from the feedback from the first meeting, from what we learned about it then, from what we've heard about it tonight, I don't see this as viable in any way, shape, or form. And I really hope that no more time and attention is wasted on it. Regardless of what a grant may be, the grant is really not the issue. It's the overall cost. It's the overall everything that this

plan means that's much more important than getting a grant. Thank you, Roger Gilly, city resident. You know, I I I don't like I mean, kudos to you, Charlie. I mean, I don't like talking about myself, but I'll work 40 hours a week, and I work 40 plus hours giving back to people that need help that I think that is worth helping. Um, in 5 years, I'm getting ready to go back for my second surgery for cancer. I would not run across High Street. That's crazy. You're looking to die doing that. Um, when they paint the the road lines, have them paint a crosswalk. I mean, anywhere else there's crosswalks. I mean, if you're going across the street, I mean, I guess it's considered jaywalking. Maybe not on High Street cuz there's no sidewalks. Paint a sidewalk in there. I don't know any business that's on the side on that side of the road that I would not drive to or if I need to go there, I would jump in my vehicle. I don't see going to uh you know go to um Shaws and then decide to go buy a couch at Merryill's Furniture. I mean that's just I mean I would have gone to Merill and bought a couch. I mean I wouldn't have tried to do both at the same time. Um, but you know, we we we're paying these people to look up the grants. Ellsworth is the largest city landwise out of anywhere. And the people that are looking for to spend this tiff money, they want to pretty much friendly Ellsworth wants to stop business downtown and put in housing. There's plenty of space to put housing. You don't have to put it in town. How about being friendly Ellsworth and put a business worth going to in Ellsworth? You know, a good restaurant, something that's going to attract people. We talk about this 80% of people driving past. How about let's put something in that will stop them and have them spend their money in Ellsworth. I mean, you're you're talking

about putting I mean, we can spend an hour on High Street with four lanes and still not make it to the old Dunkin Donuts, you know, in the summertime. And we're talking about wasting people's time, money, and the taxpayer money to spend to look at all this to to find out that you know what, we'll take it down to one lane and it's the stupidest decision we ever made. I mean, common sense is pretty easy and easy to come by. We don't need to keep doing this stupid stuff. Nor did we need to pay some firm out of Florida to, you know, go after Mr. O'Hallerin because you guys can't just make, you know, sense of things and talk things out. You know, maybe what we need to do is we got six people up here that always look at each other and and vote the same way. You know, we put you there to have your own opinions and vote differently. You know, we didn't ask you to all vote the same. You're not voting for us. As as all of us are sitting here tonight, we can see pretty clearly that you guys don't care what we think or what we say. And we're paying for you guys to sit there. We're pay we put you guys in this position. How about listen to the people for once? Ralph Jordan Baysider. You can roll your eyes at this too if you

I have conjunctivitis. I have the microphone all the time. You don't. Little history lesson for you here.

Little history lesson for you here. You ever wonder why that little section of road up there by China Hill is one way? I'll tell you. It's the same reason that road going across by Home Depot and Walmart. It's kind of shaped like this. It's because many years ago, there was a guy that had some land for sale up there on top of that hill. and he wanted to guarantee anybody that built up there, bought his land and built up there, that he could put 80% of the traffic coming off Mount Desert Island across that road. So for safety purposes, he talked the city and the state into making that one way, that one what? 3/4 of a mile, one way. Guess where he was? Guess what he was doing at the time he was making that deal? He was sitting in that seat because he was the mayor of the city council and his brother was on the planning board. That's how bad these things can go. Make up your own plans. Make your own decisions here in Ellsworth and pay attention to us. Thank you. Clarence Grant, Ellsworth resident.

