Bennett encourages development
PRESQUE ISLE — City Council and department heads gathered Aug. 16 to discuss a variety of topics, including a pavement maintenance system, property maintenance enforcement and options for keeping the mil rate down.
First up was Gerry James, Presque Isle Public Works director, who provided an update on the status of the city’s road pavement system, introducing the Road Surface Maintenance System (RSMS) — a tool that enables municipalities to assess road maintenance needs.
Staff photo/Kathy McCarty
PRESQUE ISLE PUBLIC WORKS employees worked recently to replace a damaged catch basin at the corner of Church and Main streets. City officials are looking at ways to address needed improvements to the community’s aging infrastructure, including road improvements and drainage systems.
According to James, RSMS is a software program developed through research by the transportation and highway departments nationwide. The RSMS can recommend repair strategies, cost estimates (within 5 percent) and provide a basis for long-term funding needs — taking the “guesswork” out of maintaining roads.
“The RSMS program is free from the Maine Local Road Center but we have to pay to have someone go out and survey roads — which was initially done in 1997, then done annually thereafter,” said James.
In Presque Isle, James serves as the program manager, with the city manager and councilors serving as financial controllers.
“There must be cooperation and trust between these groups,” said James. “Everyone benefits, from management and staff, financial decision-makers to citizens. This replaces ‘gut feel’ when it comes to repair work.”
James explained the importance of maintaining roadways, citing the lower costs involved with minor repairs compared to the expense of fixing larger problems if work is postponed. Given the aging infrastructure and the recent repair needed to fix a collapsed catch basin, James told councilors repairs wouldn’t be cheap.
“A total of $2.2 million would be needed for road repairs to fix everything today that is needing it. If we can break that up into five to 10 years — that’s your decision what we can afford,” James told the Council.
In addition, numerous catch basins need to be replaced throughout the city, as well as sidewalks and other maintenance, bringing the total cost up to just over $24 million, if everything were done today.
City Manager Jim Bennett said it may make sense to see if a few other communities would be willing to go in on purchasing and sharing equipment.
“Let’s think of this as part of the budget process,” said Bennett.
Councilors agreed to begin looking for ways to address the need for maintenance and how to come up with the funds to do the work.
“Presque Isle is one of the few communities that’s in better shape than it was 10 years ago. The credit goes to those who made tough decisions and to Gerry James. It’s a ticking time bomb out there, especially with hills, drainage systems, etc. People won’t be content to drive over bumpy roads,” said Bennett. “All in all, not a bad report but certainly some challenges.”
Next, Ken Arndt, the city’s planning and development director, gave an update on the current status of code enforcement complaints and outlined changes that had taken place within the last year. Arndt gave an overview of what the code enforcement officer’s job entails and what is being done to give the CEO more authority.
“Violations apply to every sort of property, residential or business. This is standard procedure we follow, given in writing, including a description of the property, what the violation is and give a correction order with time to make repairs,” said Arndt, noting that people who routinely violate the process utilize all options available to create delays.
Violations include: weeds in excess of 10 inches in height, rubbish or garbage, and dangerous buildings.
“Some are very time-consuming and expensive,” he said.
Currently, code violations must be presented to City Council, which delays resolution.
“Two changes — one Council is aware of — before the code department was able to address, they had to go before Council. That took the authority away from the CEO. We’ve changed that. Based on the status of complaints, there’s better reaction time than in the past,” said Bennett.
Bennett said the other change involved dangerous buildings.
“There are two ways to declare — go to court or for Council to determine. The owner could take (the matter) to court to ask for a stay; the burden then falls on the owner to prove,” said Bennett, adding before it took years for a case to make it through the court system.
“There’s nothing more frustrating for Jerry (McAvaddy, code enforcement officer) and George (Howe, deputy code enforcement officer) than to be tied up in court,” Bennett said, explaining to Council that he’d walk them through the process when the next dangerous building issue came up.
“We’re trying, there’re just a lot of uphill battles,” said McAvaddy.
“One individual has made a history and mockery of trying to avoid us. We don’t think it’s a nice way to treat other citizens and your neighbors. We hope they change their attitude but if they don’t, we’ll do what’s necessary to address (the issue),” said Bennett.
Bennett provided the last presentation, discussing municipal budgeting, showing several examples of ways to keep the mil rate down. His presentation gave a better understanding of how certain factors impact Presque Isle’s future tax rate.
Bennett explained how the mil rate would be affected over a five-year span, using two different models. One model showed how reducing city staff by 10 percent each year, beginning in 2011 and ending in 2015, would affect the city’s tax rate. Beginning in 2011 with a tax commitment of $11,962,672 and ending in 2015 with a commitment of $11,644,274, the mil rate dropped slightly, from $22.57 per $1,000 in valuation to $21.27 — not a significant decrease, according to the city manager.
“Dropping from 120 (employees) to 72 employees over five years reduces expenditures but only drops the tax rate by about $2. That’s not significant,” Bennett told councilors. “The point I’m trying to make is I’m capturing health costs.”
Bennett said as a council and community, there needs to be a strategy.
“It’s easy to say, ‘don’t spend.’ What we’re trying to do is say, ‘what’s our strategy going to be,’” Bennett said.
The city manager then used a second scenario over the same five-year period involving increases economic development rather than a reduction in staff. Using a 5 percent increase in growth in value, driven by economic development, the community’s tax commitment increased from $12,534,132 in 2011 to $14,257,531, but the tax rate dropped from $22.55 to $21.10 per $1,000 in valuation.
“Ironically, this does better than the employee cut scenario,” said Bennett, noting southern Maine has historically far outpaced northern Maine in growth increases.
“The point is being more aggressive about economic development and making use of the entire team, from code enforcement to the police department to planning and development. Development relates to everything,” said Bennett. “We have a couple choices how to get there. If I were an employee, I think I’d prefer the economic development strategy to cutting jobs.”
Councilor Mel Hovey said there’s been all kinds of emphasis on economic development.
“It’s tough,” said Hovey.
Bennett said it wouldn’t be easy but was doable.
“We have the advantage as a community that we’ve trained people to drive many miles for our goods and services. We have that accomplished. What we need to have is more people realizing this is a good place. We want to be the center of where people want to go to do things — a place to live and work. But for that to happen we need to create jobs,” said Bennett.
Hovey asked if it was Bennett’s intent to replace the past five-year forecast for the city.
“No, this is just an instrument designed to go through what-if scenarios. Telling employees they’d have to buy all their own supplies including gas wouldn’t even save a mil. Given a limited amount of time and manpower, this is designed to help focus on the best method to move forward,” said Bennett.
Bennett closed by explaining that mil rates are deceptive.
“Lewiston’s mil rate was 26, with average taxes around $2,800 a year. Wells was 8 mils, but taxes averaged $8,000. The homes weren’t any better. As a service community, the mil rate will be 30-40 percent higher than surrounding communities,” said Bennett. “We have a high mil rate, but we’re taking a look at things.”
City Hall will be closed Sept. 6 in observance of Labor Day. The next Council session will be held at 6 p.m. on Wednesday, Sept. 8, at City Hall. The public is welcome and encouraged to participate. For more information, contact 764-4485.
