Peaks Island Council

Peaks Island Council MEETING MINUTES Wednesday, October 22, 2025, 6:15 p.m. Hybrid ZOOM/in-person meeting in the Community Center NEXT Regular Monthly PIC Meeting November 19, 2025 CALL TO ORDER: 6:21 p.m. ROLL CALL Present: Laura Glendening, Fred Somers, Scott Mohler, Karsten Rees, Jess Burton, Norm Proulx, Shelagh Reiser Absent: Number of Audience Members (AM) in attendance: 16 in person APPROVAL OF MINUTES Unanimous approval of minutes from September 23rd PIC meeting. ANNOUNCEMENTS Rees said that the island polling location is in the Community Room. Polls will be open 7am-8pm. Glendening thanked Rees and Jerzy Sylvester for organizing candidates’ night and thanked Jerzy Sylvester for putting together a packet about the candidates. TREASURER’S REPORT Patnaude said the only expenditure was $294 for needs-based tickets. Current Balance is $7,415. Board approved Treasurer’s Report, Reiser abstained. PUBLIC COMMENT (beginning of meeting) AM asked if boat is going to be removed from ferry beach. Patnaude said the boat has not been removed but the city is working on it. Rees said that the neighborhood prosecutor will be issuing an order to remove and is serving the papers to the boat owner. Patnaude confirmed that the police chief said that his officers will be serving papers. Timmi Sellers publicly thanked Sarah Michniewicz and Pious Ali for their help in having the boat removed. Glendening asked about the stairs to ferry beach. Patnaude said the contractor is removing some vegetation and lumber will be arriving at the end of this week. Glendening asked about the work on the ferry dock. Patnaude said the work is concrete work underneath the dock being done by the Department of Transportation (DOT). The DOT said the work will not affect the ferry operation. PIC October 22, 2025 Meeting Minutes, DRAFT. Page 1 Patnaude said the water department is running a water main down Central Ave extension towards Highland Avenue. COMMITTEE REPORTS & UPDATES • Executive Committee – Glendening asked chairs of committees to share meeting times so they can be posted in the newsletter and the STAR. • Environmental and Sustainability and Parks and Rec Committee Timmi Sellers said Friends of Trott Littlejohn is having an open house Saturday, October 25, 10am-noon, to celebrate the new exercise equipment. • Ferry Service Somers said the new ferry will be delivered in March 2026. Then there will be several months for staff training and coast guard approval. Somers said that the Maine DOT will be doing routine maintenance work on the transfer bridge tower but no date has been set. Patnaude said the city is going to repair the railing at the ferry landing, timing is sometime in early 2026. Somers thanked Patnaude for the fence replacement around the parking lot. Reiser asked if the stairs going into the parking lot will be replaced. Patnaude said that the stairs going down into the parking lot are not going to be replaced because it means loss of parking spaces. AM said the sign to the bathrooms should be moved from the top of where the stairs used to be since the stairs are no longer there and they are not going to be installed in the future. • Housing and Zoning Committee – ReCode Zoning survey Rees said the Housing and Zoning committee met to discuss Land Use Code Amendments, city regulations of ADUs, looking at housing supply on Peaks. Details will be shared later in the meeting. • Island Assessment – Burton said the Peaks Environmental Action Team received a $25,000 grant from Casco Bay Estuary Partnership to help carry through on the assessment recommendations and public feedback. Next step is to develop a steering committee for the project. Three areas that will be focused on are public mental health, education, climate impact. • Paper Roads Norm Proulx said the committee has rewritten the mission statement for the committee to remove advocacy for preserving paper roads and public access to paper roads. The committee is going to document the paper roads and release a map of their location. Original mission statement: The Paper Roads Committee aims to identify and catalog paper roads across the island. Through a collaborative, educational process with islanders, local authorities, and knowledgeable experts, PIC October 22, 2025 Meeting Minutes, DRAFT. Page 2  we seek to facilitate the preservation of these historic pathways, particularly those that are of great value to islanders, and to ensure they remain accessible as integral parts of our community. New mission statement: To document the paper roads on Peaks Island by providing a clarification of terms used when discussing “paper roads” and a visual map that will indicate the location of the “paper roads,” along with their current use and proximity to Peaks Island resources, the results of which will be presented to Peaks Island residents and property owners. • Parking Reiser said that winter parking is available at Casco Bay Lines garage. The committee is still working with the city to obtain more street parking in Portland. • Golf cart No update. • Election Committee Three PIC seats are up for election in November, three CBL seats are also up for election. The PIC Election Committee is looking for a chair. Mohler will ask Jerzy Sylvester if he would like to be the chair. OLD BUSINESS • Status of boat removal – discussed during public comment. ● Land use Code Update – Rees said the Planning Board feedback will require a couple of changes to the PIC recommendations. First change – subdivision only needs to retain a minimum of 12,000 square feet subject to an Affordable Housing Covenant as laid out in state law 33 MRS Ch. 6, meaning the smaller minimum lot subdivision only applies for the purposes of developing affordable housing. Second change – lot coverage change allows maximum lot coverage of 45% (instead of 60%) with inclusion of water permeable decks allowing lot coverage up to 60%. Glendening clarified that the 45% lot coverage does not apply to ADUs. The ADU and house lot coverage limit is 70%. Proulx asked where the issue of short-term rentals falls in these changes. Rees said it does not apply because affordable housing does not include short-term rentals. Rees explained that PIC can make a recommendation about Land Use Code Amendments, the Planning Board can also make a recommendation, the city council then makes a decision about which recommendation to adopt. Rees made the motion below. Glendening seconded. Unanimous