Reconsidering Industrial Purposes in Light of Maine's Home Rule Amendment and Recent Educational Enactments
And presenting an alternative vision for industrial training on the Boothbay Peninsula
The Town Selectmen of Boothbay are in the habit of running reconsideration votes shortly after the original vote if the Town people do not deliver the vote they want.
An example in my last post is when the selectmen did not get approval for creating the TIF zone that would allow Paul Coulombe to remake the Town Center in the image of the country club, And so, as Mr Coulombe dangled 17 million dollars before their eyes, they ran another vote a month later, justifying their actions by telling themselves that the voters just don’t know what is good for them, which in the Town selectmen’s veiw is as simple as 17 million dollars, which will allow the Town selectmen to raise property taxes incrementally and eventually drive out a good portion of the present electorate.
Leadership in Maine takes the attitude of CEOs of a private corporation who assert their will over all in privately conducted meetings. It is their mission to achieve what they decide is right, and if the people disagree with them, they must get around the people by whatever means are possible. Controlling the narrative is one of the primary devices they try.
Recently, the School Board announced its plans to replace the public vote at the ballot box with a public vote in a district meeting, run by themselves.
The next week, Patty Minerich wrote a Letter to the Editor, protesting the decision.
Julie Roberts is a Boothbay Town selectperson and a member of the rich oligarch fan club. Julie Roberts responded to Ms Minerech’s letter with a comment that begins with these words:
I appreciate the opportunity for community members to share their perspectives on the proposed charter changes. Open dialogue is essential when we’re discussing the future of our schools and the well-being of the students who rely on them every day. BBR
My perspective is that previously Julie Roberts blocked me from participating in a Facebook group she was running, which I felt was inappropriate but unsurprising behavior from local leadership. Having grown up on this Peninsula in a small business in a home that my parents bootstrapped to success, I am used to local leadership being not only unsupportive of allowing some individuals the opportunity to present a community idea but to act in a downright destructive manner to the business my parents started, which was teaching STEAM skills on the job back in 1952.
Growing up in such an environment was my greatest education. It wouldn’t have been possible if my Dad didn’t have a natural ability for systemic design and innovative and resourceful enough to build his own factory, starting with procuring a boat propeller from th local shipyard and crafting it into a mixer for ceramic casting slip.
I was glad to see in the comments to Ms Minerich’s letter that someone, with an anonymous identifier, TLM2, brought up the fact that when the anonymous investors intervened with two million dollars to advance a “demolish and replace” plan, they cancelled the opportunity to have an open discussion in which all options are given an equal chance for consideration.
The dialogue that was missing was at the onset of this discussion when an independent forum, divorced from the self interest of their administrative jobs, considered all the options TLM2
Ms Roberts, with no small amount of arrogance, describes the lawsuit in which Patty Minerich is a litigant as an obstruction to the school board’s plans.
However, it is important for residents to understand the full context behind the situation we are in. For more than two years, critical repairs totaling $30 million and identified as necessary for the safety and operation of our schools have been delayed due to ongoing litigation brought forward by the same individual raising these concerns. This lawsuit has kept needed improvements tied up in court, costing taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars and pushing back timelines that directly affect our children, teachers, and school staff. Boothbay Select person, Julie Roberts BBR (link to lawsuit added by author)
“Identified as necessary for the safety and operation of our schools” by whom? Clearly Ms Roberts accepts no room for other opinions.
I responded to Ms Roberts’ perspective by pointing out that it was the anonymous investors who intervened with plans to address needed repairs with a two-million-dollar campaign financing contribution to cover the cost of an architect’s design for a new school.
I had previously obtained the identities of the anonymous investors with an FOIA request and knew that Julie Roberts is one of the anonymous group. Though I find her message disengenuous, I applaud her for participating in the public conversation beyond the secluded walls of the board’s domain, where the board is trying to relocate the public vote.
The “critical repairs totaling $30 million and identified as necessary for the safety and operation of our schools” that MS Roberts quotes are arrived at by the architects planning for demolishing and replacing the high school, which also included plans for repairing and adding new construction to the middle school.
