Planning Board Meeting ~ October 1, 2025

2025-10-01 · Planning Board · 2:41:23 · watch on YouTube →

Planning Board meeting of October 1, 2025, with all five members present. The board declined to open the public hearing on a proposed bulky waste business on Map 4 Lot 97 because the applicant had not produced the site plan asked for at the previous meeting, and voted 4-1 to require the materials by October 8 and reconvene on October 15. It approved a road maintenance agreement for Cedar Drive, then spent most of the evening working through the draft land use ordinance amendments that will go to town meeting as two warrant articles, one carrying 139 codification changes and one carrying the policy and administrative changes. The fire chief attended and the board agreed to drop underground cisterns as a fire protection option and to allow residential sprinklers alone in place of a fire pond, and to set both private ways and multiple back lot roads at 20 feet while allowing a 16 foot driveway to a single back lot subject to his approval. The board set out a schedule of public information meetings for late October and November so the package can reach the select board by its second December meeting.

What was discussed

1. 0:23
   Opening

   John Talbot opened the October 1 meeting with all five members present and led the pledge of allegiance. The recording then carries no speech for roughly 25 minutes before the board takes up the minutes.

2. 25:28
   Minutes of September 3

   A member noted the draft minutes recorded a vote under item seven as 4-0-1 when only four members were present, and the minutes were accepted as amended to 4-0.

3. 25:28
   Town planner's report on economic development grants

   George Thebarge reported that GPCOG has applied for two grants: one to look townwide at alternative energy connections and opportunities, and a larger one to study an area identified as a potential agricultural and energy economic development district. If they come through there will be resources to run an economic development committee, which Brian Lanoie (?) has been pressing for; the fallbacks are up to $10,000 of GPCOG staff time or money in the June budget cycle. The area is in South Durham, east of Hallowell Road and south of the power line along Brown Road, and came out of the review done for the clean energy battery storage proposal; the select board supports focusing there first and the work will feed the comprehensive plan update.

4. 30:33
   Bulky waste business, Map 4 Lot 97

   Matthew Morehouse, owner of Bulky Waste Pickup and a resident of 1026 Hollow Road, appeared on his application for a business at number 20 on a road the recording renders as Soer Road. The board had asked him at the previous meeting for three things: proof that abutters were notified, a site plan, and proof he had authority over the property. He produced certified mail receipts and the deed but not a site plan, having understood the photograph in his application was enough.

5. 35:35
   What the board wants on the site plan

   The board said it is not looking for a formal construction drawing but an accurate plan showing where dumpsters will be kept, where vehicles will park, what storage there will be and which buildings will be used. Juliet Caplinger asked that the resource protection line be shown on the plan and any proposed buffering. Members told the applicant the town planner is there to help and that this is asked of every applicant.

6. 40:43
   Rescheduling and the 60-day clock

   George Thebarge confirmed the 60-day clock in which the board must approve or deny, failing which the application is automatically approved, does not begin until the application is determined complete, so the clock had not started. Rather than make the applicant and the members of the public present wait until the November meeting, the board decided to take the materials by October 8 and hold the public hearing on October 15. Members noted the ordinance has no requirement about how far in advance materials must arrive, and that the emails of public questions already received are online and will be dealt with at the hearing.

7. 45:56
   Vote on the bulky waste schedule

   The motion was that the applicant provide all the information by October 8 with the public hearing on October 15, and that if the material does not arrive by the 8th the hearing moves to the next regular meeting. One member voted against on the ground that the applicant had already had plenty of opportunity.

8. 45:56
   Maintenance agreement for Cedar Drive, Map 7 Lot 6

   Heather Roy of 77 Hollow Road (?) presented the maintenance agreement, noting the road plan had already been worked through with the road commissioner, code enforcement officer, town planner and surveyor and that only the maintenance agreement was before the board. George Thebarge went through the ordinance checklist (statement of ownership interest, subsequent lots being parties, acknowledgement that the town has no maintenance responsibility, transfer of responsibilities with planning board notification, deeds referencing the agreement, authority to place liens for non-payment, recording, and no building permits until recorded) and said the requirements were met.

