05/29/2026
Good afternoon Sangerville, for those of you who live and travel on our gravel roads, if the road grader has not made it to your road yet, he will in the next few days. One of the topics we debated at road committee meeting this past Wednesday was the application of calcium chloride to our roads for dust and erosion control. As you are probably aware, application of calcium chloride is expensive, it will likely cost between ten and fifteen thousand dollars to apply to our roads this summer. We are going to take a wait and see approach to the summer. If we have another very dry summer, we will likely put down some calcium mid-summer. If dust does not seem to be a large problem, we will wait until next year after grading to do the next application. So, if dust becomes a problem on your road, please let me know.
Also, at road committee we discussed the Flanders Hill Rd. and the Silvers Mills Rd. I have sent a request for bids out today to replace three culverts on the Flanders Hill Rd. and do some ditching near the Cleaves Farm in preparation for paving later this summer. Bid packages are available at the town office. Those bids are due to be opened by the select board at the June 17th meeting, so if you have concerns or interest in this project, please attend that meeting, so if desired, you may be heard. The Silvers Mills Rd. will probably need to be repaved at least in part next year, this year we need to repair some culverts, do some ditching, as well as add some gravel to parts of the road. I realize we have some potholes that need to be dealt with and we will get some cold patch on those and our other roads, probably next week.
We addressed an overdue problem this week, our catch basins on Maple St., School St. and Church St. had not been cleaned in many years and we contracted with TGP Enterprises to do that for us this week.
The select board met Wednesday evening, a meeting postponed from the week before. Paving bids for the Flanders Hill Rd. were opened at that meeting. The bid was awarded to Pike Industries. The select board and road committee felt Pike had the most complete bid as to what was asked and they provided the lowest price. The plan is to pave the gravel section of that road with two inches of binder pavement and shim or place a partial base coat of pavement on the as much of the rest of the road as our budget allows this year. Next year we will do a finish coat. Rest assured, the work we do will be a huge improvement this year.
Another big concern discussed was the fire department tanker. This truck is 35 years old, has 400,000 miles on it and it failed inspection this spring for a long list of reasons including brakes, steering, and structural issues. Matt and I decided for safety reasons the truck would be taken out of service. We won't ask our firefighters to operate an unsafe piece of equipment, and we will not put the public at risk by running an unsafe vehicle. We are currently investigating all options for replacing or repairing this truck. A tanker's role is to shuttle water to rural fire scenes, by rural I mean outside the hydrant district, which is just the village area. The two existing pumpers carry 1000 gallons of water each and can control and extinguish most small fires such as vehicle fires, small grass fires and single room structure fires. Beyond that water needs to be trucked to a scene using tankers. In rural areas such as ours, with mutual aid agreements, every local department has at least one tanker and several tankers will respond to a neighboring town to fight large fires. Without our own tanker, these towns will still help us but there is a delay when using mutual aid and if we cannot return the help as our mutual aid obligation our neighbors will need to bill us when we call them for help. Loss of a tanker may also negatively impact homeowner's insurance rates if we don't fix the problem in a timely manner. So, we need to develop a plan to fix this situation.
We reviewed the town dog ordinance, particularly as it pertains to Veterans Memorial Park. The ordinance was passed in 1988 and prohibits dogs in the park. The select board felt it made sense to continue with the ordinance as is. The problem is created by dog owners not being responsible about picking up their dog's waste. If citizens feel strongly that leashed dogs should be allowed in the park, please let us know. The ordinance can be revised but it must be done by a vote of the people at a town meeting. If there is strong support to change the ordinance, we will create a warrant article for the next town meeting to change the ordinance.
The select board accepted a generous donation of $1,000.00 by Maine Highland Federal Credit Union for new playground equipment at Veteran's Memorial Park. Thank you, Maine Highlands. The park also has a new sign which will be installed soon. I would like to say thank you to all the volunteers of the Sangerville Veterans Memorial Park committee for all their hard work.
The Town of Sangerville, the Sangerville Historical Society and the Sangerville Town Hall committee will be undertaking a fundraising campaign to raise money to continue to renovate the town hall. We are looking for help with this project. Our goal is to raise $125,000.00 to meet the maximum match for a potential $500,000.00 grant we will be applying for this fall. If we reach our goal, are successful with grant applications and add our capital reserve fund money we will be approaching a million dollars, which can do a large part of the renovation work needed. All ideas and help are welcome.
Have a great weekend everyone.
Brian
