The topic of regionalization – pooling certain resources among towns in an effort to save money – has recently become a hot issue, spurring the state Legislature to create a 15-member Joint Select Committee on Regionalization and Community Cooperation.

Thursday evening, members of the committee met with municipal officials in four locations across the state by teleconference, trying to identify both advantages and disadvantages to regionalizing. The only agreed-upon notion was that regionalization is not a new idea and is already happening to some extent.

“We have always been happy to share the good things we have with surrounding towns,” said Joleen Lovejoy, a Rumford selectman, one of about 30 people attending the session at Bangor High School. “We don’t do it through financial incentive, but simply because it’s the right thing to do.”

Other sites included Caribou High School, Mount Blue High School in Farmington and Edward Little High School in Auburn.

Sen. Dennis Damon of Hancock County, a member of the new committee, facilitated the forum from the Bangor site, hoping to take suggestions offered at the forum back with him to Augusta.

“We don’t come here with any specific agenda,” said Rep. Ted Kaufman, Damon’s colleague from Mount Desert Island. “We’re really here to learn from you.”

Each location was given an hour-long private session before the four spots were linked through television. In Bangor, Damon urged attending officials to identify any barriers to regionalization.

“The idea [of regionalization] is filled with potential and filled with danger, and we need to acknowledge that,” Damon said.

Sue Lessard, town manger for Hampden, expressed concern over pooling resources across town lines.

“The problem of moving through state, county and towns is that we’ve been set up to compete,” Lessard said. “For us to be successful, someone else has to fail. We don’t want to take away a sense of community.”

Representatives at Caribou High School and Mount Blue High School, however, shared Lovejoy’s sentiment that regionalization has worked well in their respective regions. But even with that success, money remains the biggest overlying problem. Many are blaming the state government for the financial crunch they face.

“The state takes about 90 percent of our revenue when we do all the work,” said Elmer Berry, chairman of the Androscoggin County commissioners. “We need to overcome the distrust that has built up between the local and state governments.”

While Berry proposed an alliance with officials in Augusta, others such as Tony Smith, preferred keeping state government out of the picture.

“I prefer to keep big brother away from my pocket,” said Smith, an attendee in Bangor. “We don’t need the politicians telling us what to do.”

Many different types of regionalization came up throughout the discussion, ranging from combining school resources to bringing together fire departments and jails. Some, like Lovejoy, are happy with the way things are, but Damon said he was more interested in helping towns that have concerns, offering a possible solution.

“An incentive-based approach is probably a better way to go about this, rather than to force the issue,” Damon said.

Damon and the rest of the committee will return to Augusta with several ideas on both sides of the issue of regionalization, but the senator acknowledged that only a portion of the state was represented at Thursday night’s discussion.

“We’re not everywhere, we realize, but this was the best we could do,” Damon said.