Well, I've sat here and listened to you guys all night and we if we've been up and down High Street a million times, you can't get up through there now. And through your last decisions to move the courthouse downtown, uh you've just made that even worse as far as traffic goes. And I don't know how you expect people to get in and out of town or stop at any businesses. Why would they? You can't even get in and off the street. Uh one lane cut off from that. I don't see how what are you going to do with the traffic? I mean, it's not going to stop people from coming. I just if if you got anything to think about, we're going we just increased the traffic problem on High Street. You got the courthouse, you're going to have people walking, you got pedestrians. Do you think it's unsafe now? You just wait. Okay. So, I don't know how you could sit up there and even consider taking a lay a lane. I If you do, would you please please explain it to me? Thank you very much.

Boy, I'm getting my steps in walking up here tonight. Um, you know, this is a whole city issue. It's not just one street. It's all of the streets. It's the side streets, Water Street, State Street. Traffic is going everywhere because Google Maps, Apple Maps, everything. They reroute you to the less like congested area. But the problem is all of the working people coming off the island trying to get through Trenton, everywhere like that, they come down Water Street from Beachland Road that backs up for miles. Like everyone sees it and they have frustrations. Accidents happens. You can't get out in traffic. I can't even pick up my kids on time because I have to fight through traffic even if I leave a half an hour early because of course Bridge Hill, etc., etc. This is not just a high street issue. This is a con entire city issue of every single street. And you know, even now it's in the wintertime in the morning coming off of Bridge Hill onto Union um Union Bridge, it's it's impossible. You have a lane that goes straight and turns uh left and then a lane that turns right. Change those lanes up. This lane turns only left. your right and your straight go through. That would alleviate so much traffic. But instead, we're spending so much money on studies and this and that. You can't widen High Street. You have businesses you'd cut out completely if you did that. There is just absolutely no way to widen that corridor to make it four lane uh five lanes or anything to make traffic flow better. And then you get congested back up to two and then you go to one. So at the top of the hill um by giant sub you go down to one again like that's not helping traffic. So if you need if you want to help traffic you

have to start with the whole entire city not just one road in the city.

Further public comment on this matter. John Lahan, City of Ellsworth. I'd just like to talk just for a second. I want to get back to the financial aspect of it. Grants, I appreciate what Mr. Brooks had to say. I hope you're still listening on there. He's made the most sense of anything I've heard at a city council meeting, and I've come to a lot of them in the last several years. There's no such thing as free money. When we spend money here at the city of Ellsworth, when we get grants, and we have all these people working to write grants and get all this money, there's always strings attached. There's always restrictions to them and it costs money. And guess where those grants come from? I pay federal income tax. I pay state income tax, pay city income tax. All these grants come from money from us, from taxpayers. So I want to just bring it back to money for just a second like that. I agree totally with Mr. Brooks what he was talking about about grants. I hope the city of Ellsworth, the council staff's looking at finances as a as a driving factor, not just some of the other things we're looking at because people are hurting in the city of Ellsworth. I know there's elderly people right now that making choices where they're going to eat, whether they're going to heat their home. That might not bother you, but I'm 78 years old, not as old. Well, yeah, I guess I am older than than than Mr. Grant, but uh you know, that bothers me when you see people having to make those type of decisions. And you can alleviate that by the spending decisions we make here at the city council level. So I'm opposed to grants other than Robert C Grant Senior and Buzzy Grant. That's the only two grants I'll listen to that made any sense tonight. Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Further public comment. Seeing none, I'll close the public hearing. Council, how would you like to proceed on this agenda item? Take a chance to answer some of the questions. Yeah. And Charlie, do we have some answers to any of the questions that were asked? I do. Um,

yeah. And I'll I may refer to Twilight. You know, I would also note that u many aspects of this meeting deeply sadden me. Um, I've been here for almost two years now and um, I think one of the reasons that I took this job um, was to engage in great issues presenting to the city. I think in as I've mentioned to council before that a lot of people think my job is to like make decisions or um, and it's really sadly it's to orchestrate conflict. It's to put tough issues in front of the community, in front of the council that maybe haven't been looked at in years or decades, like public restrooms, um like uh you know, how to improve safety and mobility on a high street. And there is 10,000 different ways to think about that. Um there will not be uniform opinion. Um I've really never seen anything in the way of the behaviors that have occurred tonight. Um, and I'm I don't say that in terms of aspersions against the people in the audience. Um, but there's clearly a lot of pain and I dare say rage um

