AUGUSTA – Brewer residents awaiting a decision on the fate of the local water district will have to stay tuned.

During a hearing Tuesday on a bill aimed at dissolving the district, members of the Legislature’s Utilities and Energy Committee asked the two parties to continue to try to come to a negotiated agreement.

At issue is control of the Brewer Water District. The district, established in 1946, serves most of Brewer as well as parts of nearby Orrington, Eddington and Holden. It is governed by a five-member board of trustees appointed by the City Council.

City officials say they want to take over the district because of increasing water rates, fire hydrant rental fees that are among the highest in the state, and the district’s growing debt load. City officials also expressed concerns about the district’s quality of customer service and lack of public accountability.

Water district trustees say they are resisting the move because they do not think the city has demonstrated to their satisfaction that it is financially and technically able to operate the water system. They also expressed discomfort at the speed at which the takeover process is proceeding and at the fact that most trustees learned about the bill through an article in the newspaper.

A bill seeking to dissolve the district, repeal its charter and turn its assets over to the city government was submitted to the Legislature in late January at the city’s request. In February, the district’s board of trustees unanimously voted to oppose the bill. The dispute had become increasingly divisive in recent weeks, with the city and the trustees each retaining legal counsel and lobbyists.

A tentative compromise between the city and trustees struck Friday blew up during a special trustees meeting Monday after trustees opted not to withdraw their opposition to the bill by not seconding a motion to that end.

After listening to testimony from more than a dozen people on both sides of the issue, the committee decided to postpone a work session on the issue scheduled for Thursday in order to give city officials and water district representatives another chance to work out their differences. The session was rescheduled for March 21.

“We really don’t want to be in the middle of a public dispute,” said Rep. William Savage, D-Buxton, House chairman of the committee. He was among the committee members who saw communication problems as one of the dispute’s underlying issues.

Savage was in Brewer on Friday night to attend a work session at which city and district representatives discussed their differences and worked at resolving them.

While city officials who participated say they came away from the session believing a tentative compromise had been struck, Water district Chairman William Hayes told lawmakers that his position on the compromise had been misrepresented in a news article and apparently by fellow trustee Andrew Landry, who also took part in Friday’s session.

Hayes said he was “shocked” to hear Landry “change what we had planned to do” and call for a two-step process that would have involved withdrawing the trustees’ resolution of opposition and replacing it with a resolution of support.

Savage said he’d prefer to see the matter settled without the Legislature’s intervention. He also cautioned that any decision that might result should not be based on the personalities now involved, who are transitory, but rather on what’s best for water consumers in the long term.

Rep. Peter Rines, D-Wiscasset, agreed that the parties involved should try to work out their differences among themselves. “When we solve this problem – and we will solve it – somebody’s not going to be happy [with the outcome],” he cautioned.

In another water district development, city councilors replaced two current trustees during their monthly meeting later that night. Effective April 1, residents Allen Campbell and Gary Briggs, both of whom now serve on the planning board, will succeed trustees James McLellan and Everett Gray, whose terms expire at the end of the month.

After the council meeting, Mayor Michael Celli said the city would be writing a letter to trustees asking that a meeting or meetings be scheduled to continue negotiations. District trustees said during the hearing said that they wanted more dialogue.

According to City Manager Stephen Bost, a former state senator, possible outcomes for the bill include passage as it stands, a referendum requirement, or its being killed.

On Tuesday, legislators also raised the possibility that the district could be overseen by elected rather than appointed trustees.

In the event the Legislature nixes the bill, city officials expect to gain some control over the district by replacing trustees, a process that began Tuesday night. A third position expires next spring.

The council’s proposal to take control of the water district apparently has struck a chord with some residents, who have been complaining about continual rate increases for years. Ratepayers here face a 15 percent hike this summer and a similar one soon after that, according city officials.

Trustees attributed much of the rate hike to work done to comply with drinking water laws and to replace an aging system, parts of which dated back to the late 1800s.