St. Albans to hold special town meeting

ST. ALBANS – Selectmen have set a special town meeting for 7 p.m. Monday, Aug. 20, to deal with unexpected expenditures and changes since the March town meeting.

Town Manager Larry Post said Tuesday that one of the more pleasant articles on the warrant calls for accepting a gift of $50,000 from former Selectman Wolfgang Fasse to purchase land for a new fire station.

A second article would allow for the land for the future station to be purchased from C. John Wilson on Corinna Road.

Post said the town is looking at fire station grants, including homeland security grants and state Community Development Block Grants, but added, “We are not going to be able to build immediately. Getting the land is a first step.”

Another article would take $40,000 from the dam account to be used to repair roads. Post said the original proposal was to take an additional $10,000 from a sand-salt shed account, but that proved problematic.

Post said the article was reviewed by the Maine Municipal Association legal division because there was a perception by some community members that there was not $10,000 in the salt-sand shed. “By eliminating taking that money, we’ve eliminated the controversy,” Post said.

The $40,000 is earmarked for road work on Pond Road, Nye’s Corner Road and Town Landing Road.

Other articles include paying additional First Park dues because of unexpected increases in its budget ($2,707); raising additional funds ($16,667) for the Sebasticook Valley Hospital Ambulance; appropriating additional legal funds to meet a deductible requirement ($8,000); and approving a land swap to help “square off” a resident’s property lines.

The town meeting will be held at the town hall and will be followed by a regular selectmen’s meeting.