All articles pass at Southwest Harbor Town Meeting
Residents stand in line to sign in on Saturday at Southwest Harbor’s annual Town Meeting. More than 100 registered voters attended the meeting that lasted two hours. ISLANDER PHOTO BY SARAH HINCKLEY
SOUTHWEST HARBOR
The firehouse, with doors wide open, was packed with people, safely distanced from one another, for the annual Town Meeting on Saturday. Voters approved every article on the warrant, most with very little discussion.
Even Article 43, a request to apply for a Land and Water Conservation Fund grant, passed with no votes in objection and a round of applause. If the grant funding is awarded, it would be used for recreational development of a parcel of land adjacent to Chris’s Pond and the Manset Dock area.
Board and committee conduct policy considered
SOUTHWEST HARBOR At the request of a resident and future business owner in town, members of the Board of Selectmen agreed to consider adopting a conduct policy that would outline appropriate behavior for members of the town’s boards and committees.
Natasha Johnson, who recently went before the town’s Planning Board with a site plan review application for a marijuana retail store she and her husband, Tyler Johnson, are opening, requested the item be placed on the meeting’s agenda.
“This request arose out of an interesting exchange with a member of the Planning Board,” explained Board of Selectman Chairman Kristin Hutchins, who had attended that meeting. “I would say the conversation got heated… I would invite this board to set a standard for committee members and boards to conduct themselves during meetings.”
Waterfront noise, traffic debated
SOUTHWEST HARBOR A property owner voicing concerns about increased overnight commercial use of a town-owned lot next to a working dock led to contentious debate at the July 17 meeting of the town’s select board.
Members of the public, many of them working fishermen, spoke in opposition to suggestions from property owner Marion “Missy” Marron who was looking for guidelines from the board on the use of the parking lot known as the Hook Property now that it is owned by the town.
Last October, voters approved a town purchase of the property at a special town meeting. Before the purchase, the town had been leasing it as an extension of the Manset Town Dock parking area for 25 years.
Pursuit of grants stopped; projects dead in the water
SOUTHWEST HARBOR Residents will not get the chance to vote on Warrant Article 43 at the annual Town Meeting on June 5.
The article asked if voters want to pursue grant funding for two projects in town, but the Board of Selectmen decided on Tuesday to amend the annual Town Meeting warrant to exclude it.
Expansion and development of the Manset Dock was one of the projects and developing a parcel of property adjacent to Chris’s Pond that would include low–income housing was the second. Those involved with coordinating the projects were pursuing grant money from the state’s Land and Water Conservation Fund with an application deadline of the end of this month, as well as a federal Small Harbor Improvement Program (SHIP) grant.