9. 51:14
   How the ordinance amendments will be presented

   George Thebarge explained there will be two warrant articles: one carrying the codification, and one carrying the policy and administrative changes, with the codification included in the public information process even though it is a separate article. He proposed two public information meetings, the first on the half dozen policy issues, which he expects to be what people want to talk about, and the second on the more mechanical administrative updates after any changes prompted by public input.

10. 56:23
    Questions on the codification items

    Juliet Caplinger asked about item 17, the floodway definition, and was told the term is being removed because it appears in the definitions but is not used, with the flood plain management article having been updated to match the state model required for the National Flood Insurance Program. She also asked about item 54, which assigns groundwater extraction review to the planning board, and pressed on what the town actually does with such reviews, raising cases where a subdivision is proposed next to properties whose wells are running dry. George Thebarge said it is dealt with project by project through conditional use and subdivision review, as at the Day Road and Bowie Hill subdivisions where a hydrologist looked at infiltration, rainfall and neighbouring wells, and members agreed the groundwater regulations should be looked at as a separate exercise.

11. 1:07:08
    Back lots and private ways

    George Thebarge explained that the present system, where the code officer and road commissioner review the road and the planning board only sees the maintenance agreement, is confusing enough that different code officers have approved two acre lots and five acre lots on the same kind of road. The proposal separates single back lot access, which stays at five acres approved by the code officer but allows a 16 foot driveway instead of a 20 foot road subject to the fire chief's sign-off before a building permit, from private ways, which move into the roads article with the road plan, maintenance agreement and review process in one place.

12. 1:12:35
    Two acres or five for multiple back lots

    Members debated whether multiple back lots should stay at five acres, which a legal opinion says the current confusing language requires, or return to two. Several argued five acres pushes the road further and drives up costs for families dividing land, and that if the word five is removed and the ordinance clearly says two, the legal opinion falls away. The board leaned toward two acres while acknowledging that a wider change would be a major rather than a minor policy shift.

13. 1:12:35
    Fire chief on driveway and road widths

    The fire chief said 16 feet is already a compromise: in a Maine winter a 16 foot way is effectively 12 with snowbanks, his pumper and ladder trucks are 8 feet wide, and the jack spread of the ladder truck is 16 feet. He said 16 is workable for a driveway serving a single house but that for multiple houses 20 is better, because vehicles need to pass while others are exiting. The board settled on 20 feet with two foot shoulders for private ways and multiple back lots, and 16 feet for a single back lot driveway with the fire chief's approval limited to whether his equipment can get in.

14. 1:22:53
    Fire protection water supply

    Current standards give a developer three options: an underground cistern, typically 30,000 gallons; a fire pond of 120,000 gallons or more with freeboard; or a reduced volume with fire chief approval of sprinklers. The fire chief asked that cisterns be dropped because performance has been poor, with leakage and frost cracking, and because filling 30,000 gallons initially and refilling after a fire is a challenge. He also said he would be content with residential sprinklers alone rather than sprinklers plus a reduced pond, noting sprinklers keep most fires in check with around 90 percent extinguished by a single head, and the board agreed to change the requirement from and to or.

15. 1:33:08
    Whether allowing sprinklers alone ends fire ponds

    George Thebarge warned that if sprinklers alone are allowed, essentially no new fire ponds will be built, because a developer avoids a cost of around $150,000 while the sprinkler cost of $10,000 to $15,000 a house falls on the builder. He noted ponds built in one development, such as at Deer Creek, protect the surrounding area. John Talbot disagreed, arguing builders will still fit sprinklers because they cannot otherwise sell the lots, and that requiring a pond asks a new developer to cover for the sins of his predecessors. The fire chief said his position is about protection rather than economics and that a sprinklered house is well protected.

