A recent unruly discussion over the Alna selectmen's bidding policy led First Selectman David Abbott to seek a policy change – and a gavel.

Abbott picked up the gavel on eBay and kept it at hand's reach during the board's May 16 meeting. He also reminded attendees to wait for him to call on them to speak.

“Things kind of deteriorated,” Abbott said. “I don't want any of that, so if anyone wants to speak, they can speak when they're recognized by me. Everyone will have a chance to speak ...,” he added.

Under Abbott's policy change that the board went on to approve, selectmen no longer have to waive the policy in order to skip putting a project out to bid.

The two-year-old policy had called for bidding on work expected to cost more than $3,000. From now on, a projection that high will trigger a discussion between selectmen and the town official proposing the project. The work could then go out to bid or not, as selectmen see fit.

“This way, we're going by the policy, we're not suspending it,”  Abbott said of the change. It passed unanimously.

The current board instated the policy when Trask was still road commissioner. Several residents and sometimes some selectmen said he had a conflict of interest in doing thousands of dollars of roadwork that didn't go out to bid. Trask denied he had a conflict of interest.

An argument broke out at the May 2 selectmen's meeting when Trask claimed the board had only followed the bidding policy when he was road commissioner.

Selectmen said they waived the policy for him, too, just as they did when Road Commissioner Jeff Verney recommended hiring Jack Shaw to grade the town's dirt roads.

Some people at the board's latest meeting joked about the recent shouting match. “We have to have a good row every two years,” Second Selectman Jonathan Villeneuve said.

Former selectman Chris Cooper said he only wished it hadn't caused the postponement of a landscaping proposal he had planned to make that night.

“I liked the fight, all right,” Cooper said.

Snowplow contract stays flat

Selectmen took Mark Hanley up on his offer to plow Alna's roads again next winter for the same $161,095 a year he has been getting.

“Anything that isn't going up is a good deal,” Abbott said.

Hilton back on school board

William Stafford stepped down from his seat as an Alna representative to  Regional School Unit 12's board. Family commitments are taking up more of his time, he told selectmen.

“I just don't feel that I've been as effective as I have in the past,” Stafford said.

He asked selectmen to put Ralph Hilton back on the district board to serve until March 2014, when the next municipal elections are held. They agreed, and thanked Stafford for his four years of service.

Hilton said that since he last served, he has continued to attend RSU 12 board meetings and is serving on the RSU's facilities committee.

Susan Johns can be reached at 207-844-4633 or sjohns@wiscassetnewspaper.com