LIVERMORE — The Board of Selectpersons voted Monday night to appoint the animal control officer as a second constable for the town.

Administrative Assistant Carrie Castonguay told the board the suggestion had been put to her as a way to give more teeth to the position, especially when summonses are needed. She spoke of an instance on Church Street when a pit bull was terrorizing the neighborhood and the state police had’t done much when called.

Richard Burton of Lewiston serves as the animal control officer.

In other business, there was one bid for mowing town properties. Brian Shink offered to do it for $8,000 per year for the next three years.

Shink has been doing the town mowing for seven or eight years.

The annual amount is up $2,300 from last year.

No copy of the 2014 contract could be found, so Castonguay used a contract similar to the cemetery mowing contract, which states that all clippings must be removed.

Shink said he mowed the ball fields twice a week last summer and hauling the clippings would require more time and additional costs.

Selectperson Tim Kachnovich pointed out that the cemeteries are confined. The clippings there can’t be blown onto private properties, which is why the clippings need to be hauled off. That specification wouldn’t apply to the town mowing.

The board voted to accept the contract but have Castonguay and Shink negotiate a price.

In other business, the board voted to allot up to $4,000 for Adam Castonguay to sweep town roads. Intersections will be given priority since they are the most important.

Highway worker and Road Committee member Ron Greenwood pointed out the town spent $3,600 on sweeping last year and will spend about that this year. He suggested the town could own a box sweeper within three years for that amount.

There would be some maintenance costs, but the life expectancy of the sweeper is 20 years.

“It’s something to think about,” Greenwood said. He suggested looking at similar smaller items too.

The selectpersons decided that although they thought it a good idea, it wouldn’t be something to consider now.

After a discussion about the scheduled paving of a 7,000-foot stretch on River Road, the board voted to put the work out to bid and ask bidders to provide different options, with prices, for that paving.

Kachnovich said the town needs to go with the best bang for its buck. He also said the town is lacking a long-term road plan. “We need to have an engineer say, ‘This is what you need to do each year to maintain the roads,'” he said.

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