Greenville zone changes to be part of special town meeting

GREENVILLE — A pair of proposed zoning changes have been approved by Greenville officials and are scheduled to go to a town vote next month.

The changes were endorsed 5-0 by the planning board on June 4, Chair John Contreni told the select board.

“We had hoped to put these changes before the (annual) town meeting on Monday,” Contreni said, but the items were not ready in time to be included on the June 2 warrant.

The first zone change was requested by Hammond Lumber, to go from downtown district 2 to village commercial. The second concerns land near the transfer station going from the industrial district to the adjacent village district.

“The purpose of this one is to allow building homes which will help with our deficit of residential homes,” Contreni said.

Code Enforcement Officer Ron Sarol had been approached by some industrial zone landowners interested in building on their properties.

“The current zones would only allow industrial use,” he said. “Moving them to the village district allows for mixed use commercial and residential.”

Hammond Lumber would like to be able to construct a garage on its property. 

“All that material you see in the open, they would like to put that under cover and have trucks come through, load up under cover and then come out,” Contreni said.

Reclassifying part of the property from the downtown 2 to village commercial zone would allow the business to build a structure that’s more than 5,000 square feet while still maintaining open space.

A special town meeting, which would include items on revised bylaws for the Shaw Public Library as well as a proposed amendment to the land use ordinance that would change how far away a structure must be from the property lines in certain sections of town provided specific criteria have been met, is planned for 6 p.m. on Wednesday, July 2, between the regular planning board and select board meetings.

The warrant is set to be signed at the next select meeting on Wednesday, June 18, which would ensure enough time for everything to be posted.

A fourth item will likely be added pertaining to the Northern Forest Center Spruce Street housing project.

The organization is getting close to bidding out the project, Town Manager Mike Roy said. 

“They’re working with a real estate attorney as we speak for the dedication of the road,” he said.

In other business, the Maine Municipal Association has awarded the fire department a $3,000 safety grant to purchase 12 sterling bolt escape belts that enable firefighters to hook onto ladders as an added safety measure.

“Once again our fire chief is successful with grants and that’s just saving taxpayers some money,” Roy said.

Greenville has received several safety grants over the years, Roy said.

A dedication for the refurbished downtown veterans memorial will be on Flag Day at 1 p.m. on Saturday, June 14.

The site looks beautiful, Roy said, saying the walking was done the week prior and the American Legion has placed new name tags on the monument. Lighting will be coming soon.

“Thank you to all those involved,” the town manager said. “There were a lot of donations made and there’s a lot of in kind donations made.”