16. 1:38:28
    Existing dry hydrants and who maintains them

    The fire chief said the department has roughly 25 dry hydrants across the town's 39 square miles and tries to check each one every year. He gave examples of failures: the Brianna Drive pond dries up in August because it was built on bedrock and not deep enough, the Swamp Road intake was buried under feet of sand after recent heavy storms, and the Eagle Point Road hydrant is cracked and out of service with no recognised homeowners association to pursue. Members discussed enforcement against HOAs and noted the town used to dredge one or two ponds a year at town cost.

17. 1:43:36
    Water storage figures and campgrounds

    Members read the language: underground tanks require a minimum of 10,000 gallons for a subdivision plus 2,000 gallons per lot, while fire ponds must have 120,000 gallons or more with no per-lot addition, so a thirteen lot subdivision could in principle have the same volume as a four lot one. At Deer Creek a hydrologist's calculation at the developer's cost set a minimum of around 130,000 gallons; through this year's drought the freeboard dropped two or three feet but the pond still held about 100,000 gallons. On campgrounds, the proposal is to stop duplicating the state's engineering review with a town site plan review that has no standards to apply, and to correct the camping season end date from September 15 to October 15, with no year round camping.

18. 1:54:33
    Subdivision road buffers and noise standards

    On buffers, the ordinance requires 50 feet between a subdivision and the existing road but nothing between a new subdivision road and neighbours; the board asked for discretionary rather than automatic authority. On noise, the current standard is residential across the board in a town with a good deal of light manufacturing and agriculture, so the draft sets three classes, adjusts the daytime and nighttime hours and sound pressure limits, specifies the measurement method including that no rain may be falling, sets 75 dB for impulsive or intermittent noise on the town attorney's suggestion, moves the start of construction noise from 6:30 to 7am, and requires a qualified acoustical study at the applicant's expense where noise is identified as an issue.

19. 2:00:08
    Disagreement over the fireworks exemption

    John Talbot said he did not want the special event exemption used as a lever against a neighbour's Fourth of July fireworks, which draws people parking for a mile along Stackpole Road, and that residents come to the select board every year asking for fireworks to be banned. George Thebarge said the clause does not create a permit requirement, it only says you are exempt from the noise rules if you hold a permit. Allan Purinton pointed out the state has its own fireworks law, and a member found that Maine requires a permit from the Commissioner of Public Safety for fireworks displays. The board left the point for public comment rather than amending it.

20. 2:10:31
    Decibel limits

    The residential limit rises from 55 dB to 60, with higher limits for agricultural and commercial uses and 75 dB for intermittent noise. Members recalled the change came partly from a proposed development that said it could not meet the existing levels, and noted 55 dB is low enough that a leaf blower exceeds it. Members were satisfied because a commercial use in a residential area still goes through conditional use review, where the board can refuse it or require mitigation.

21. 2:15:43
    State-mandated housing changes

    Four related items, all driven by LD 2003 and LD 1829, bring the town into compliance with state law and cannot be changed by the town: tiny homes must be allowed as an individual house and as a standalone accessory dwelling unit; accessory apartments may be standalone rather than only within a barn or above a garage; the town's requirement that a mobile home on an individual lot be at least 14 feet wide with a 3:12 pitch roof cannot stand; and for mobile home parks the 20 acre minimum and the requirement of an acre and 200 feet of frontage per site are replaced by 20,000 square feet and 100 feet on septic, with no cap on park size, no subdivision road requirement and no requirement for underground utilities. The board agreed to present them as one package while explaining they are state requirements.

22. 2:15:43
    Administrative changes

    Juliet Caplinger raised three: that moving zoning district boundary determinations from the board of appeals to the planning board will draw attention and the board should work out what reviewing a boundary actually involves; that submission deadlines are moving from two weeks to three weeks ahead of a meeting and from 10 copies to 5; and that proof of payment of taxes is being put on the applicant rather than the town. On deadlines the board agreed to add a separate resubmission deadline of two weeks, so the planner has time to prepare and circulate material.

