MEXICO — A five-member committee will gather information on reestablishing the police department ahead of a public hearing March 4, at which residents will be presented with four options for coverage.

The Select Board unanimously supported forming the committee, whose members were selected at the Feb. 4 board meeting, though they have not yet been confirmed, Town Manager Raquel Welch-Day said Monday. The members are expected to be named soon.

Welch-Day posted on the town’s Facebook page Jan. 28 that the question on whether to reestablish the department would be on the June 1 ballot. However, at last week’s Select Board meeting members of the public made it clear a decision should be made sooner.

Welch-Day said the board also agreed to the following timeline:

• March 4 — An informational meeting will be held at 6 p.m. regarding options for police services.

• March 6 — Ballots will be available for voting at the Town Office. Registered voters can request an absentee ballot to be mailed to them until March 18. People can vote in person at the Town Office before April 1.

• April 1 — Voters can cast ballots from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. at the Town Office. Results will be announced at the board meeting that evening.

Town officials recently mailed surveys to more than 2,000 registered taxpayers asking them to weigh-in on future police coverage. Welch-Day said more than 200 had been received as of Feb. 4. The deadline for submission is Friday.

The four options being considered are:

• Continue using the Oxford County Sheriff’s Office, which the town pays for through its annual county assessment.

• Contract with the Sheriff’s Office specifically for 18-hour coverage from 6 a.m. to midnight for $480,544 per year.

• Contract with the Sheriff’s Office specifically for 24-hour coverage from 6 a.m. to midnight and on-call only from midnight to 6 a.m. for $630,795.

• Reestablish the department at $945,920 per year, which includes pay for an investigator, a new position approved last year by voters. There would be a property tax increase.

Town leaders have been working toward having local police service again, after the department suspended operations in August 2024 due to a lack of officers.

Mexico Administrative Assistant Jim Theriault Bruce Farrin/Rumford Falls Times

The town hired former Mexico Police Chief Jim Theriault of Rumford as an administrative assistant to look at the feasibility of the move.

He told officials at last week’s board meeting that he spoke with a Sheriff’s Office representative “and I can’t find anybody in that department that wants anything to do with Mexico. Why? I don’t know why. The biggest reason is that they’re shorthanded, too.”

Theriault said, “I’ve been here since August. I’ve been working my butt off, 40 hours a week, for that six months. I have seen about 10 applications and I’ve narrowed it down to five candidates. I still need one more. And I’ve gone forward with not hiring them but telling them that we’re interested in them.”

Selectman Richard Philbrick said to him, “You say you have five, but if they go to (the state training) academy, you’re going to be down because it isn’t going to be five.”

Theriault said there are reserve officers standing by. “Overtime is not a problem when they go to the academy,” he added.

“As soon as we have an officer, the county will not cover us anymore. So we can’t have just one,” Welch-Day said. “We have to have at least enough to cover a day shift and then Rumford would help us out at night with the contract that I put out.”

One resident, Kelli Carrier, urged the town to form a committee to set the town in the right direction.

“Whether you have five people or 10 people, those five people shouldn’t be coming in without some direction or naming a price,” she said. “You need to have a committee together. I’ll volunteer … I want to know where my money’s going.”

She added, “You’ve got to have a plan and without a plan, how can we vote?”

Theriault said if the town waits until June to vote, he likely won’t be around anymore and some of the interested officers might be lost.

“I took this job because I put a lot of sweat into the town of Mexico. Twenty-two years,” he said. “That’s why I’m over here but I can’t wait until June, and I don’t know how to tell these guys that they’ve got to wait till June. They’re ready to come now.”