Wiscasset selectmen Feb. 20 nodded a resolution Wiscasset Climate Action Team Chair Cassaundra Rose said is required to get into Maine’s Community Resilience Partnership and to help qualify for a state Community Action Grant and other possible funds. With a March 29 deadline to apply for a $50,000 CAG, the board plans to pursue one for assessing the waterfront’s vulnerability.

Something needs to be done, including near the harbor master’s office, or that shoreline will be washed away, Town Manager Dennis Simmons said. 

Some of WCAT’s suggestions, including seeking CAG funds for a heating or cooling shelter at Wiscasset Community Center, would be premature to fund, given Johnson Controls’ ongoing, “full-on” assessment of energy use at all the town buildings, Simmons said. And according to the discussion, replacing the community center’s and town office’s generators – by using CAG funds as a match to other grant money – would save a capital request, but is a no go because the generators would use fossil fuels.

Gathering public input at workshops and in a survey, WCAT found “overwhelming concern about impacts like flooding and erosion, changing ecosystems, increased rainfall and snowfall, increased health concerns and poor air quality,” Rose told selectmen. The federal government will be putting billions of dollars into climate resiliency, and passing the resolution will help show that Wiscasset is committed to resiliency, energy efficiency and other potential projects for which grants could be sought, she explained.

Selectman Terry Heller, the board’s liaison to WCAT, said WCAT has done good work, and she highly recommended passing the resolution. The board did, 5-0.

Also Feb. 20, the board in a split vote chose to have the ordinance review committee see what other towns have for firearms discharge ordinances and then give selectmen a recommendation. Selectman James Andretta dissented. 

Maine Warden Service’s Doug Kulis, a past Wiscasset-area district warden for 25 years, told selectmen a town cannot regulate hunting, but can pass a firearms discharge ordinance. “So ... the way I’m reading that (state law), a discharge ordinance for public safety is one thing; if it’s a discharge ordinance for limiting hunting and fishing, it may be different. But I think that may be something for the Attorney General’s Office to look at ... versus me just saying that.” He offered to pass along any questions to the state.

Kulis added, local police, not the Warden’s Service, would be the enforcing agency for a local ordinance.

Wiscasset Police Chief and Harbor Master Lawrence Hesseltine reiterated his recent statement to the board. He can see no place safe to fire a gun there, he said. There is kayaking, there is a lot of foot traffic, and someone might be at a mooring at any time, he said. “I can’t see where you’d be anywhere in that harbor where it’d be safe to shoot a gun, in any direction ... I support an ordinance, just for the public safety.”

Selectman William “Bill” Maloney said, due to state regulations on firearms hunting distances from schools and other development, the only part of the harbor to consider local firearms discharge restrictions for is “from the yacht club to Castle Tucker inside the railroad tracks.”

Residents’ views varied. Duck hunter and hunting safety instructor Chet Grover, who has not hunted in the area under discussion, opposed seeking an ordinance. He questioned the need for “more laws, on top of more laws” and said hunters and others need to co-exist, like not walking where you see someone is hunting, and not hunting where people are walking.

Leslie Roberts, who approached selectmen with the ordinance idea this winter, restated her safety concerns. And Pleasant Street’s Michael Olszewski said he has “heard and seen the gunshots ... I really don’t understand what the animosity is toward some type of ordinance that is just about protecting the citizens. That’s it, simple to me.”

Lincoln County Regional Planning Commission Executive Director Emily Rabbe said, if selectmen do pursue an ordinance, it would not make it onto the June 11 ballot, nor should it: “I think given the level of research that’s needed, we want to be thoughtful about this ... We shouldn’t try to ram this through for the June (vote).”

In other business, selectmen moved Bruce Engert from interim to permanent code enforcement officer; kept Steve Williams on the airport advisory committee and Heller on the appearance of the town committee; named Patrick Sandefur to WCAT; approved Wiscasset Farmers Market’s request to sell alcohol; and nodded Littleton, New Hampshire-based CAI Technologies’ $27,650 proposal to digitize tax maps and provide geographic information systems (GIS) internet services.