About six months after losing the public referendum, the school boards ran a reconsideration vote without following the protocol outlined in state law. Now they are arguing that the petitions presented, following state protocol, are invalidated by the addition of a second article that asks If the signer would support a repair plan not to exceed $10,250,300.
Art. 2: If Article 1 on this ballot is validly approved, resulting in the repeal of the April 24, 2024 vote regarding the Elementary/Middle School Project as described on the April 24, 2024 ballot, do you favor authorizing the board of Trustees of Boothbay-Boothbay Harbor Community School District (the “District”) to update and renovate the existing Boothbay Region Elementary School as further described below (the “Project”), and to issue bonds or notes (the “Bonds”) in the name of the District solely for the Project in an amount not to exceed $10,250,300. The Petittion
IF
In my opinion, if is a key word in the statute governing reconsideration ballots and in the petition. The statute governing education reconsideration ballots says the boards can run a reconsideration vote IF the voters petition the boards to do so by fulfilling the specified parameters of the petition. §1354. Reconsideration gives no further parameters or instructions. It does not say that only the question about the reconsideration ballot can be on the petition. It says only that the reconsideration petition must be done within the specified time frame and signed by the specified number of local signatures.
Title 20-A: EDUCATION
Part 2: SCHOOL ORGANIZATION
Chapter 103: SCHOOL ADMINISTRATIVE DISTRICTS
Subchapter 5: DISTRICT REFERENDUM
§1354. Reconsideration
The procedure to reconsider votes taken at a district referendum shall be as follows. [PL 1981, c. 693, §§ 5, 8 (NEW).]
1. Time limit. The board of directors shall, within 60 days, initiate a new district referendum to reconsider the vote of the previous referendum if, within 7 days of the first referendum, at least 10% of the number of voters voting for the gubernatorial candidates in the last gubernatorial election in the municipalities within the district petition to reconsider a prior district referendum vote. (emphasis mine)
[PL 1981, c. 693, §§ 5, 8 (NEW).]
2. Required quorum. A reconsideration referendum is not valid unless the number of persons voting in that referendum is at least equal to the number who voted in the prior district referendum.
[PL 1981, c. 693, §§ 5, 8 (NEW).]
Note here that the reconsideration petition is exclusive to the inhabitants of the municipalities within the district, contrasting with the anonymous investors group, which includes some from the district, some from other areas of the state, and some from outside the state.
There was no reconsideration petition before the board ran a reconsideration vote on the Middle School, but the existence of such a petition is the condition upon which the board’s authority to run a reconsideration vote rests. The previous ballot had split the vote for the high school and the middle school, making each a separate question. If they had not separated those two issues, the boards might have a case to make that the second vote was not a reconsideration vote. On its own, the middle school proposal in the reconsideration vote was not significantly different than what was on the ballot as a standalone question a few months earlier.
Now the boards are arguing that the second article of the petition violated the rules of §1354. Reconsideration.
Previously, I sent an FOAI Request to Superintendent Kahler that asked:
This is a Freedom Of Access Request for documents identifying the donors who financed architects Lavallee Brensinger to design the Boothbay Regional School system, plus the channel through which the payment was received, including the donor and the recipient of the donation and if this donation was made as Municipal section 9 Fiscal Matters Conditional gifts, please provide documentary evidence of the conditions.
If you are not the party through whom this information is available, please identify the correct party to contact with their contact information.
If you are the correct party and you feel there is a legal reason why you can not fulfill this FOIA request, please identify that legal reason.
Superintendent Kahler responded:
I am writing to follow-up with you regarding your FOIA request dated 17 January 2023. In response to your request, the District will not be producing records which are designated confidential by statute (1 M.R.S.A. 402(3)(a)) or records which are otherwise privileged or confidential (including communications that are protected by the attorney-client privilege or work doctrines).
I found the language odd since the standard description of work product doctrines are framed in the context of litigation with an opposing party. The wording’s message comes across as whatever the school boards are negotiating is none of the public’s business, anticipating that the boards might find themselves in legal conflicts, and are protecting the work product in advance. Speculatively, in this context, the “work product” signifies the conversations the boards are conducting with “donors” under the terms stated in §5654. Conditional gifts, especially since that was what I specifically asked about.
