MINOT — Selectmen on Monday directed Town Administrator Arlan Saunders to determine whether the town could contract for dispatch services with an agency other than Lewiston-Auburn 911 or the town of Lisbon.
Saunders was asked to contact the Oxford County Regional Communications Center in Paris and United Ambulance, either of which, selectmen figured, could probably absorb Minot’s call volume without stressing their systems.
According to fire Chief Dean Campbell, Minot averages about 140 calls a year, or about 10 a month.
Selectmen noted that they didn’t want to rule out any possibility and, provided the town was adequately served, they would go with the least expensive option.
In other business, selectmen voted not to adopt an ordinance declaring the town’s athletic fields a smoke-free area.
Minot-Hebron Athletic Association President Carrie Woods had asked the board if they could so post the fields.
Maine Municipal Association lawyer Michael Stokes advised the board against giving a nonmunicipal entity authority to post town property and suggested selectmen give a lot of thought before adopting an ordinance.
The core issue was how the town would enforce it.
“He wondered if we would really want to be calling the Maine State Police out to the ball field because someone is smoking,” Saunders said.
Selectman Steve French reported he applied for and received a waiver for having to test the town’s well water for synthetic organic compounds. He estimated the extra testing would have cost the town $1,200 a year — about double what it now costs the town to test its well.
Saunders told selectmen he has filed the application with the Army Corps of Engineers for a permit for the Indian Brook culvert project.
“The timeline is very tight if we are going to be able to complete the project this summer,” Saunders said.
He noted that it will take six weeks just to fabricate the culvert — a 50-foot by 6-foot by 8-foot structure that’s open on the bottom to allow a natural stream bed. It will push the project that much deeper into the construction season.
Minot Consolidated School is on Shaw Hill Road, which will be closed to through traffic for at least four days.
Selectman Eda Tripp reported that over Mothers’ Day weekend the Tri-Town Optimist Club picked up trash along Shaw Hill Road. Selectmen issued a public thanks and directed Saunders to send a note of thanks in their name.
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