By Barbara Scott
Staff Writer
The Caribou City Council met on Oct. 24 for a regular meeting, during which a public hearing time had been scheduled to disseminate information pertaining to the Nov. 8 referendum vote on a proposed New Municipal Charter, as developed by the charter commission.
Steve Buck, city manager, retraced through a PowerPoint presentation, the history of the charter commission and the resulting amendments which had been made to the document. “The prior summary is a direct extract from the Charter Commission’s Final Report, pursuant to their authority and presentation,” stated Buck. “The summary assumes reasonable prior knowledge of the current Charter and the public is encouraged between now and Nov. 8, to either read the entire new charter on the city’s website or obtain a hard copy from the city clerk during normal hours of 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday,” he added.
The Nov. 8 referendum question appearing on the voting ballot will read: “Shall the municipality approve the charter revision recommended by the Charter Commission?”
Representatives of the charter commission, Patricia Collins, chair, and Jon Swanberg were present at the Oct. 24 meeting. Caribou Mayor Kenneth Murchison offered his congratulations to all charter commission members for their excellent process and councilor Chris Bell added he personally would like to congratulate the nine charter commission members for their excellent work.
Jayne Farrin, Caribou city clerk, informed the public as to changes on absentee ballot voting and same-day voter registration (these changes appeared in an article last week’s edition).
In other business the council considered reviews of a Draft Telecommunications Moratorium and a proposed RC-2 Tax Increment Financing District both pending for public hearing on Nov. 14.
Tax Increment Financing (TIF) is a funding mechanism that takes advantage of the increase in assessed valuation resulting from new private development to pay for improvements necessary to accommodate that development. As the assessed value of a parcel of land within the TIF District increases as a result of new private investment, the resulting new property Tax revenues are dedicated to retire the debt incurred for the provision of those public or private improvements. The proposed RC-2Tax Increment Financing District is also pending a Nov. 14 public hearing.
The councilors authorized a letter of support for Pines Health Services’ application for capital development building capacity funds and approved license and permits for a Texas Hold’em game of chance on Nov. 8 and Senior Citizens Bingo, both taking place at the American Legion Post 15,
The next meeting of the Caribou City Council will be held on Monday, Nov. 14 beginning at 7 p.m.
