Ball field over budget
PRESQUE ISLE, Maine — Before considering 2016’s budget this fall, the Presque Isle City Council approved several permits and funding requests Monday night, exposing budget concerns to come.
The Recreation and Parks Department is almost finished with a new baseball field along the Bishop’s Island Riverside Park area, a replacement for the one on Main Street. If all goes accordingly, the field will be done around the same time as the start of Major League Baseball’s playoffs October 8, 2015.
Constructed by Trombley Industries, the field “is now nearly complete,” parks director Chris Beaulieu wrote in a memo to the council. However, the field still needs to be surfaced, hydro-seeded and laid out with a baseball grid and sandy infield. That work has been difficult to procure and requires an additional $32,000, Beaulieu said. Out of three companies contacted, only Sports Fields Inc. could fit the time-table to be open next spring, he said.
After some debate, the council gave Beaulieu a go-ahead to draw $20,167 from the recreation and parks department’s capital improvement plan and use the remaining $12,467 of the special reserve fund.
With that top surface work the field will be ready to play ball in the spring, at a cost of $154,000. Most of that has been funded by $121,800 earned from selling the old Main Street baseball field property to Haines Manufacturing and Griffeth Ford, along with $20,000 earned from selling the 442 Main Street basketball court to Haines and selling an easement.
Beaulieu told the council he would like to expand the baseball field by another $150,000 to include lighting (estimated at $75,000), dugouts, fencing, storage, a “demo house” and a pedestrian bridge. Those amenities would increase the “quality and flexibility” of the games for both adult and youth teams, although they “are not absolutely necessary,” Beaulieu said.
The field would cost about $304,000 in total with the additional amenities, but that could be brought down if the parks department can source used dugouts, storage and lighting from the school district, Northern Maine Community College or Loring Development Authority, and if the city is successful in landing grants.
The city council will consider the additional $150,000 request later this year or next, although that may come with some scrutiny. “Did you ever expect that this would cost $304,000?” asked Councillor Peter Hallowell, lamenting the spending increases and projections.
In other financing requests, the Presque Isle Police Department will be able to overspend its capital account by about $6,000 to add a new truck along with a recently-purchased Dodge Charger to an apparently aging fleet. It’ll be the first time since 2011 that the police bought two vehicles in a year.
The police are going to need new cars or trucks in the coming years, Chief Matt Irwin told the city council. Six of the police department’s 11 vehicles are running with more than 100,000 miles and four have around 125,000 miles.
Recently, when some cars were being repaired and officers were travelling south for training “we had several shifts where our on-duty officers had no vehicle available,” Irwin said.
The police department purchased a Dodge Charger, a demo vehicle with 10,000 miles, and with city council’s blessing spent an extra $6,000 not included in its capital account to buy a Dodge Ram pick-up truck in the midst of delivery.
The Dodge Ram, procured for under $25,000, is worth the investment, especially in winter, Irwin argued to a slightly skeptical city council.
“We need a pickup truck for hauling large items,” Irwin said. “In a winter storm, the lights are higher, more visible.” And, he added, “the mileage is not that different.” The 2014 Charger gets an estimated 19 miles per gallon in city driving and 31 MPG on the highway, while the Ram gets 20 city MPG and 28 highway MPG.
The council authorized the police department’s request, some moving with reluctance. “We have depleted our capital reserves,” said councillor Hallowell, noting that the Fire Department is also facing spending challenges.
In other Presque Isle matters, the city council approved three automobile business permits and tabled one, pending some lingering issues.
The council approved an automobile graveyard and junkyard permit for Cowett’s Used Auto Parts, the C.A.R. Parts business with locations at Davis Street and Fort Road, along with a graveyard permit for Frederick Bonville, of Fred’s Auto & Salvage on Chapman Road, and an automobile recycling permit for Geary Bonville, who’s G.S. Bonville & Son is at the same Chapman Road location. The council decided to wait to decide on another permit request by Geary Bonville for an automobile graveyard and junkyard at the same Chapman Road location, due to “pending issues involving” the Department of Environmental Protection.
The city council is meeting again Thursday, Sept. 17 at 7 p.m. for a joint meeting with the planning board, which will consider a medical marijuana ordinance. On Monday Oct. 5, the the Presque Isle city council meets again for a full session in which the city’s next budget will be proposed.
