The Lincoln County Regional Planning Commission (LCRPC) held their annual meeting on Wednesday, April 16 at the 1812 Farm in Bristol, celebrating the incredible work the Commission accomplished over the last year, honoring community leaders, and conducting regular board business. LCRPC provides land use, transportation, economic, housing, environmental sustainability, and community development planning, and related technical assistance to municipalities in the county. Attendees included the Lincoln County Commissioners, the County Administrator, LCRPC board members, town municipal officials, state officials, and congressional delegations staff.  

This year’s meeting theme, “Lifelong Lincoln County,”provided the opportunity to hear about the ways LCRPC is engaging in efforts to make Lincoln County more welcoming and safer for older residents and hear from leaders at the state, regional, and local level. The theme honors one of the LCRPC’s six strategic priorities, intergenerational community building. In addition to incorporating the needs and voices of older residents in daily activities and long term planning, LCRPC staff have helped reconvene the Lincoln County Triad, a coalition that fosters collaborative partnership among law enforcement, service providers, and community members to enhance the well-being, safety, and protection of the older adult population in Lincoln County through convenings and education. Sheriff Deputy Rand Maker spoke to attendees about issues his department sees around the county impacting older residents and the ways they are working proactively to alleviate the most pressing problems, including the introduction of a new community resource officer. Makeremphasized the issues that older adults face, like transportation, housing, food security, fraud, etc., are not unique, but are felt more acutely. 

Maine Council on Aging Executive Director, Jess Mauer, spoke about the work her organization does to mitigate challenges related to bias, poverty, housing, transportation, food security, social inclusion, workforce development, and care across all settings that impact older Mainers. Mauer spoke about how Maine is not alone with an aging population and how other states and countries are also seeing this trend. Rather than seeing it as a problem, Mauer focused on the message that “older people are our future”, and that community initiatives and policies should direct energy into empowering and partnering with older residents.  

Jim Peavey, the chair of Age-Friendly Georgetown, shared inspiration and advice about starting a local age-friendly community initiative. Peavey’s age-friendly work began after the town’s comprehensive plan highlighted the need for more support and infrastructure for the town’s older population. Georgetown is one of the state’s two strongest leaders in age-friendly efforts, which have been made possible through strong community engagement, careful planning, and a lot of listening. “Go slow”, Peavey warned, when sharing possible steps a town might take to start an age-friendly initiative.  

LCRPC staff and board members awarded $23,200 in “Assistance with Specific Know-How” (ASK) grants to Alna, Bremen, Damariscotta and Newcastle (in a shared grant), Waldoboro, and Westport Island. For over a decade, LCRPC has administered this annual grant opportunity to provide towns with funding for municipal and/or community projects that need specific technical assistance. These can include preliminary engineering/design, economic research, and architectural or environmental planning. The goal is to help solve a municipal issue or complete an important town project that addresses town public infrastructure or facilities, business attraction or retention, and local health and safety issues. This year, county commissioners allocatedadditional funding to increase the maximum grant award from $2,500 to $5,000, allowing for more meaningful momentum for municipalities.  

The evening also included recognition of Waldoboro’s Parks and Recreation and Public Works Department, for their collaborative efforts to install a new playground in town; Monhegan’s Broadband Committee, for 6 years of hard work securing broadband access for the entire island; late Frank Hample, for his impressive public service to the town of Somerville and Lincoln County; and Lincoln County’s Commissioners and County Administrator, for their thoughtful work allocating $6.7 million in ARPA funding to high-impact projects for affordable housing planning, water & sewer infrastructure, broadband access, public safety, and the CLC YMCA Community Navigator Program.   

LCRPC staff includes Emily Rabbe, Executive Director; Laura Graziano, Community Resilience Planner; Curtis Brown, Land Use and Transportation Planner; and Alex Zipparo; Economic and Community Development Planner. The LCRPC board, chaired by Mike Tomko of Boothbay Harbor, consists of two representatives from each town in Lincoln County and meets monthly. All are welcome to attend and should reach out to LCRPC Executive Director, Emily Rabbe (erabbe@lcrpc.org), for more information. To learn more about LCRPC’s work and strategic plan, go to the Commission’s website lcrpc.org.