Maine municipalities are invited to pick a local person, project or group to receive a 2019 Spirit of America Foundation Tribute for outstanding community service, and to honor the recipient at your annual town meeting or during National Volunteer Month in April.  There is no fee, and over 160 Maine municipalities chose a Spirit of America award winner this past year.  For more info, visit website www.spiroaft.com/gems and the “Contact Us” page on that site.

Municipalities with town meetings should know that the new senior tax lien foreclosure law may require a “patch” for the warrant article that many towns use to authorize the sale of tax-acquired properties. Maine Municipal Association’s Legal Services Department has issued written guidance to help our members with this process.

Maine Municipal Association is seeking candidates to serve as a participating member on our Property & Casualty Board of Directors. A vacancy was created with the recent retirement announcement by Thomas Goulette, town manager in Guilford. With his planned retirement, Goulette is also stepping down from the P&C board.

Each year, the Maine Municipal Association publishes a “Year in Review” document, which outlines our achievements, challenges and responses from the preceding year, and explores ways that we will address upcoming opportunities and concerns. The publication is mailed to members and is made available throughout the year in a variety of ways.

The Maine Revives Civility project has scheduled three “listening sessions,” which are designed to engage citizens and community leaders in how to develop productive governing dialogue. The sessions will be held, on Feb. 26-27, in: Dover-Foxcroft, Bangor and Ellsworth.

Maine Municipal Association will hold, support and organize 90 training events throughout the state in 2019, including new offerings on Civic Engagement, Workplace Safety, Regulating Short-Term Vacation Rentals – and more. The entire 2019 training calendar is out, a combination of MMA events and those sponsored by professional affiliate groups with which we work. The training sites span the state, from Fort Kent to Saco.

The state Department of Agriculture, Conservation & Forestry has released the form to be used in its first ever animal-control reporting survey. The goal is to calculate how many animal-control calls are responded to annually. It is important that municipal animal control officers or clerks complete and return this form, keeping in mind that police and sheriff’s departments also respond to calls about animals.

Dec. 13 is the effective date of LD 1539, “An Act to Amend Maine’s Medical Marijuana Law.” This means that, starting today, all new registered caregiver retail stores, dispensaries, testing facilities, and manufacturing facilities are prohibited from operating in any municipality until that municipality’s legislative body has voted to “opt-in” to their operation.  See MMA Legal Services' updated Medical Marijuana Information Packet to learn more about this and other changes to the statute.

The State of Maine and its State Economist have released the new LD 1 worksheet, setting the personal income growth factor at 2.77 percent.

Maine Municipal Association’s Legal Services Department has produced an article on complying with LD 1629, the new state law that changes property-lien and tax-collection procedures involving senior citizens who own properties. Legal Services also added a new supplement to its Guide to Municipal Liens manual.