Orland voters to consider Jet Ski ban on pond

ORLAND – Residents will weigh in on a proposed ban on Jet Ski use on Rocky Pond when they gather for the annual town meeting next week.

Voters will got to the polls from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Monday at the Town Hall. Discussion of the warrant articles, including the Jet Ski issue, will begin at 7 p.m. Tuesday at the Orland Consolidated School.

The Jet Ski proposal came to the town as a request from 24 camp owners around Rocky Pond concerned about the increased activity from personal watercraft on the 153-acre pond located in the eastern corner of the town.

Since the town’s selectmen do not have authority to prohibit personal watercraft from local ponds, the warrant article asks voters if the town should recommend such a ban to the state Legislature.

If local residents approve the measure, the selectmen will forward it to one of the local legislators to be introduced to the Legislature, according to Selectman Wayne Ames.

At that point, it would work its way through the committee process before going to House and Senate, Ames said.

The plan has generated some discussion in town, and could do so again on the floor of town meeting, if proponents are allowed to speak during the meeting.

Many supporters of the measure are summer residents who own camps on the pond, but live out of town. Town meeting procedure requires that residents vote to allow non-residents to speak to the issue.

“It all depends on whether the town meeting decides to let people from another town speak,” Ames said Thursday. “That requires a two-thirds vote. That could be a sticking point.”

The town had developed a municipal budget that showed a slight decrease from last year, Ames said. That budget was based on a preliminary county tax of about $91,000.

The county tax, however, came in about $17,000 more than that figure, according to Ames.

“We were at about 0.9 percent less than last year,” he said. “We should be close to a break-even budget.”

In building that budget, the selectmen flat-funded many special requests and decided not to fund others, he said.

The school budget totals $3,044,145, an overall increase of $24,358. Increases of $34,419 in the high school tuition line of the budget were offset by cuts in the K-8 budget, including the elimination of a classroom teaching and educational technician positions, reductions in other positions and the elimination of the Camp Kieve program.

There are no contested races this year, and, for a while, it appeared that two seats on the school committee would go begging.

Only one candidate, incumbent Millard Clement, took out papers for a three-year term on the committee. A second three-year term and a one-year term drew no candidates.

Two residents, however, have offered themselves as write-in candidates. Edward Hatch is seeking write-in votes for the three-year seat; Kimberly Urango is seeking the one-year seat on the committee.