23. 2:21:04
    Scheduling the public information meetings

    The board wants at least two and possibly three public information meetings before the holidays, and agreed October 15 cannot be used because the bulky waste hearing will take an hour or more. The first ordinance meeting will be October 22 or October 29, depending on which date the town manager needs the room for a regional meeting of the non-Portland-area towns, with the second on November 12. George Thebarge will set up the web page and try to get notice into Friday's news blast, and aims to get the package to the select board by its second December meeting so it can be processed in January, with a draft codified ordinance back to the board in late January or early February before the formal public hearings.

24. 2:31:45
    How the two warrant articles will work, and adjournment

    The first article puts all the policy and administrative changes into the existing ordinance; the second then codifies that amended ordinance into the new format, so residents can follow the changes in the document they know before the format changes. Members said the presentation will summarise the 139 codification items with examples rather than read them out, with everything available on the website, and agreed the strongest argument for keeping major policy changes out of this round is how much there already is to explain. The board adjourned.

What was decided

• 25:28
  Accept the September 3, 2025 minutes as amended, correcting a recorded vote from 4-0-1 to 4-0passed
• 45:56
  Require the bulky waste applicant to provide all outstanding information, including a site plan, by October 8, and reconvene the public hearing on October 15; the chair called the vote 4-1passed
• 51:14
  Approve the road maintenance agreement for Cedar Drive, Map 7 Lot 6passed
• 1:12:35
  Agreed, without a formal vote, to set private ways and multiple back lot roads at 20 feet with two foot shoulders and to allow a 16 foot driveway to a single back lot subject to the fire chief's approval, and to lean toward two acres rather than five for multiple back lots when the draft goes out for commentpassed
• 1:22:53
  Agreed, without a formal vote, to remove underground cisterns as a fire protection water supply option at the fire chief's request, and to change the standard so a fire pond, a dry hydrant on an existing pond or stream, or residential sprinklers alone will each satisfy itpassed
• 2:15:43
  Agreed to present the state-mandated changes on tiny homes, accessory apartments, mobile homes on individual lots and mobile home parks as a single package, explaining that the town cannot alter thempassed
• 2:15:43
  Agreed on submission deadlines of three weeks before a meeting for new submissions and two weeks for resubmissionspassed
• 2:21:04
  Agreed to hold the first public information meeting on the ordinance on October 22 or October 29, whichever the town manager does not need the room for, with a second on November 12passed
• 2:31:45
  Adjourn the meetingpassed

An outcome reads "unclear" where the recording does not state it plainly. The recogniser drops short words, and "the motion does not carry" is one missing word from its opposite.

Worth knowing

• 25:28
  GPCOG has applied for two grants on the town's behalf, one for a townwide look at alternative energy and a larger one to study a proposed agricultural and energy economic development district in South Durham, east of Hallowell Road and south of the power line along Brown Road. The amounts are given inconsistently on the recording, as $20,000 plus $70,000, then $20,000 plus $75,000, with the combined total stated as both $95,000 and $100,000.
• 40:43
  The board refused to open the public hearing on the bulky waste business because the applicant had not produced a site plan asked for at the previous meeting, and set a deadline of October 8 with the hearing on October 15. One member voted against, saying the applicant had already had plenty of opportunity. The 60-day clock in which the board must decide, failing which an application is automatically approved, does not start until the application is found complete.
• 1:22:53
  The fire chief asked that underground cisterns be dropped as a fire protection option because of leaks, frost cracking and the difficulty of filling and refilling 30,000 gallons, and said residential sprinklers alone would satisfy him. The town planner warned this means essentially no new fire ponds will be built, since a pond costs the developer around $150,000 while sprinklers cost the builder $10,000 to $15,000 a house, and ponds built in one development protect the surrounding area.
• 1:38:28
  The fire department has roughly 25 dry hydrants across the town's 39 square miles and several are failing. The Brianna Drive pond dries up in August because it was built on bedrock and not deep enough, the Swamp Road intake was buried under feet of sand after recent heavy storms, and the Eagle Point Road hydrant is cracked and out of service with no recognised homeowners association to hold responsible.

Motion language found in the transcript

Located by pattern matching, with no model involved: "I move that", "I'll second", "all those in favour". This is an independent check on the summary above: 4 passages of motion language, against 9 decisions summarised.

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