approval. PIC October 22, 2025 Meeting Minutes, DRAFT. Page 3 • Needs-based tickets Rees said that Sarah was able to connect Norm Proulx and him with the finance manager. They will meet soon to discuss issues about providing monthly passes instead of individual needs-based tickets. NEW BUSINESS • Community Center programming Haida Arias introduced some people from the Recreation Division of the City Parks and Recreation Team. The after-school recreation program will begin to use the school gym, except for Mondays and Wednesdays. This means the community room will be available during the days on Tuesdays, PIC October 22, 2025 Meeting Minutes, DRAFT. Page 4 Thursdays, Fridays. The city has interviewed and selected five people who will be on call as a city rep for programs run at the school, such as pickup basketball, etc. Sarah talked about the success of the Bingo program that was run in the community room last week. 40 people came, including some from town. Haida said the city needs to hire one more person to help run the after-school program from 3-5pm. Glendening said PIC could post the job in their newsletter. Ryan French said the goal is to have the Peaks Island community room used more by the community and he wants to make it easy for the organizations that are already meeting somewhere to use the room. He said that the insurance requirement when using the room is taken care of when the programming is coordinated with the Parks and Rec department, or through PIC. The Recreation Department can insure programs run at the school and in the community room. Haida said that instructors who organize classes through Portland Parks and Recreation get paid 70% of class fee, city gets 30% of fee. Insurance is covered by the city. • Preliminary budget talks Patnaude said the approved PIC budget should be submitted sometime in February. Glendening asked when Capital Improvement Plan requests should be submitted. Patnaude said that process is about to begin. Some recent island projects such as the new fence around the parking lot and the stairs to ferry beach will be paid for with CIP money. He explained that the city gets about $30 million of requests and has about $10 million to spend. He recommended road repairs (not backshore which will be paid for with FEMA money), sidewalk repairs, etc. Patnaude said some projects that are submitted are put in the five-year plan and don’t have to be resubmitted in subsequent years. Somers asked when the CIP requests should be submitted. Patnaude said requests should be submitted early 2026. Patnaude said some small requests could be assigned to operating budget. Proulx suggested that PIC follow up via email or mail with each budget request from island organizations, stating the outcome of their submission. Somers said that he thought that was already occurring but agreed that it was good practice. General agreement from councilors. • Public water access/boat storage/public dinghy dock Glendening said that she would like PIC to organize a committee to start investigating these topics. Rees asked for more information about the public demand for boat storage and a public dock. Glendening said she does not have a sense of public demand, but that community water access and public docking is important to an island community. AM asked if Army Dock is owned by the city. Somers said it is. Reiser asked about boat storage. Glendening said she is talking about somewhere that the kayaks and small dinghies can be stored during the summer, not winter storage. Proulx asked if ferry beach is owned by the city. AM said it is. PIC October 22, 2025 Meeting Minutes, DRAFT. Page 5 Rees asked about life rings at beaches. Glendening said that they cost about $500 for a life ring cabinet, and they are important for public safety. • PIC Committee restructuring Glendening proposed the following committee structure so that environment and sustainability issues get more attention. Change 1 – Divide Environment, Sustainability, Parks & Recreation committee into two committees. 1. Environment and Sustainability – Island Assessment joins this committee 2. Parks & Beaches & Waterfront – Change 2 - Add Safety Committee – Golf Cart committee joins, and this includes the traffic studies Shelagh and Karsten have been working on Current list of committees: ● Executive - ● Environment, Sustainability, Parks & Recreation- ● Housing & Zoning - ● Island Assessment - joins Environment and Sustainability ● Paper Roads - ● Parking - ● Ferry Services - ● Golf Cart - joins new Safety Committee Proposed new list of PIC committees: ● Executive - ● Environment & Sustainability – including work with the Island Assessment ● Parks, Beaches, & Waterfront ● Housing & Zoning ● Paper Roads ● Parking ● Ferry Services - including Needs Based ferry tickets ● Safety Committee – includes old Golf Cart committee, and traffic studies. Disaster preparedness could be here too. Rees asked if PIC should wait for newly elected councilors to weigh in on the restructuring. Glendening said this PIC has the working knowledge of committee structure so the vote should go ahead. Rees asked if Ferry Services committee could be called “Ferry Services and Needs Based Tickets” so it is more explicit. Reiser suggested “Ferry Services and Access.” Councilors agreed with changing the name of that committee to Ferry Services and Access. Glendening made a motion that PIC adopt new committee structure. Proulx seconded. AM said that having a safety committee again is a good idea. Motion passed unanimously. PIC October 22, 2025 Meeting Minutes, DRAFT. Page 6 Glendening offered to chair the Environmental and Sustainability Committee. Burton said that it would be good for Glendening to chair the Environmental and Sustainability Committee for now and then see if a newly elected councilor wanted to take over. PUBLIC COMMENT AM asked Safety Committee to advocate for the city to install a 4-way stop sign at the top of Welch Street. Rees said that the process should begin by consulting the city traffic engineer. AM asked about a live cam on Welch Street to watch the ferry line. Somers said that the long history of that item ended with city push back and the decision not to pursue. Somers made a motion to adjourn. Proulx seconded. Motion passed unanimously. ANNOUNCEMENTS/UPDATES Next PIC Meeting: Wednesday, November 19, 2025, at 6:15 pm in the community room and on Zoom. Meeting Adjournment: 8:13 p.m. PIC October 22, 2025 Meeting Minutes, DRAFT. Page 7