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Showing posts from July, 2017

Recent Advances In Central Management Of The Maine Economy

To give some context to theory, I am posting this history: The Boothbay Comprehensive Plan of 2015 follows word for word a Maine State bill passed in 2013 and codified as "Industry Partnerships" This act seeks to centrally control the the entirety of all resources in Maine, as a corporate conglomerate structure. Title 26: LABOR AND INDUSTRY Chapter 39: MAINE INDUSTRY PARTNERSHIPS §3304. Industry partnerships 2.   Responsibilities of the collaborative.   The collaborative shall: A.  Provide support and staffing assistance to the industry partnerships established under this chapter;  [ 2013,  c. 368,  Pt. FFFFF,  §1  (NEW) .] B.  Create an industry partnership to advise the collaborative, the State Workforce Investment Board established in section 2006 and the boards of the local workforce investment areas designated pursuant to the federal Workforce Investment Act of 1998, Public Law 105-220 on aligning state policies and leveraging resources acr

Changing Economic Paradigms

Weston Neil Andersen, founder of Andersen Design at age 91, photograph by Susan Mackenzie Andersen The narrator of the video, produced by GHD inc  is selling the need for the round about. He tells us that the traffic going to the Boothbay Botanical Gardens will double in the next twenty years with nothing to back that up but his confident tone of voice. Selectmen promoting tiff financing speak as if there can be no doubt that projected property taxes will yield sufficient return on the investment to cover Boothbay's cost of the round about. Tiffs are seldom spoken about in terms of risk, but there is no such thing as a no risk investment. The future does not follow a certain path. My family has been selling in this region since 1958 but we did not anticipate the sudden down turn in summer tourist spending that happened regionally in 2002 and has continued to decline ever since. The next year, The Boothbay Opera House reopened as an entertainment venue, followed by the B

Unspoken Transformations in State & Local Government

In 2015, the Boothbay selectmen decided it was time for a new comprehensive plan. To introduce this idea the planners wrote: The Town’s current comprehensive plan was adopted in 1989 following a period of somewhat rapid development and change in the community. The Town has used the 1989 plan as the basis for its zoning for almost 25 years. The passage of time and changes in the Town and the Boothbay region have made much of the plan out-of-date and a less than useful guide in managing the future of Boothbay. Therefore the Town has prepared this update of the Comprehensive Plan to serve as a guide for the decisions the Town must make about growth, development, redevelopment, and change over the coming decade. The 2015 Plan is a complete review of the issues facing our community and addresses emerging issues as well as providing a fresh look at ongoing issue Our family moved to East Boothbay since 1958. The number of businesses on Ocean Point Road have remained relatively the same I

Should Boothbay have a Town Charter?

I have been trying to determine when Boothbay ordinances governing businesses in the home were changed. Unlike state statutes, adaptations in Boothbay town ordinances do not have dates. I believe significant changes were made between 2007 and 2014. This  speculation is based on the discrepancy between the introductory paragraphs describing the governing philosophy of the ordinances, and the actual zoning ordinances, lending the impression that they were written at different historical times. The introductory description expresses a reasonable and pro-economic approach to policy which is not consistent the governing ordinances which prohibit the growth of home occupations by limiting non-family "employees or subcontractors" to two or three. I cannot find the words stating that the ordinances are intended for home occupations having little effect on the neighbor hood. In January 2014 I went to the town office to pick up a DBA form and learned about the restrictive or