in in the group. I I got off Facebook

I got off Facebook about six or seven years ago because I just felt that that environment had changed so dramatically and to me it just feels like it's Facebook in here which makes it hard when you're people are snickering when people are talking during the meetings when they won't ask when to come up one at a time. um for this deliberative body. That's what the city councelor, all these people aren't just the 50 or so people in this room, but they represent as elected body members thousands upon thousands of voters to represent all of their opinions. Um to talk to each other about the great issues before the time. And it can be very hard for staff and for the council, I think, to deliberate on these matters when they're being accused of things with their eyes. um when they're being accused of corruption, when campaign tactics are being brought in about who's going to be eliminated from office. Um we have some very big issues to discuss as a city. Um Ellsworth has been always known as the friendly city and there's people in the audience, it's scary. It's really scary. There's people in the audience who've come up to me after meetings and said, "I look forward to ending you." Um, and I saw a pe couple people nod when I just said that and I can't tell you how scary that is. Um, you know, I know we live in a charged time. Um, and I would love to think that, you know, we can have more meetings like this where there's lots of public engagement and dialogue, which is really important. Um but that we can you know uh really treat each other a little better in terms of decency and respect for the council chair for the full council for the process. We are trying to be very transparent and upfront about the items that the city is moving forward on workshops, city council meetings. Um sometimes I joke with staff that we're being punished because we're so transparent. We offer opportunities

for items to be addressed multiple times. Um, and you know, there's been eye rolls on this accusative and I just got a great one from Mr. Howerin. And I just wonder what the answer to the question was.

He has the ability to do that. Um, and I'd just like to apologize to the council and to staff for having me especially to Twila who's trying to be at her child's graduation has done a lot of work on this project. Um I think the answers are pretty straightforward and Twilight you can uh let me know if not um terms of the May DOT the uh uh they have been involved in the previous process. I believe they would be involved and it's their road. They have to be involved. They have to approve anything that would move forward. It's one of the discussions we've had with staff um at a pretty extensive level of you know main DOT uh in terms of this project itself originally said that they didn't want you know for the original conceptions to have anything that had to deal with traffic um I think uh movement or traffic amount that would reduce those things and then they changed their guidance they said actually not that they would do it but that they um they wouldn't be opposed to seeing that in one of the proposals. Now, in some ways, me and the staff have lived with the cost of that seemingly small decision to look at a proposal fully paid for by the federal government that I think is not right. But at the same time, that's also up to the council to decide whether they'd like to move forward on this item with um further traffic studies that, you know, would involve city council money this time. And no, if we get together a plan like all of these pieces, we would have to um that the city council that the staff that the community has been fully vetted um that would move forward and ultimately be main DOT's decision and on this next step we would want to um talk to them and really get their input just like we did in the last process. So that's for the main DOT. As for TIF, um the uh it's tax increment financing. We have a whole website ellmain.gov/ /tiff on the tiff um reimagining which the council um went through. I know it's it's been discussed as a slush fund um

before I' I'd note that it's uh it's more akin to a um a a tax credit um or a um tax shelter I should say that as we talked before it's roughly 59 cents in the dollar that as the city of Elsworth has grown and the city of Elsworth has grown massively. I think that's one of the other things that troubles me about tonight and may have something to do with the tenor of tonight um is the city has grown by spectacular levels. $700 million valuation increase over four years, new hotels, new um apartment buildings, new housing developments, two new tractor dealerships, scores of new businesses. There's an incredible amount of growth going on in the city. Um, but tax increment financing allows you to shelter that growth um to be able to sequester it and spend 59 cents on the dollar without hurting the state's revenue sharing that comes back um for our schools, for city departments. And uh if you don't if that growth occurs, you do have offsets that occur because the state effectively sees or thinks of you as being too wealthy. Now, there's restrictions in how you can spend that tax increment and financing. Um, when it comes to the Beckwith Hill tiff districts, as TW has noted, there's economic development restrictions. Um, this next fiscal cycle, we're pegging around 220,000 undesated from that tiff district that'll be kicked off. Um, and there are I shouldn't say smaller things like these um uh these restrooms, but there's also much larger things, multi multi-million dollar roads that can be paid for with this 50 cents on the dollar that really um require a lot of care and staff. our deputy city manager has acquired a main municipal partnership initiative grant for $750,000 to look at the Bayside road um to be matched. So, this is the type of thing that in the future we have a a tag up to $2 million that this type of funding could also be used for that type of activity which we also think is valid. Whether the council wants to move forward, you know, um on the restroom or

