LIVERMORE FALLS — Selectmen on Monday approved closing the town office all day Friday, Dec. 23, and reopening Tuesday, Dec. 27.

Christmas is on a Sunday this year and the official holiday will be recognized Monday, Dec. 26.

Town Manager Kristal Flagg said town office employees would like to have the Friday before Christmas off and use compensation time or a vacation day.

The town office has been short-handed since the end of October with Deputy Town Clerk/sewer clerk Amanda Leclerc out sick, Flagg said. It doesn’t look like she will return until January, she said.

The other employees have been putting in a lot of extra time to get the work done, Flagg said.

She discussed compensation for the board for the extra work two employees, Tax Collector Dawn Young and Town Clerk/Treasurer Sue Sapiel have picked up.

Their workload has increased quite a bit, Flagg said.

Young is doing extra work during the day and Sapiel has been putting in long hours to get the work done, she said.

Flagg recommended a one-time stipend of $100 for Young and $250 for Sapiel.

“It’s more of a appreciation” stipend, Flagg said.

“It’s nice everybody is working as a team,” Chairman Bill Demaray said. “Everything is going smooth.”

In other business, Flagg told selectmen that an advertisement to put surplus highway equipment was submitted to a weekly paper but unbeknownst to her was not published in the paper.

Two bids were received from two highway workers for surplus items, including some used tires and old chain saws. Warren Smith won the 11 items with the high bid of $857.

A resident questioned the bid advertising and Flagg said she called the paper and received a copy of the ad on printed regular paper that was supposed to run in October.

Resident Richard Korhonen went to the Farmington office of the paper and found out that the ad never actually ran in the paper, Flagg said.

The newspaper representative apologized and said that the newspaper was being published through a new computer software program and some ads were omitted, Flagg said.

“We had an illegal bid,” Korhonen said.

By the time this came to light, Flagg said, the bids had come and gone and items had been paid for and taken.

They also gave the town a credit for error, she said.

Korhonen said he planned to bid on an item.

“We did what we were supposed to do,” Flagg said.

Flagg said she has requested a double check on the ads to make sure they run in the paper as expected.

“We’ve never had a problem before,” she said.

Resident Ron Chadwick said that it should have raised a red flag when the only two bidders were highway employees.

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