Milo looks to combine rec department with Brownville’s

MILO — Late last month Milo and Brownville officials held a public hearing on the possibility of merging the two neighboring communities’ recreation departments into a new Penquis Recreation Program. Reasons cited included providing more opportunities for area youth and other residents and to potentially save money.

During the monthly meeting on Nov. 13, the Milo Select Board formally voted to enter into an agreement with Brownville. This town is set to discuss the Penquis Recreation Program and possibly vote at its next select board meeting on Tuesday, Nov. 19.

“We want to combine the Milo and Brownville rec departments and basically what we want to do is hire a full-time director to cover both programs,” Milo Select Chair Paula Copeland said. Copeland said under the arrangement, the director would be a Milo town employee with this community covering insurance and benefits such as a cellphone stipend and mileage reimbursement.

She said both towns would keep ownership of existing properties and equipment.

“The idea behind this is with one full-time director that would be their only focus because right now both towns have part-time rec directors and it’s hard to get the time they need to do a really good job; not saying they are not doing a great job – they are doing a great job right now – it’s just we think we could do better,” Copeland said.

She said there may not be a great cost savings, but programming could benefit under the Penquis Recreation Program.

“The benefit will be more consistency, we will have one person who will be able to spend the time getting grants, getting that sort of stuff and maybe develop more programs,” the chair said.

“The idea is the rec director and rec committee would develop programs based on feedback from parents, coaches,” Town Manager Bob Canney said. 

A recreation committee would oversee the department with three individuals appointed by each select board, potentially for 2-year terms. The rec director would be a seventh member to break ties if need be.

Selectperson Tony Heal said often youth programs are associated with rec departments but programming should be offered for all ages. “This is an opportunity to bring somebody in who has more time on their hands to kind of explore these vacancies” he said, mentioning former programs such as co-ed volleyball and tennis tournaments.

“Their main focus is rebuilding the rec program for everybody in both towns,” Heal said.

“If you just  sit for a moment and think about it, the possibilities are endless because recreation is just a vast defined word,” he said. “We have an area where our backyard, your Seboies, your Schoodic Lake, your KI, I don’t think we have utilized that properly when it comes to recreation.”

Heal mentioned art, music, and drama as other potential rec offerings. 

“It’s daunting when you lay that on the foot of a part-time recreation director,” he said.

Canney said if the Brownville Select Board gives its approval then the position would be posted. He said the plan is to combine rec departments for two years for an in-depth evalution.

To determine Penquis Recreation Program funding both school population and town censuses were looked at. In SAD 41 about 63 percent of students from the two towns are from Milo and 36 percent from Brownville while per the most recent U.S. Census the combined split is 68/32, so a halfway ratio of 65/35 was agreed upon.

Canney said the towns would no longer have their part-time rec director positions, but in Milo Jessica Atkinson — who teaches second grade at Milo Elementary — submitted her resignation, effective at the end of the year.

“We do wish Jess well and we want to thank her for all the years she gave the town, she had some great programs and she was dedicated,” Canney said.

“This was not a reflection on Milo’s or Brownville’s current director,” Copeland said.

In other business, Canney said the following week would be the final meeting with department heads on the public safety building.

“(Plymouth Engineering has) everything ready to go and the next step, once they’re good with it after they meet with us, is it goes to the USDA for approval and then it goes out to bid,” he said. “We should be able to get this out to bid hopefully by the end of this month or early December.”

The town is currently in the planning stages of a new building to house the fire, police, and public works departments. The community can spend up to $6,375,000 in USDA funds for the public safety building, which will be located at the business park and across the road from the Milo Water District office less than a mile up Park Street from the 100-year-old town hall where the fire and police departments are currently located.

Plymouth Engineering had been meeting with town officials and department heads to design each department’s section of the facility, with plans being solidified. The engineering firm estimates the building, groundwork, and engineering costs to total $7,200,758 or $825,758 more than what Milo has available in project funding. To make up the difference, residents approved a line of credit not to exceed $825,758 to cover costs above and beyond the $6,375,000 at a special town meeting 

The construction is expected to be an 18-month build.

The select board appointed Amanda Fernald to the SAD 41 Board of Directors to fill a vacancy through next April. 

At the September school board meeting Board Chair Mary Lynn Kazyaka said she received the resignation of board member Tony Bavelaar, who mentioned the time needed for other commitments in his life as his reason for stepping down.

Bavelaar was one of five Milo representatives to the board. He was elected to a 3-year term at the 2023 annual town meeting. The select board has the power to appoint to fill a vacancy.

For the annual town meeting on Monday, March 10 residents will also be voting on two 3-year select board positions and a pair of 3-year positions on the school board. Nomination papers are available on Dec. 2 and are due back by Jan. 9.

Canney said Fire Chief Matt Demers sent him a department report, in which Demers said Greenwood Emergency Vehicles of Brunswick would be coming up the next week to look over the ladder truck and give a quote to get the bucket and controls working again.

“After their discussion last month I asked him to get an updated quote,” Canney said, about ideas for upgrading the department truck fleet. “We owe it to the taxpayers to No. 1 get it back in the building and get it protected and back under cover and secured and get an updated quote. If we’re even going to consider looking for a new ladder truck we at least ought to know what it’s going to cost to get this current one back into service.”

Last month some firefighters traveled to Brindlee Mountain Fire Apparatus in Union Grove, Alabama to look at a Pierce-brant 75-foot quint truck or a ladder/pumper combination. Demers said the original asking price was $350,000 with all of the Milo Fire Department’s punch list items included, but Brindle Mountain Fire Apparatus is willing to sell the truck at $290,000 with the 23-point punch list items, such as snow treads for the tires, changing valves, a paint scheme and lettering, and more.

Another idea is combining the smaller pumper and rescue truck into one unit, and having a separate pickup for EMS calls and hauling a trailer for calls needing the rescue sled. In Alabama there is a 2017 mini pumper for $350,000 and Brindlee Mountain Apparatus would sell both vehicles to Milo for $590,000.

The chief said he would bring forward a cost analysis for the select board to review, including how much money the current vehicles could be sold for and/or traded in.

The department is looking to replace the 42-year-old ladder truck that Greenwood Emergency Vehicles will examine. The vehicle is needed not just for height but if a house sits back off the road as well to fight fires on structures with metal roofs.

Canney also mentioned the closure of the Piscataquis Regional YMCA in Dover-Foxcroft. “I will say the loss of the pool over there affects the BearCats program, that was one of the things that they did a lot,” he said about the after-school program in SAD 41.

The facility closure was discussed during the previous week’s regional town managers meeting. “There is a private group of citizens working to keep this thing going, the pool is probably the last thing that will come back up,” Canney said.

The newly-formed Piscataquis Area Community Center is working to open at the former PRYMCA facility.

At the beginning of October the Old Town Orono YMCA Board of Directors announced that operations at the PRYMCA would be closing by Nov. 1 with financial reasons cited for the facility closure. The PRYMCA has been in operation since 1988.

In July 2022 the board of directors of the Dover-Foxcroft-based organization and the Old Town Orono YMCA formally voted to integrate as one organization. For almost two years prior the Old Town Orono YMCA had been providing leadership to the PRYMCA through a temporary management agreement. In the 2-plus years since then the PRYMCA operated as a branch of the Old Town Orono YMCA.