March 28, 2024
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Territories unable to absorb airport costs, state says

DOVER-FOXCROFT – Piscataquis County commissioners learned Tuesday that any contribution to the Greenville Municipal Airport must be funded through the budgets of both the unorganized territories and the county.

The Joint Standing Committee on Taxation last month eliminated a $10,000 donation for renovations to the Greenville airport that the commissioners had included in the 2002-03 unorganized territories budget. The committee also eliminated a similar donation from Somerset County’s unorganized territories budget.

“Because the Greenville airport does not serve only the unorganized territory, it would be improper to require property taxpayers in the unorganized territory to pay for those services when property taxpayers in the organized areas of the county are not required to pay,” Sen. Kenneth Gagnon, D-Waterville and chairman of the joint standing committee on taxation, wrote in a letter to the commissioners.

In his letter, Gagnon implied that such a donation taken solely from the unorganized territories budget is inappropriate and even “unconstitutional.” If the county spread the costs among the organized communities that benefit, then it would be permissible to include a similar request of unorganized territories, he noted.

Had the commissioners been notified of the committee’s hearing, the three-member board could have explained the logic behind the request, Commissioner Tony Bartley said Tuesday.

Because Greenville and the surrounding developed communities already pay for the operation and maintenance of the airport, the commissioners thought it only fair that the unorganized territories contribute. Bartley said that the airport gets frequent use by seasonal residents in the unorganized townships in the Moosehead Lake region and that residents of some of the unorganized townships have hangars at the airport.

Both Commissioners Eben DeWitt and Bartley called it unfair to include such a request in the county budget forcing residents in communities such as Milo, Brownville and Dover-Foxcroft to pay for a facility they do not use.

Greenville Town Manager John Simko had requested $10,000 donations each from of Piscataquis and Somerset counties to help the town acquire federal and state funds to pay the costly renovation of the airport’s major runway.

The commissioners were advised that they must now approve the unorganized territories budget without the $10,000 donation and resubmit the budget to the state, a move they tabled Tuesday.

In other business Tuesday, the commissioners approved an interlocal agreement between Aroostook, Hancock, Penobscot and Washington counties to apply for and receive a Maine Community Development Block Grant from the Department of Economic and Community Development. The grant funds will be used to provide microloans and technical assistance to small businesses in the five counties.


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