Three towns seek grant to consolidate municipal services

Pembroke, Perry and Charlotte selectmen have been working together on a grant that could help the three towns to consolidate certain municipal services, personnel and administrative offices. The grant, if approved, would provide funds to establish the shared positions of clerk, treasurer, tax collector and administrative assistant and equip a single office to house staff, records, computers and other equipment for all three towns.

Judy East, executive director for Washington County Council of Governments, is serving as a consultant to the select boards in writing and processing the grant application to Maine Municipal Bond Bank (MMBB), the grantor. The application is due in MMBB's Augusta office on March 23, and East expects that successful applicants will be notified by the end of April.

Each town is applying for $25,000 under the program, which requires the funds to be expended by July 2008. MMBB plans to award a total of $1 million to local governments, in grants ranging from $25,000 to $100,000, for the purpose of reducing costs or increasing efficiency in the delivery of local municipal services.

The selectmen have discussed several options for acquiring or constructing a municipal building that would serve the three communities. They are also looking into other grants or other financial assistance that might be available for such a project.

A priority goal listed in the grant application is to explain to residents the changes that would occur in the delivery of town services. Selectmen from Perry and Charlotte said they would have copies of the grant goals available at their town meetings next week to acquaint townspeople with the proposal. Changes in the form of government would be required if personnel were hired rather than elected, as at present. A formal agreement among the towns would be needed to set up a cost-sharing structure. Alignment in fiscal year would be required. Such structural changes would require voter approval.

Under the proposal, town websites would be developed or refined, and include digitized tax maps, town reports, tax records, ordinances, and links to schools, community organizations, and to the county registrar of deeds. The centralized municipal office could also provide fee-based services to other nearby communities, thereby contributing to its own support.

In a meeting March 15 at the Pembroke Fire Station, selectmen from the three towns put finishing touches on the grant application form and discussed the changes that could result in town governance. They noted that Treasurer Grace Hatton has served for 60 years in Charlotte and that Janice Scanlon has been town clerk in Pembroke for 25 years and now holds the same post in Perry. They and other long-term town officials are nearing retirement, and it is becoming difficult to replace such experienced persons with volunteers from the general population. As municipal responsibilities become more complex, the selectmen agreed, the need grows for professionally trained personnel. If the merger contemplated in the grant proposal becomes a reality, Pembroke selectman Milan Jamieson said, town government would be "run like a business."