AUBURN – A hazard mitigation plan for Androscoggin County communities was presented Wednesday night.

Only five of the 12 towns in the county were represented at the meeting. They were Durham, Livermore, Livermore Falls, Minot and Sabattus. Neither Auburn nor Lewiston was represented.

Carol Fuller of the Androscoggin Valley Council of Governments presented the plan that has been in the development stage for nearly one year to the representatives of five towns at the quarterly meeting of municipal officials and emergency management directors.

The plan identifies major hazards that local communities could face, and it outlines goals and strategies to minimize potential impacts. The major issue addressed is flooding, but other potential disasters including severe weather and earthquakes are addressed. Some strategies include public education, preparedness and education of public works departments, planning boards and other governmental bodies.

A grant from the Federal Emergency Management Agency funded the nearly yearlong development process. The funding for the grant was made possible by the Disaster Mitigation Act of 2000, which requires municipalities to have their own plan in place before they could qualify for mitigation grants. The grants become available after the president of the United States declares a disaster.

Fuller explained the process where a public hearing must be held before adoption of the town’s specific plan. That can be by adoption by a council or board of selectmen or at a town meeting. She advised against holding a public hearing at a town meeting saying that people come to the annual meetings expecting to vote articles either up or down.

Fuller stressed to the towns, “Plan locally. Make changes that may be specific to your towns.”

Suzanne Bussiere, representing Central Maine Power, discussed protocols for power restoration and efforts to coordinate with EMA. “When we are faced with a storm that exceeds 12 hours, sometime during that 12 hours we’ll contact Joanne (Androscoggin County EMA Director Joanne Potvin) and let her know where the outages are and the expected time for restoration,” she said.

“During the Ice Storm of ’98, CMP was inundated with calls,” Potvin said. “After the ice storm we got together and discussed what would benefit everybody. We know that we do have something in place now if something should happen.”

President Bush issued an unprecedented disaster declaration for Androscoggin and nine other Maine counties on May 14 authorizing FEMA to provide assistance for damages sustained from cold winter conditions to public utilities, equipment and buildings owned by state agencies, local governments, school districts, Native American tribes and some nonprofit agencies.

The Ice Storm in 1998 was another declared disaster that affected Maine.

Since 1987, FEMA has disbursed nearly $7 million to Androscoggin County communities and about $25 billion nationwide.