MILBRIDGE — Townspeople who conduct business at the Milbridge Town Office next month will need to share the main hallway with busy carpenters and plumbers.

The work will result in new restroom facilities for the office staff and visitors.

The Town Office was originally Milbridge High School, which had restrooms in the structure’s windowless basement. The rooms are accessible only by a steep stairway.

On Oct. 16, selectmen Gary H. Willey, Billy J. Phinney and Harold E. West decided to have new restrooms built on the first floor. The rooms would be accessible to staff, visitors and handicapped persons. The rooms would conform to the state law requiring municipal buildings to be accessible to handicapped persons.

Attorney Earle S. Tyler Jr., who maintains an office in the southwest corner of the building’s first floor, will give up part of his office to accommodate the restroom project.

While discussing new arrangements in the building, Tyler recommended how his loss of office space might be compensated by the selectmen. He told the board that they should consider utilizing the floor area that constitutes the present waiting room and the present secretaries’ office.

He requested that a door be placed in the corridor just west of the assessor’s office door and that certain improvements be made in the building’s southwest corner so that he could use that area as a combination attorney’s waiting room and storage area. Tyler also said he and the secretaries would switch offices. He said the town should make the walls soundproof.

Tyler asked the selectmen to give him assurances that he would be able to rent his part of the building. The selectmen responded that the issue could be decided only at a town meeting.

Fred Haskell, a plumber from Milbridge, offered the selectmen a proposal for installing a plumbing system for the new restrooms. The selectmen awarded Haskell the plumbing job without sending the job out to public bid, because the town has no other licensed plumber and because the price in his bid proposal was acceptable to each of the three selectmen.

At 7 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 30, selectmen will discuss the option of using a local bid procedure for any other part of the restroom project.

The selectmen decided to pay $7,122 to County Concrete of Columbia for 250 tons of hot-top asphalt. The asphalt cost $28.49 a ton.

A bid by Shurtleff Co. for the delivery of winter road salt was approved by the selectmen, who ordered 60 tons at the rate of $35.52 a ton. The total cost was 2,131.

Patti Betters was hired to re-start and administer the town’s recreation program. She will be paid at an hourly rate of $6 for a total of 125 hours. Selectmen stipulated in the work agreement that the director submit regular reports to the board concerning any program changes or progress. Her contract will expire on Dec. 31, 1991. The Milbridge Recreation Committee recommended Betters for the job of directing the recreation program.