By Emma Bouthillette 

Staff Writer

While a majority of Kennebunk voters agreed preserving open space and revitalizing the downtown, several non-binding referendum questions on the Nov. 4 ballot suggest they are divided on how much ought to be spent.

Roughly 84 percent of voters agree it is important to preserve the health and vitality of downtown Kennebunk, and 73 percent support plans developed for revitalization.  

Out of 6,540 voters, 27.5 percent said the town should not spend money on revitalization, while 72.5 percent agreed with town expenditures between $1.5 and $4.5 million with popularity shrinking in proportion to the price tag. According to the referendum questions, depending on the amount the town dedicates to downtown enhancement, taxes are estimated to increase between $23 and $71 yearly on an average $285,000 property valuation.

Town Manager Barry Tibbetts said the town hired Market Decisions owner Curt Mildner to aid in writing the referendum questions and analyzing the final results. Mildner declined to comment on the non-binding referendum before he presented the findings to the town Nov. 25. 

Downtown Implementation Committee Chairman Bob Georgitis said the committee hopes to find alternatives to spending taxpayer dollars. 

“We don’t know what the cost of the project will be and there have been no definitive decisions made,” Georgitis said. “We are going on community resources and plans so far. I’m hoping we can craft a program so we don’t have to use taxpayers money.” 

While the committee will need support from taxpayers to further current plans, Georgitis said he is hoping with current economic times the federal government will create new programs to fund downtown enhancement. With the enhancement of downtown Kennebunk, local business should also profit from improvements, he said. 

Open Space Planning

More than half of voters agreed it is important to preserve land for parks, recreation or conservation and 71 percent of voters supported using town funds with matching funds to preserve town land, but were also divided on how much the town should spend to do so. 

While 26.9 percent of 6,298 voters responded to referendum question six did not support town expenditure, 73.1 percent voted to spend between $50,000 and $200,000 annually for purchasing land. Assistant Town Planner Caroline Segalla said the next step will be deciding how much money is appropriate to spend on purchasing land to preserve.  Segalla said the 64.4 percent of 6,461 voters who support issuing bonds is also an encouraging result. 

“These results reinforced the results from the quantitative research survey from September 2007. It is consistently showing residents are willing, but the funding mechanism has never been defined,” Segalla said. 

Preserving land for parks, recreation or conservation has become a nationwide trend, Segalla said. She cited election results complied by the Trust for Public Land that stated voters nation-wide approved 88 measures, totaling nearly $8.4 billion in new public funding for land conservation.

“There is strong support nationwide, even with the economic times,” Segalla said. 

Selectmen Presentation

A brief presentation of the survey and analysis of the results is scheduled during the Nov. 25 selectmen meeting. Mildner will present his findings, and the selectmen have invited members of the Open Space Plan Implementation and Downtown Implementation committees.