My first concern with §5654. Conditional gifts is that the first condition imposed by the donors will be a non-disclosure agreement over everything that transpires during the negotiating process. The response I received to my FOIA request felt like a confirmation.
The documents I received included the Town Meeting notes in which the boards elected to use §5654. Conditional gifts are the funding source for the project. §5654 places no conditions on the “donors” while permitting the negotiations between the donors and the Town to create costs for the taxpayers “in perpetuity” while excluding the inhabitants of the community from having a voice in what is agreed upon. By imposing costs on local property taxpayers while excluding the inhabitants from having a say in matters that they are required to fund, the statute violates the intent of Section 2 of Home Rule, which links having the responsibility of financing an industrial building with having a vote.
Section 2. Construction of buildings for industrial use. For the purposes of fostering, encouraging and assisting the physical location, settlement and resettlement of industrial and manufacturing enterprises within the physical boundaries of any municipality, the registered voters of that municipality may, by majority vote, authorize the issuance of notes or bonds in the name of the municipality for the purpose of purchasing land and interests therein or constructing buildings for industrial use, to be leased or sold by the municipality to any responsible industrial firm or corporation.
Considering that the state is transforming our public schools into industrial job training facilities in acts like the Industrial Partnerships Act and the Maine Space Corporaion, any school building construction is for an industrial purpose, further supported by the frequent references made about “making spaces” when promoting “the project” of which images were never shown to the public.
When an organization intentionally leaves the public out, the public can only speculate about what is being planned for them. Knowing Town leadership, it follows that the negotiations will be with individuals or entities who have concentrated wealth, and focused on bringing larger scaled corporate culture to the Peninsula.
The boards are probably angling for State money, a speculation supported by their application for a State program that expands publicly funded education four more grades, covering the cost of higher education to grade 16.
The documents I received in response to my FOIA request include a description of “The project” in which the words ”pre K through 12 consolidated school construction” are struck out, permitting the municipality-funded industrial training to be applied to any age group. This would dominate the economic development of every municipality in Maine, with some businesses having their industrial job training funded for free by the municipal taxpayers, which includes other businesses that fund their own job training.
In the meantime, there is an opportunity to expand the conversation and to engage alternative thinking for the future of the Boothbay Peninsula.
I submit that a water-challenged community should not be targeting a large corporate culture that depends on an aggressive population increase. Such a peninsula is better suited for a small industry, which, if it increases population growth, it does so at a much slower rate. The leaders talk of importing water from other sources, but that is not guaranteed.
Since we have the TIF Zone and TIF zones are for economic development, why not open the TIF Zone to accomodate Businerss in Residence zoning, excluding the category of businesses in a home that are short-term rentals since the state-municipal ordinances made STRS the default zoning across all of Maine by excluding them from their housing reports. STRs are a vampire industry that drives up real estate prices and consequently drives out many other industries. The new state-municipal ordinances require that special zones be established for diverse interests. It follows that STRS be prohibited in the TIF zone to allow for diverse economic development.
This would encourage remote workers, small enterprises, and businesses in or attached to the home to the region, which is a movement popular with the younger population.
Imagining it from the perspective of the historical assets for which I am responsible. I envision a network of independently owned ceramic studios in which the primary productive activities can be conducted in small studios, but some activities,s such as original glaze and body development, mold making facilities, and marketing facilities, including a video production space and training facilities, might be located in the Industrial Park or other alternative space.
All of the small enterprises could be served by the marketing umbrella of Andersen Design as an established brand representing individuality and handmade production. This is a distinctive identity in a world undergoing an AI Industrial Revolution.
Mudshark Studios is a rare slip casting company in the USA that does contract work for many major corporations.
Mudshark began as a mold maker working in his own studio. Part of its success probably goes to the fact that there are very few ceramic slipcasting operations in the USA. Most Western ceramic companies relocated to global low-cost labor markets in the eighties. MAGA will tell us that the purpose of Trump’s tariffs is to bring back manufacturing in the USA. There you go! Why are Boothbay’s leaders missing out on an innovative opportunity to be an industrial leader by dismissing Andersen Design?
