By Emma Bouthillette 

Staff Writer

At the Kennebunk Selectmen meeting Tuesday, Selectman Bob Higgins was expected to read a letter to the board and submit a letter from his attorney in regard to his removal from four committees in the wake of alleged comments he made to the fire and rescue personnel who responded to a brush fire at his residence on Woodside Drive. The selectmen’s meeting took place after The Post went to press. 

Speaking Tuesday morning, Higgins said his comments to fire personnel after the brush fire was extinguished were taken out of context. Higgins said he was talking with Deputy Chief David Cluff about the upcoming practice burn on Intervale Road. Higgins said Cluff offered him the chance to put on firefighting gear and see what it is like to enter a burning building, and Higgins said he replied, “With my luck I’d pass out and need CPR.”

Other accounts of the conversation differed, including a letter from firefighter John Audley to Town Manager Barry Tibbets. Audley paraphrased what Higgins said: “Actually I would not want any of you guys to touch me. I would want one of the girls to do CPR on me, like the one out front.”

“Taken aback by the sexist, chauvinistic and salacious comment, I could only respond (and again I paraphrase) ‘That is my wife you are talking about and I’m not sure I am comfortable with that comment,’” Audley said in the letter. 

Higgins said he felt the situation transpired differently than Audley’s account.

“After the crew finished cleaning up, we were standing around, bunch of guys joking. I was laughing and cracking a joke when I said ‘I’d just assume a woman would do it [resuscitate using CPR],” Higgins said. “I never saw Talia [Audley]. I didn’t point at her.” 

Higgins said these alleged comments have taken on a life of its own and become a political issue.

Selectmen Dan Boothby made a motion at the July 8 to reconsider the vote on committee members that in essentially removed Higgins from the cemetery committee, video committee, community garden committee and the York County budget committee. Boothby declined to comment on his decision to reconsider the vote. 

“I not only feel blindsided by what was taking place, but this board was acting not so much like a judge and jury, but to me more like a kangaroo court. The actions of this board in looking to satisfy the concerns of fire personnel on some comments I made at a brush fire at my residence have now become completely political in nature and represent little more than character assassination,” Higgins wrote in his letter to be read to the board, which he provided to The Post before hand.

Higgins’ attorney, Alan Nelson, said in a letter dated Aug. 8 his client’s removal from the committees was in violation of the town’s charter. 

Before Tuesday’s meeting, Chairman Wayne Berry declined to comment about whether the vote was a violation of the Charter without having the Charter in front of him or without reading Nelson’s letter.

Higgins said he thinks he is being singled out because he has previously alleged misuse of ambulances, having seen the town vehicles at restaurants and drive-thru’s making dinner runs.

 He also said he thinks if he was a regular resident this would not have been taken as seriously.

“I look at it as I’m a selectman when there is selectmen work to do,” Higgins said. 

Berry said Higgins has been subject to scrutiny once before for allegedly calling a staff member of the Parks and Recreation Department a “gal Friday.”

“He’s expected to act in a manner with better reception toward the public. He is just not getting it. He’s expected to act differently as a selectmen than residents do as residents,” Berry said.