Mount Desert Looks To Plan Its Future
Town Meeting Back at the Neighborhood House, Police Department Set to Buy Eight New Portable Radios
MOUNT DESERT—Noel Musson of the Musson Group explained to the Mount Desert Selectboard at its December 16 meeting that the Mount Desert Comprehensive Planning Committee is looking to the town’s future.
Toward that end, the selectboard appointed two new members to the ten-member committee: Mike Olson and Howard Lawrence.
“We’re super excited to be starting on the comprehensive plan process,” Musson said. “It seems like a really good time and the community is really ready for these kind of conversations.”
The plan is a shared vision of the town’s future, created by the committee with help from the Musson Group and is meant to help Mount Desert define goals for a future vision and also identify “implementation measures consistent with the shared vision of the future,” according to Musson’s presentation.
It’s a time to celebrate what’s important to the community as well as have the hard conversations about where the community wants to go, Musson said. He compared it to a road map where people think about where they want the town to be in the future and how to get there. They are going to try not to spend an excessive amount of time analyzing data, he said.
Neighboring Bar Harbor is completing its multi-year comprehensive plan process with the goal of presenting it to its town council this winter and voters in June.
Like in Bar Harbor, in Mount Desert there is a website meant to be a one-stop shop for all things comprehensive plan related. There will be a community survey launched and meetings with town staff.
“Just to try to get the temperature of the community,” Musson said of the eye-level survey. “It’s a first step for us to try to really get a sense of what’s happening in town.”
That survey is meant to “get a temperature read” in a broad way of how people feel about the town. It is the first of multiple opportunities for the community to engage in the process.
Sample questions might be: what do you love about Mount Desert, has the town changed, how, what do you want the town to be like in ten years, Musson said.
So far the group has created an inventory and analysis draft, website, initial engagement outline, and worked on the committee’s organization. That website allows for a single location for the documents and updates related to the plan.
Next steps include establishing a committee meeting schedule, launching a survey, reviewing data with town staff and community engagement.
The expectation is that the plan will be drafted in the fall and winter of 2025. That estimated time frame is about a year.
“It’s a fairly aggressive time frame,” Musson said.
At that same meeting, the selectboard members took a preliminary look at a potential budget that will eventually go before town voters.
OTHER BUSINESS
The board authorized the purchase of eight portable radios and accessories, and programming of these radios for the Mount Desert Police Department not to exceed $17,500.00 from the PD capital reserve account. That account has a balance of $223,910.75.
According to a December 11 memo from Police Chief David Kerns, “These radios will replace our existing portable radios which are beyond serviceable life.”
“By replacing all portable radios in the same fiscal year, we were able to obtain a more competitive price. Following the Town of Bar Harbor’s purchasing policy, we submitted a combined bid request for 25 portable radios and accessories to be paid in full by the Bar Harbor & Mount Desert Police Department,” Kerns wrote. “Bar Harbor will cover the cost of 17 portable radios, accessories and programming. Mount Desert, through mutual aid, will cover the cost for the remaining 8 radios, accessories and programming costs.”
The board accepted an unconditional monetary gift of $500 from Christopher Campbell to the Mount Desert Fire Department
It also allowed a waiver to Rural Wastewater Rebate policy on select delinquent taxes that were out of the taxpayer’s control.
The board also tentatively set the location of the 2025 Annual Town Open-Floor Meeting back at the Neighborhood House.
The Bar Harbor Story is generously sponsored by Acadia Brochures of Maine.
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