Here at Mudshark Studios we’re a team. We’re a team of makers, scientists, doers– we’re a bunch of radical people who have come together to make your ideas out of clay. Whether you’re looking for custom molds or ceramic production services, our dedicated and experienced team is ready for action. But we’re more than just a kickass team–we’re educators, too. We are committed to educating our clients on the various materials and techniques used in the ceramic production process. We want you to feel confident that your project is in the right hands with the right tools, and we think the best way to achieve this is through sharing our knowledge and experiences with you. mudshark studios.com
Andersen Design goes beyond what Mudshark does in creating original bodies and ceramic surfaces, a skill needed in all sorts of industrial applications. Andersen Design created its own product line rather than doing contract work, but the network of studios can contract with whoever they want to (hopefully Andersen Design) as well as creating their own designs. The fact that Andersen Design created its own product line also built its identity as a marketing brand that can market other handmade creators.
The TIF Zone could also include the Museum of American Designer Craftsmen, which could attract all sorts of talent to the region.
The speculation that the primary intention of the anonymous investors’ plans is to exploit our public school system for industrial job training is found in the continuing conversation where the focus is on technical training rather than other types of education, such as history, literature, philosophy, and law that are needed to create a citizenry educated in larger social concerns.
Longtime Boothbay Region High School (BRHS) technology educator Chip Schwehm is on the path to retirement, leaving a big gap to fill. However, it’s not just a matter of finding a teacher with the right personality and skills. Schwehm, the school’s STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics) teacher, holds a special industrial arts and technology certificate that allows him to run the shop and technical education program. BBR CSD eyes exploratory program for tech education
The point made above is that it takes a special kind of certification to run an industrial training class that is also a “shop” in a public school, leaving room for interpretation of the term “shop” which is further informed by looking at Bath Tech, which is a non-profit organization. and not a public school funded involuntarily by local taxpayers,
The Community School District (CSD) School Committee approved moving forward towards a possible partnership with Bath Tech to create a satellite Career and Technical Education (CTE) exploratory program at BRHS. According to Campbell, Bath Tech can hire someone under a CTE umbrella who has industry experience, such as a carpenter or welder, even without the technical certificate. BBH CSD eyes exploratory program for tech education
It’s good that the boards are recognizing that local industrial talent has something to teach. My Dad had a degree from Pratt Institute Institute in Industrial Design and not only ran his own shop but built a business from scratch when it was the sort of business that did not previouslt exist on the Peninsula, Andersen Design is still an uncommon class of business in that it is both an artisan enterprise and the reinvention of the industrial factory production that spawned the overcrowded urban tenament housing of the Industrial Revolution.
New England managed to avoid that sort of housing during the 19th century. The new state-municipal ordinances are determined to make up for that by mandating priority zones in every Maine municipality, for what is often called “workforce” housing, where regulating housing density is prohibited, in the State’s one-size-fits-all solution to be implemented in every Maine municipality.
While regulating density is prohibited in State municipal ordinances, overcrowding is not mandated, and if my understanding is correct, state-municupal ordinances apply only in priority zones and not outside of them. The TIF zone is not the same as a state municipal priority zone.
Wikipedfia describes the Industrial Revolution as a transition that included going from hand production methods to machines;” The fact that Andersen Design reversed that is not something that I expect to be recognized by local leadership which has never been supportive of Andersen Design or many other small enterprises, especially not as historical and philosophical studies are being de-emphasized in our public school system in favor of industrial job training.
As the sole person responsible for the productivity assets created by Andersen Design, it is my task to be the educator about the philosophy that created Andersen Design and why it still matters and is even more relevant today, as large portions of the workforce are rejecting corporate culture with its broken promises. My Dad did that in 1952 when he left his role as Dean of the Akron Art Institute because he would rather be making ceramics. It was always about the work process, something that overlords miss when they exclude the people from the conversation.
Time marches on, and no community support is forthcoming, and I know many business brokers on Alignable will be more interested in selling our assets than in the challenges of setting up such a network. I will have to consider where my support actually is.