DIXFIELD — The Board of Selectmen nominated police Chief Richard Pickett and residents Tim Kelly and Robin Marshall to be Planning Board members Monday evening.
Pickett and Kelly were both nominated with a vote of 3-2, while Marshall was nominated with a vote of 3-1, and one abstention.
The selectmen announced during their previous meeting that the Planning Board needed to fill its two empty seats in order to begin the process of editing the wind ordinance that was approved in the recent election. The two available seats are full-time positions, while selectmen added that an alternate part-time seat needed to be filled. Pickett was nominated for the alternate seat, while Kelly and Marshall will occupy the full-time positions. The Planning Board has five seats, with three of them currently occupied.
Chairman of selectmen Malcolm Gill said that the next step will be to inform Pickett, Kelly and Marshall of their nominations and extend an invitation to them, along with the current Planning Board members, for their meeting on Dec. 10, where they will discuss the next steps to be taken on the wind ordinance with lawyer Kristen Collins.
In other business, selectmen listened to an update from Dave Phair, head of the Public Works Department. Phair informed the Board that the town’s plowing equipment is ready to go and that they’ve started gathering sand and salt for the upcoming winter.
“We still had salt left over from last year,” Phair said. “We had about 80 pounds of salt held over, which saved us about $7,500 as a result.”
Selectman Hart Daley also informed Phair of a resident who was curious as to whether the Public Works Department cuts down problematic trees before they become a nuisance or afterwards. Phair explained that legally, the department cannot simply remove the tree if it hasn’t become a problem yet, but they are allowed to make a recommendation to Central Maine Power, which could then remove the tree if they find it to be problematic.
“However, this doesn’t extend to private property,” Phair said. “We can’t touch those trees.”
Phair also suggested to selectman that they consider including additional funds for cemetery maintenance at the next budget meeting
“We have a large number of headstones that need to be replaced or repaired,” Phair said.
Gill suggested to selectmen during the closing moments that the next scheduled meeting on Christmas Eve be canceled, to which the board unanimously agreed.
“That’s family time,” Gill said.
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