MINOT — Town officials voted unanimously this week to allow Regional School Unit 16 the use community field trails for the school system’s Tri-Town 5k race to be held this fall.

The four-mile-plus network of trails behind the Minot Consolidated School on Shaw Hill Road connects the school property to community ball fields and the Town Office, Town Administrator Danielle Loring said.

RSU 16 also includes the towns of Mechanic Falls and Poland.

At its Monday night meeting, the Board of Selectmen also discussed the cost of training new firefighters ($150 apiece for basic fire school) and outfitting them ($2,500 apiece) with turnout gear for its all-volunteer department in advance of next year’s budget.

“Our hope is to do a campaign to bring on more members to Minot, similar to other towns across the nation (because) we’re struggling to bring on new volunteers to serve on the department. So we’re trying to figure out our costs,” Loring said.

Volunteer members are paid for training and for each call to which they respond, she said.

In other business, officials learned the highway department supervisor rejected purchase of a tarp to cover the town’s winter sand pile because the cost had doubled from an earlier estimated $3,500, Loring said.

Loring told the board she would recommend moving the date of the employee appreciation lunch from November to August in an effort to allow more board members to attend, especially those who work for the school department.

The board discussed the possibility of conducting a townwide survey of local residents aimed at learning what they believe are services that are lacking in the town.

“We’ve hit a point where we’ve upgraded our services so that we’re in the 21st Century, in terms of online and remote services available to the public,” Loring said. “But I think the next question is, ‘what do people see as being our essential needs? What can we start focusing on next, whether it’s a community center where we could possibly have before- and after-school programs or a home for the local recreation department, or whether instead of purchasing a giant tarp, it might be a sand salt shed?’ What are the next level services that people find that they wish might have so that we can start coming up with a plan to start meeting some of those needs.”

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