And Tuesday night’s select board meeting.

Shaun Farrar

Sep 18, 2025

The Bar Harbor Story is generously sponsored by Swan Agency Real Estate.

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TRENTON—This Saturday, September 20, will be the Trenton Volunteer Fire Department’s last pancake breakfast of the year.

During the Trenton Select Board meeting on Tuesday, September 16, Fire Chief Steve Heckman dispensed this important nugget of information as he gave the fire department update and encouraged people to attend the last breakfast which occurs from 6 – 10 a.m.

Heckman will not be able to be at the breakfast because he will be attending a fire service leadership class in Brunswick.

The fire department also started its training season this past Monday night by traveling around to newer facilities in the town to establish some familiarity with the sites in case there is a fire at any of the locations.

Fire department personnel visited Acadia Timber Cottages which will be four-season rental cottages and is located on Route 3.

Trenton’s two solar farms were also visited by firefighters on Monday night. The layout of these solar fields, the electrical aspects, and the remoteness of the sites all present challenges to potentially fighting a fire at one of the solar farms.

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SELECT BOARD BUSINESS

General Assistance Appendices

The select board held a public hearing with no public comment and then discussed and unanimously approved the town’s general assistance appendices that will be effective from October 1, 2025, through September 30, 2026.

Snare Creek Farms Recreational Cannabis Sales

Tuesday night’s meeting was the third select board meeting in a row where no representative from Snare Creek Farms attended, so the select board decided to remove it from the agenda until someone from the company makes contact and asks to be put back on the agenda.

Maine Municipal Association Annual Meeting

Select Board Chair Fred Erhlenbach asked if anyone wanted to attend the Maine Municipal Association’s (MMA) annual meeting. Select board member Judith Sproule said that she looked at the proposed agenda for the meeting and she did not see that any of the subject matter being presented was of interest to her.

None of the other select board members wanted to attend and Erhlenbach said that for as long as he has been on the select board, no select board member has ever attended an MMA annual meeting.

Help Wanted

The person who does some light maintenance for the town, such as shoveling snow and sanding the walkways at the town office and some mowing at the entrance to the industrial park, is getting done at the end of October and the town is looking for someone to replace him.

Town Finances

Erhlenbach said that the annual audit for town finances started and on Thursday of last week, he came in and did his annual interview of town business. The preliminary numbers show that the town has an unassigned balance of $1,418,000 as of June 30, 2025. Erhlenbach also reminded the board that the town encumbered approximately $300,000 for the current budget, so the real unassigned fund balance is closer to $1,100,000.

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