OTISFIELD – Selectmen have again told the Comprehensive Plan Committee members their plan would not be included on the November general election ballot.

Comprehensive Plan Committee Chairman Jim Bishop recently outlined changes requested by the selectmen that the committee made to the plan. They include a land use plan that calls for two zoning designations, critical rural and rural.

Critical rural includes floodplains, wetlands, fragile shoreland areas and Crooked River shoreland. The rest of the town is designated rural. Within the rural area the plan notes some areas requiring special protection for environmental quality and the character of the town.

These areas include slopes in excess of 20 percent, wildlife and waterfowl habitats, scenic vistas, public points of access to water bodies, significant ground water supply areas, lake watersheds, sand and gravel aquifers, stream corridors and other wetlands.

Included in the plan is a statement that the committee was unable to follow the state strategy of a Growth and a Rural area. They outlined a priority list to allow the town to control “the unfettered development that has occurred on individual lots” to protect important natural resources.

In the plan the priority list includes: requiring buffers in housing ordinances, strengthening the code enforcement program and requiring new construction to provide erosion, sediment and phosphorous control.

They also changed wording in the formation of a Town Government Committee.

It had called for elected and paid town personnel to be excluded from the committee and for the committee to be elected. This was changed to exclude elected officials but allows elected officials to act as advisers. The plan now calls for this committee to be appointed.

One portion that remains to be completed is the Capital Improvement Plan.

Bishop plans to meet with Selectman Gerry Robinson to finalize that plan. He asked the selectmen if the Androscoggin Valley Council of Governments could complete the task of putting the revisions into the plan.

The board agreed and Bishop said then it will be sent to the state planning office for review.

“I don’t have to like what you put in the plan, I just want it to be right,” Selectman Lenny Adler said. “I want it to be complete.”

Attention then turned to a letter from the committee to the selectmen outlining a schedule to include the plan on the ballot in November.

“This will only get on the ballot if you change Gerry Robinson’s or my mind and my mind is made up,” Adler said. “I want us to wait for the annual town meeting (in March) so the people can talk about it and discuss it.”


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