CARTHAGE – A public hearing on this small town’s first Comprehensive Plan is scheduled for 7 p.m. Monday, Feb. 23, at the Town Office.

Everything changes over time and the small western Maine town of Carthage is no different, said Selectman Brenda Flagg who’s also a member of the Comprehensive Plan Committee.

And for that reason, a plan that will provide guidelines for future growth is important.

“As a business owner, I have to have a plan every year so I can plan for the future. It’s good business practice for the town to have a plan,” she said.

“Towns or businesses or people have ideas and plans and dreams. Putting them on paper increases the chances that they will be completed,” she added.

For nearly three years, a group of residents representing all segments of the community has been meeting to learn what they like and don’t like about their town, and what they’d like to see in the future. Fergus Lea from the Androscoggin Valley Council of Governments helped lead the group through the development of the plan.

Townspeople raised $4,455 at the 2000 annual town meeting for the project. That money was matched by $13,500 from the state Planning Department for the development of the 26-page document.

The proposed plan, dotted with photos and maps of the town, is available to residents from the Town Office this week, as well as at the public hearing on Monday.

Residents will decide whether to adopt the document at the annual town meeting next month. That date has not yet been set.

Lea is expected to provide an overview of the plan, followed by an opportunity to ask questions, clarify statements and dispel any misconceptions that residents may have about the plan, said Flagg.

“This is the first step in looking at the future of Carthage. Carthage is changing. I know the town needs a codes enforcement officer and a Planning Board, but this comes first,” she said.

The 2004 town meeting warrant won’t include funding for any of these officials. But Flagg said a future town meeting may be asked to fund them if residents adopt the Comprehensive Plan.

Among the plan’s recommendations, besides appointing a CEO and Planning Board, are:

• Allowing in-home businesses in all areas of the town.

• Encouraging natural resource and recreation/tourism-related businesses that are compatible with the town’s character.

• Establishing a periodic newsletter informing all landowners of ordinances and procedures for compliance.

• Maintenance by the town of town-owned land on Saddleback Mountain as a wilderness area.

• Annual written correspondence by selectmen to each commercial woodland owner to ensure that uses and development is done in a way that preserves natural resources.

• Encouragement of private landowners to keep their land open for public use.

[email protected]