| Joanne Cole |
The Select Board’s Oct. 6 meeting focused on preparations for the Oct. 27 Special Town Meeting on proposed donations and a lease for the Pineland Athletic Facility, along with updates on the expanded recreation programs and revenues the facility could support.
The board also formally appointed Interim Town Manager Bradley Plante and discussed upcoming budget work and the timing of a possible property revaluation, among other matters.
Pineland Athletic Facility gifts, lease and information. At their last meeting, the board set Monday, October 27, as the date for a Special Town Meeting for voters to consider accepting donations from Planson International to fund a two-year lease of the Pineland Athletic Facility for recreation and community activities for all ages. The town would not be obligated to continue beyond the two years and could also terminate the lease early.
With the town meeting on the horizon, the board considered next steps and heard updates at this meeting. Parks and Recreation Director Sarah Rodriguez took questions and added context to detailed information she’d submitted for the meeting agenda packet.
Rodriguez told the board that if voters approve the Planson International gifts and a two-year lease is entered into, $200,000 of donated funds would become available immediately “to pay the bills,” including rent and utilities for the two years. The Recreation Department would begin “growing into the space,” adding offerings and starting to accumulate revenues to put away for future needs, she said.
As requested, Rodriguez had prepared a breakdown of the expanded activities the Pineland facility would allow, together with associated revenues and expenses. She described it to the board as her plan “for Year 3 and beyond” – that is, if the community were to decide to take up the lease beyond the two years funded by the Planson gift and with a broad array of Rec offerings up and running.
Altogether, Rodriguez’s ‘Year 3 and beyond’ analysis showed a bottom line of $41,000 in net revenues after expenses for staffing the front desk, for custodial service and staff to support youth programming, as well as rent, utilities and other building expenses. Her projection assumes no volunteer staffing, she told the board.
Currently, Rec rents spaces in the schools and uses the small former garage behind Town Hall, limiting program offerings and enrollments. The larger indoor spaces at Pineland—a gym, fitness room, and multipurpose rooms—would allow higher participation and revenues from existing profitable programs, like Rec’s summer camp, its popular before- and after-school Kids Club programs, and gymnastics, according to Rodriguez’s analysis. Her side-by-side comparison showed an increase in after-expenses revenue for Kids Club from its current $41,456 to $102,418 with the Pineland facility.
New offerings such as February and April Vacation Camps and birthday party rentals could add about $10,000 in annual net revenue, according to Rodriguez’s estimates.
Rodriguez also outlined a membership model, aiming for a $30-$40 monthly fee for the fitness room and drop-in activities like basketball and pickleball. She’s investigating a possible grant for fitness equipment, she told the board. Her financial projection assumes $8,000 monthly in membership revenues, equivalent to 200 members paying a $40 fee, considerably less than the former Pineland Y’s fee, Rodriguez said.
Information about the condition of the building was also submitted, including from Libra Foundation’s Erik Hayward. Hayward explained that Pineland’s focus is and has been outdoor recreation and that the gym and bowling alley functioned “mainly as an adjunct to the outdoor experience at Pineland.” With declining snow and ski days and roof leaks in the former pool wing that served as the skiers’ lodge, they determined that repairs and continued operation wouldn’t be cost-effective, he said.
Also submitted were notes from a recent site visit by Air Serv of Lewiston, an HVAC contractor for the town in the past. Air Serv found the Pineland building’s HVAC systems to be operational and an aging cooling tower patched and running. The tower may fail, and a $100,000 donation from Planson International is available to replace it and cover associated work, if needed, or the funds can be used to address other building systems and infrastructure needs.
Because the Fairgrounds has been suggested as an alternative site for a new recreation and community building and will likely come up at the town meeting, Rodriguez outlined restrictions under the Land and Water Conservation Fund grant used to develop the Fairgrounds. She told the board that it’s theoretically possible to request a “conversion” of the use, but only if land of “equivalent or better” value, with equal or better value for active outdoor recreation, is provided in exchange.
Board members—except Vice Chair Connie Justice, who again recused herself due to her role with Planson International–discussed how to share Rodriguez’s information with voters ahead of the October 27 town meeting and what other information to seek. Chair Colleen Strickler proposed that members send their questions to Interim Manager Brad Plante for follow-up.