on furthering plans for high street corridor um is an allowable tiff use. Um whether it's a good one or not is ultimately the decision of the city council. Um, and that was Twilight. Were there any other ones out there that you wanted to discuss more?

No, I think I would just say again that main DOT has been involved. I mean, I've been on the job for 11 months now, but since I was involved in this project, which was handed, you know, to a bunch of us who were newer. This was, you know, grantly written before our time. So, we're trying to do the best with it um as we can and I think we're doing a good job. But it was also based on information from the comp plan public input the comp plan the business attraction plan. So the grant was not written in a vacuum again before our time but it was very much based on concerns that came forward in those plans. Uh and we're just trying to to honor prior plans that that were done too and really listen to uh you know so it's not just war plans sitting on a shelf and it was really based on that. So, a main DOT team was brought in. Again, as long as I've been on it, they've been on calls. They've been giving their feedback. It is a state road. Nothing happens without main DOT. And they've been uh giving their, you know, opinions around CP and uh been part of the conversations and reevaluating it. Again, the proposal tonight was for us to be able to apply for a grant that would allow a comprehensive safety action plan to be written so that if we do go for future grants, and again, not this doesn't have to do with the road diet. This is that was one opinion from a study that um what is not really the topic of of tonight. So, I understand the concerns around it. We just can't at some point go forward for for larger grants for anything on High Street without having a comprehensive safety action plan. And you know, it's hard. We don't want to spend taxpayer money, but we're getting denied a lot of we don't want grants to how are we supposed to do it, right? So, the grant would allow us to have that in place uh without a lot of money out of out of the city's pocket. And uh that was really what was being proposed to council tonight, but it's up to council and we do bring these things to council for their approval or not and uh and it

rests in their hands tonight. Great. Thank you, Toya. Councelor Smith,

thank you. A couple of other questions I heard that I want to at least share my perspective on. Um where to start? I I want to uh thank Charlie for his comments about the tone tonight and where it's coming from and it's probably coming from the amount of change that people have been here a long time are seeing. Um to the point uh Gordo brought up. So I'm I am the CEO of Gross Smart Maine. We're a nonprofit. We help communities manage change. This is what we do. Ellsworth is going to change. This safe streets for all is an opportunity for you to participate in what that's going to look like. Otherwise, change will happen to you and nobody likes that within this program. No, within this is my turn.

Within within this work, Grow Smart Maine is an uncompensated member of the advisory committee. We have not been paid. We have no contract. We offer that expertise. Harold Bredesen works with me. He has attended, I think, a couple of meetings to support the town in their work at no cost. I want that to be incredibly clear. Other things that I want to make sure that we talk about, there's an interesting thing about the grant and its tax dollars. And you're right, even if it's a federal grant, it's federal tax dollars. We pay federal tax dollars. It makes me think about when the senators Collins and King announce congressionally designated spending and we know that there's three million that we're hoping for for the library. That is your tax dollars. It's an opportunity for your tax dollars to come back to Ellsworth. US DOT is going to have grant money. your tax dollars are going to go out to support a community that wants to manage growth. It can be elseworth and we can get some of our tax dollars back. If we say no, some other city will get it and they'll work with it. So, the idea that your tax dollars are going to go down if Senator Collins doesn't have congressionally designated funding or we don't have this isn't true. The money will go to somebody else. One other piece um it was I don't know if anybody else caught it. There was a question about why is child care part of this and then you had the woman who spoken on a lot of issues tonight say I can't pick my kids up on time. That's why daycare is part of this. Where daycare is located and how you get to it at the end of your job or before your job impacts traffic plans. And that's why I asked the same question when it

