Town attorney to Newport board: Do business

NEWPORT – The town attorney, Edmund Bearor of Bangor, has advised officials that they can legally proceed with business despite a recent court ruling that questions the validity of actions taken by town boards with vacancies.

The Maine supreme court ruled on April 26 that a Kennebunk zoning board erred in a ruling. The court threw out that ruling because, it said, there was an unfilled seat on the zoning board.

In the wake of that ruling, the Maine Municipal Association spokesman, Michael Starn, warned that all elected and appointed boards were affected.

Starn told the Bangor Daily News last week that towns with an existing vacancy should quickly amend their charters or pass an ordinance to allow for official business to be conducted without a full board.

“My biggest concern is the boards of selectmen,” he said. “You could almost live with planning board and zoning board of appeals alternates, but so many small towns have three-person boards of selectmen.”

Newport is one of the many affected towns since there is a vacancy on its Board of Selectmen. It was created when the person elected in March was found to have a conflict and did not accept the position. A new election is scheduled for June 12, but no one has taken out nomination papers to be on the ballot.

Newport has held one Board of Selectmen meeting since the court ruling and has another scheduled for Wednesday night.

Bearor, however, said Tuesday that he does not agree with MMA’s interpretation that the ruling affects elected boards and councils.

“I just don’t read it that broadly,” Bearor said, particularly because statutes dictate how vacancies on elected boards are filled. “There is no way you can get this done in less than 45 or 60 days,” he said.

“My experience in municipal government over the last 20 years indicates that there are people who would get elected just so they could resign,” Bearor said.

“It is very unlike an appointed position, which can be easily and quickly remedied,” he said.

Bearor said the state’s high court ruled on a case that involved an administrative board, not an elected board.

Since MMA’s comments that business cannot be conducted without a full board, Newport Town Manager James Ricker has said he has been inundated with calls.

“They want to know, for example, if our fee schedule is valid. They want to know if we had a full board when the fees were adopted. They are questioning everything,” Ricker said.

Bearor, who represents several communities, including Newport and St. Albans, that have vacancies on their boards of selectmen, said, “If I had a board contemplating a major issue, say, bidding out a $5 million police or fire station, I would ask them to put it off. But for run-of-the-mill business, I can’t imagine stopping local government.”

Bearor said he was not being cavalier and acknowledged there will be some clarifications coming from the Legislature on the issue.

In addition, the town that was recently ruled against, Kennebunk, is reportedly mounting an appeal.