The board also discussed meeting with the town attorney on October 14 to consider the lease being negotiated by counsel and the interim manager, to review the town meeting warrant and address any other questions. When fellow members mentioned the budget process under the town charter, Strickler reminded them that the town is considering a gift; the budget process would come into play in Year 3, she noted.
Members ruled out setting up a public tour of the Pineland facility before the October 27 Special Town Meeting, citing the press of other business for town staff. They also decided against sending out a mailer to alert the community to the meeting, on grounds of cost and turnaround time. If voters approve the Pineland gifts and lease on October 27, a ballot referendum vote preceded by a public hearing will follow, board members and town staff noted, offering more occasions to inform and engage the community on the Pineland opportunity.
Bradley Plante appointed Interim Town Manager. Although Brad Plante began work Sept. 22, the Oct. 6 meeting was the board’s first chance to formally appoint him. Since arriving, Plante has met with department heads, visited the Transfer Station to revisit a safety plan from his prior interim tenure in 2022, toured the Pineland building, and consulted architect Nancy Barba on structural assessments for Town Hall and the Pineland facility, he told the board.
No “budget parameters” for FY27. Past boards have issued “budget parameters” to guide the manager and department heads as they develop proposed budget. Parameters have included limits on raises for staff, on new positions and on use of the town’s surplus. In practice, however, rising costs and the need to stay competitive with other towns have caused boards to put forward budgets that departed from the parameters they’d set.
This year, the board agreed to forgo parameters altogether. Instead they directed Plante to develop the FY27 budget as he sees fit. Plante said that in his 20-plus years of municipal budgeting, he’s started with department heads submitting “what they believe they need to operate for the coming year.” They meet with him and he may make adjustments, he said. The board and the Finance Committee have the final say, all agreed. Departments’ budget requests are due Nov. 13.
Valuation and revaluation. Assessor’s agent Michael O’Donnell briefed the board on the need and timing for a property revaluation due to what he described in a memo as “the extraordinary rise in property value” since the last revaluation in 2020. The 2020 revaluation was based on sales data from 2018 and 2019, O’Donnell said, and the gap between New Gloucester’s assessed values and market values has only grown since then. “We’ve been stagnant values in a rising market,” he said.
The gap not only raises questions of fairness and accuracy, it has practical implications. When a town’s ratio of assessed values to market value falls below a 70 percent benchmark, the state cuts the town’s tree growth reimbursement. The wider the gap in value, the larger the financial penalty. New Gloucester cleared the 70 percent ratio bar for the current tax year, but O’Donnell can already see that the town will lose 40 percent of its tree growth reimbursement next year, forfeiting about $33,600, he estimates.
O’Donnell laid out two revaluation options to bring assessed values more nearly in line with actual values. A comprehensive revaluation—as in 2020—would be most accurate, in part because it captures subcategories of property that increase in value at different rates. O’Donnell said that New Gloucester’s acreage prices have gone way up, for example.
But a comprehensive revaluation is “a big undertaking,” O’Donnell said, time-and staff-intensive for his firm, which already has several lined up, and expensive for the town, an estimated $363,000. He can guarantee New Gloucester a slot in 2029 and possibly in 2028. Funds can be budgeted across two years.
The alternative approach is ‘factoring,’ applying a multiplier equally across all subgroups of property, O’Donnell said. On the plus side, factoring gets the value ratio back on target and is quick and inexpensive; the fee would be $10,000. But it lacks precision and can be confusing to taxpayers, he said.
O’Donnell will need a decision from the board by next summer. More market information will be available by then, but he cautioned that even if the real estate market slows, New Gloucester’s values are unlikely to realign without action.
Public Works pick-up and plow/sander awarded. It took a few trips to the Meetinghouse and multiple conversations, but Public Works is set to move forward on a new pick-up truck, with plow/sander and a trailer. Following Public Works Director Ben Tinker’s recommendations, the board made awards to Quirk Ford for the F350 cab and chassis and to local business Trafford Truck Equipment for the associated gear. Availability and delivery time were key to Tinker’s choice of truck vendor. He expects the new vehicle will be on the road, ready to work, by mid-November or sooner.
Watch the video of the October 6, 2025, meeting at this link. Find contact information for Select Board members and links to meeting agendas, minutes and related documents at this link.