came up. And it's like, well, it's economic development. Like, yeah, if you can't get daycare, you can't work. But where it's located impacts the traffic patterns as well. So, I thought it was really great that one member of the audience answered a question from another member of the audience. if if you caught it. Those were the questions that I was aware of that weren't already answered except I think to say incredibly clearly from what my understanding is moving forward. The city didn't propose narrowing High Street. The city heard the feedback from the community. The city went, "Well, that's not going to move forward." and that that is part of what this grant proposal will be moving forward. And I think the total cost of it has been said it's $20,000 and it's in that time that's invested in working and it is part of the inind contribution to move forward. I think Twilight said that there might be another $10,000 in these tiff funds that are held for this purpose. So that is the all-in cost because you can count that in kind contribution. That's my attempt to answer the questions I've heard tonight, address any misinformation that was put out tonight on this issue. Um, now that we've heard from the public and always, thank you.

Thank you, Nancy. Any further counselor questions or comments on this matter? I think um for myself that um end of the day this is focusing on safety on high street which is a huge need um for our growing community. Um I am and as much as I you know I knew nothing about the the proposal in the single lane. It does sound crazy to me, you know, like I'm not gonna, you know, but at the end of the day, that was a process that the city didn't really have any input into until we received the study. But I think here, this is something that we can have control over, whereas we're looking into the safety of our high street for our residents, for our guests. Um it's a I believe personally believe this is a good investment um for the city to pursue. um especially because you know the 20% as Nancy said half of it's in kind um and then we're using these tiff funds for the type of projects that they're for and so um I plan to support u moving moving to authorize this and um I thank Twila and the city staff for all their hard work and efforts putting this together and advancing it to the city council. Do I have a proposed motion?

If nobody else is, I move to authorize the city manager to submit the state safe streets for all application to the US Department of Transportation for development of a high street corridor comprehensive safety plan. Do I have a second? Second it. Second, councelor White. Further discussion from council? Seeing none, all those in favor? Opposed? Yay's carry. Good luck on the graduation, Twila. Thank you. Thank you. Um, we have we are on to council order. No public comment.

No, sir. Um, when is that coming? One more time. One minute. There's no more public comment in this meeting, sir. We've provided public comment on every sir. I I be I would please I understand that folks are energized by this but we the council has been very patient Charlie all I want to say is I do want one person here feel threatened it's not by no I I apologize completely if you feel threatened any of you it's not our intention we are here to take care of Steve Oler period

thank you sir We're on to council agenda item number 14, council order number 0526 02. Um discussion potential action on the request of the public works director on acceptance of the cooperative salt bid.

Good evening. I am not the public works director. I am Sarah Develin, deputy city manager, Ellsworth resident. I am here tonight to discuss the cooperative salt bid that um the city entered with the towns of Bar Harbor, Tmont, Trenton, and Mount Desert. Mount Desert, sorry. Um we issued an RFP to look at doing a cooperative purchase in the region. Um at the same time, the state also issued their RFP. So we submitted our quantity request to the state as well. Um we used Open Gov for the procurement software for this effort. We received four bids. New England salt was the low bid. I would ask the council to table this until um the next meeting as the state bid will come in and we would like to see and wait if the state bid is lower than the bid we got because then we would pivot and shift to that bid and become part of that cooperative purchase.

Okay. Well, that sounds reasonable to me. Do we have a motion to table? I make a motion to table this. Second. Thank you. Most both Smith second. Um, all those in favor? Opposed? Yay's carry. Council order number 0526 03, acceptance of the planning board report on recommendation to amend chapter 56 unified development ordinance as proposed.

