BETHEL – Two longtime Planning Board members, Dennis Doyon and Suzi Harrington, were honored at the end of Wednesday night’s meeting.

Their three-year terms expire Dec. 31, and neither opted to seek reappointment. Doyon has been a member 13 years and Harrington 10 years.

Town Manager Scott Cole presented both with certificates of appreciation “in recognition for your outstanding contribution to the Bethel Planning Board.”

Cole said the tenures of both planners, marked by participation in scores of meetings and hundreds of volunteer hours, “has made Bethel a better place in which to live.”

“The very nature of planning guarantees that the significance and value of your endeavor only increases with the passage of time,” he added.

Board Chairman Al Cressy said the duo have been “the bulwarks of our board.”

He also noted that the board could not replace their experience.

“With you, we’ve had a solid board and we’re going to miss you, really,” he added.

In other business, planners tabled work on a new site plan application for Keith Durgin’s proposed Bear River Sand and Gravel – Woodwaste Processing, Composting and Rock Crushing project.

Darryl Brown of Main-Land Development Consulting Inc. in Livermore Falls, spoke on behalf of Durgin, explaining the project’s application in detailed summations.

Located on the Paris Road near the Greenwood/Bethel town line, Brown said the project is the site of a gravel pit that Durgin wants to expand to 35 acres. He has already applied to the Maine Department of Environmental Protection to enlarge the site.

Brown said Durgin purchased the property in 1999 and intends to have a 3-acre wood processing and composting area to handle wood waste like stumps and branches not pressurized lumber.

Essentially, the project will be recycling wood into wood chips and mining gravel and loam in the glacial outwash site, and operating a small rock crushing operation.

Brown said Durgin had notified abutters of the project, none of whom were present Wednesday night.

When asked about the mining operation, Durgin said he intends to follow the gravel and loam that runs through an esker on the property, whether it be in a north or south direction.

Planners raised concerns about the buried gas pipeline which runs parallel to Paris Road, noise from the planned year-round operation, and protection of the aquifer under the site from hazardous waste materials.

By a 7-0 vote, they found the application complete, then voted 6-1 in favor of conducting a site walk at 3 p.m. Jan. 14. A 5-2 vote OK’d a public hearing to be held 15 minutes before the board’s next meeting at 7 p.m. Jan. 14.

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