JAY – Selectmen opted Monday to educate residents on putting out their trash rather than change the town’s solid waste ordinance. The board said it would monitor the situation.
A resident complained last month that trash is being put out too early and is getting torn apart by animals. Trash was also piled on the sidewalk, blocking it so people had to walk in the road.
Town Manager Ruth Marden said a majority of the towns she surveyed don’t regulate times when garbage has to be put out. But seven towns did regulate it, with one allowing trash to be put out the day of pickup between 5 a.m. and 5 p.m. and another allowing trash to be put out after 4 p.m. the day before pickup.
Regulations are all over the place, she said, with no consistency.
Selectman Rick Simoneau said residents need to be educated about what is happening with trash. If they’re going to put trash out early, it needs to be in a container to prevent animals from getting into it and ripping it open.
The town plans to put a full-page ad in a weekly paper. Marden plans to send out a letter to inform residents of the concerns and ask them not to block sidewalks with trash.
In other business, selectmen Chairman Bill Harlow updated fellow selectmen on Thursday’s meeting of the Building Committee.
The 14 members want to build a new town office and police station within the next warrant year, he said.
They also want to stay with the original plan for a one-story, 10,670-square-foot building that was estimated to cost $1.1 million to $1.2 million a couple of years ago.
Harlow said architect and committee member Craig Boone recommended that 20 percent be added to the original estimated cost due to the rising costs of building materials.
The town has $642,000 in a reserve account for the building and the last time Town Manager Ruth Marden ran the numbers, Harlow said, the yearly payment to borrow the remainder would cost less than the $100,000 voters raise each year for the building.
Marden said the issue would be back on the agenda in the future when the budget process starts.
Simoneau also updated selectmen on the firetruck committee meeting.
Simoneau said that new Fire Rescue Chief Scott Shink is looking for an already built new truck with the safety features firefighters want for the $312,000 voters have raised.
Residents twice previously rejected buying a new truck that had been estimated to cost about $378,000.
In other business, selectmen rejected Danielle Peart’s request to sponsor her with a donation for a Miss Maine teen pageant due to a policy that requires donations be put before voters.
Peart, 15, and a sophomore at Jay High School, said she had just learned that she was chosen as a contestant for the pageant. She has collected $325 of the $650 needed.
By the time Peart left the meeting, individual selectmen and residents had donated more than $30 to help her.
Anyone interested in donating to Peart may send the donation to 21 Walker Hill Road, Jay, Maine 04239.
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