CARIBOU, Maine — While thousands of local residents were watching primetime television Tuesday night, the fate of rural Caribou was discussed among 14 people in a small room on High Street.
The three hours of mostly arguing between Caribou city councilors and members of the Caribou Secession Committee resulted in zero progress to prevent the rural part of the community seceding from the city and becoming the new town of Lyndon.
Committee members laid out eight solutions to avoid secession in a 54-page report recently presented to Caribou citizens at a public hearing on June 11. After the public hearing, the City Council and the secession committee agreed to sit down on July 7 to discuss the possible ways to avoid having 80 percent of the land mass and 30 percent of Caribou’s 8,189 population split off.
But both sides on Tuesday seemed as unable to find common ground as when the committee members, citing rising taxes and inflated property values in the rural areas, first unveiled secession plans a year ago.
Conversation on avoiding dividing the city derailed throughout the evening Tuesday as both parties attempted to discuss the eight possible alternatives offered up by the secession committee, including going back to a town meeting form of government, cutting taxes by 28 percent or downsizing city staff to dramatically reduce costs.
Some councilors, in particular Jody Smith, expressed an interest in discussing the bullet points to see which elements could be explored further and possibly forming committees to study them more. But the secessionists pressed the councilors to approve the alternatives as presented without delay.
Councilwoman Joan Theriault told the five secession members that they were asking for the impossible.
As the meeting extended into its third hour, the tension was evident on the faces of department heads such as the chief of police, the fire chief and the city manager as they looked on and listened.
“I honestly wonder why we had this meeting,” Mayor Gary Aiken said to the committee.
“We’re disappointed with the demeanour of the council,” secession committee spokesman Paul Camping said in the parking lot after the meeting. “They embarrassed us and made our plan look foolish. That’s not why we came here. We came here to avoid secession.”
Similarly, Aiken said outside the meeting of the secession members, “Their minds were made up before they got here.”
Without any compromise to work on, the secession committee will pursue legislation to split Caribou and create the new town of Lyndon. But first it needs to secure a state representative to sponsor the legislation. If all goes according to the group’s plan, secession will ultimately be up to the voters of Caribou in a future referendum vote.
A full copy of the secession committee’s 54-page secession report can be found on the city’s website at cariboumaine.org.
