Special town meeting set to vote on disbanding Brownville police department

BROWNVILLE — Following the vote made at last month’s annual town meeting to defund the department, a special town meeting asking if residents will disband the Brownville Police Department and discontinue town police services has been scheduled for Monday, May 1 at 7 p.m. at Brownville Elementary.

The warrant will also feature an article that if approved will authorize the selectmen to dispose of all police equipment and vehicles — the department has a fleet of three — that are now no longer being used.

“It wasn’t a vote to get rid of, it was a vote to defund it,” Town Manager Kathy White said during an April 20 selectmen’s meeting.

At the March town meeting citizens — by a vote of 131 to 43 — voted to defund the Brownville Police Department and instead rely on the existing coverage from the Piscataquis County Sheriff’s Office for the region as of April 1. The proposed sum of $167,620 was amended to $35,767, enough to operate the department for the first three months of the year.

“In order for us to de-establish anything we have to have an article and warrant that reflects that,” Select Chair Dolly Perkins said, saying the annual town meeting only featured a budgetary article on the police department.

“That’s why we want the question, we asked and this is what the majority of people decided,” she said about the March vote to defund.

Brownville officials had previously said that the police department cannot be reactivated with no money earmarked for these operations. Any new police funds would need to be raised through a vote of residents — no financial articles appear on the May 1 warrant.

White said as that evening she was still consulting with legal counsel on the language for the special town meeting warrant, which was then ready and signed by the select members the next day in order to be posted by the required seven days in advance of the May 1 session.

The Brownville Police Department had been located in the town office on Route 11, and the equipment is being stored at the building with the three vehicles parked outside by the adjacent public works facility. Non-emergency calls to the town office — which handles inquiries for the various community departments — are now being directed to the sheriff’s office and 9-1-1 calls are going to the county agency.

The April 20 selectmen’s meeting featured an executive session at the end of the agenda. White said this pertains to a discussion on the contract for former Police Chief Seth Burnes, who the town manager had said requested that the agreement be honored. Burnes was hired at an annual salary of $55,000.

On Feb. 17, Chief Nicholas Clukey resigned after nearly a decade in the position. When asked at the time, White said she could not speak on Clukey’s reasons for stepping down due to the move being a personnel matter.

Burnes was appointed as interim chief several days later to serve until he could be officially hired as chief. Burnes joined the department in July 2013 as a reserve officer and he was promoted to sergeant in April 2016.

Observer photo/Stuart Hedstrom
MAY 1 SPECIAL TOWN MEETING ON THE POLICE DEPARTMENT — A special town meeting will be held on Monday, May 1 at 7 p.m. at the Brownville Elementary School. Attendees will be asked to disband the town police department as well as authorize the selectmen to dispose of department equipment such as the fleet of three vehicles parked by the public works facility.