Yep. Good evening everyone. I think I'm the last thing in the main agenda. Okay. So, I'm going to make this quick. This is just a procedural thing. It's part of the ordinance amendment process as we've discussed in council and in workshops and in public engagement. Um the city is going through a comprehensive ordinance revision process. Um this includes amendments to chapter 56 which is our unified development um ordinance and this is to conform with recent state housing and zoning laws. The process includes planning board review and their recommendation to accept any amendments made to the unified development ordinance. The planning board voted unanimously to recommend these proposed amendments to chapter 56 at their meeting on May 6th. The full package of phase one of these ordinance amendments, including chapter 56 and other chapters, will come before city council to adopt at the June 15th meeting. Phase one, as a reminder, prioritizes essential essential technical updates and legal compliance to bring the city's land use ordinances in alignment with recent statute changes from the main state legislature. It also removes outdated and redundant language, aims to streamline development processes, and seeks to clarify regulations for staff, applicants, and the public. And included in your packet is the official report from the planning board. You may not have seen something like this before. This is um really a matter of procedure to make sure that we're very thorough because the scope of this project is so large. Um we want to make sure that we're doing everything on the up and up. The um final draft amendments are actually on the city's web page already. Um they've been up for a little over a week. We are currently in the process of doing the copy edits to all of these things and making sure that references to other chapters are correct. Um so that is what we're currently doing. And once that is all complete, we'll be posting the PDFs of the final versions

of things, both clean and redlined, for council to review and for the public to review, too. Um, so that's where we are. So, this report is just the recommendation from the planning board to accept the amendments um for just chapter 56. And so, this agenda item is for you to just accept the report. Charlie,

and I should just note, you know, I know um we've had a few other instances in the past where folks thought, you know, oh my gosh, this is changing everything. This is, you know, this as as Danielle know, this is one step of the process. Uh if you go to Ellsworth main.gov and you'll see in our main column tabs, you'll see a comprehensive city ordinance review. I think that's one of the pieces that the city has really tried to get better at. Um is when there could be issues that could be contentious that or they're big initiatives for the city that we do as much transparency and public dialogue as possible. Um it includes videos to previous meetings. Um it includes like all the phases of the approach. Um as you mentioned the draft ordinances, additional resources. We've had multiple workshops on this item. This phase one really is um as as noted kind of a cleanup area. I think uh if you've been unfortunate enough to have to have read the entire chapter 56 um like you're reading a book, which unfortunately a lot of our business owners and those looking to do business will have to do. They have to go through every single code. you just it's riddled with errors, misconceptions, things are not in alignment with state law. Um lack of definitions, lacks of like legitimate tables of contents. This is an incredibly time intensive, laborious process um to clean that up so that we can be more business friendly so that um those looking we're seeing a lot of business development already and an incredible amount of business development. But um that is the lifeblood of all cities and towns is new business growth. Not just valuation increases on existing homes due to the increase in tourism, but new businesses coming in here um to offset um the tax uh growth on the existing tax base and um having very clean ordinances would be excellent and um this kind of phase one, phase two, you know, could be considered things that are more in the policy realm um that could be a little more controversial, which we'll also have to have a, you know, pretty good process and more public meetings on exactly each one of those things that come through. So,

thank you, Charlie. Yeah. Any questions from councel of our wonderful staff on this matter? Seeing none, do I have a proposed motion? Councelor Smith, I move to accept and place on file the report from the planning board that recommends the amendment to chapter 56 unified develop development or or thank you as proposed.

Great motion. Do I have a second? Second. Second from councelor White. Um, any further discussion from council on this matter? Seeing none, all those in favor? Opposed? Yay's carry. I'm going uh so that concludes the main meeting for this evening other than we do have an executive session to consider whether or not to go into one before we go into the special meeting. Um, before we do that, I'm going to give us all a little break. I'm going to call a recess and have us start back here right at 10 o'clock. We're in recess until 10 o'clock.