PHILLIPS – The Comprehensive Plan Committee will host a “Beginning with Habitat” presentation on comprehensive and open space planning at 6:30 p.m. Dec. 16 at the Phillips Middle School.

The presenters are from private and government groups whose focus is the natural landscape. The Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife, Conservation’s Maine Natural Areas program; the State Planning Office; the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service; Maine Audubon Society; Southern Maine Regional Planning Commission; and the Wells National Estuarine Research Reserve joined together in 2001 to help towns plan for open space.

The “Beginning with Habitat” program has been shown in 70 towns to date.

In addition to helping people become aware of threats to open space, the program helps towns in their planning with Geographic Information Systems computer-generated maps and data about the natural resources of each town.

Molly Docherty, director of the Maine Natural Areas Program, one of the program’s sponsors, said, “The goal here is to balance growth with the protection of natural resources for wildlife, recreation, sustainable forestry, and agriculture.”

Residents are invited to view these maps of Phillips, to ask questions and to bring pencils for adding their knowledge of the area to the maps.

For more information about “Beginning with Habitat” or the Phillips Comprehensive Plan Committee, people can call Shelby Rousseau at 639-4314 or 864-7311, extension 4.

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